11 for 2011 Recap

Thank you for the comments on my December recap post – I am really pleased with how parts of my December worked out, especially the movement part.  Resolutions are funny things for me – some of my longest lasting resolutions have been things that I resolved out of the blue, like my Tuesday night yoga promise, which led to a sustained yoga practice (see, meeting a goal without realizing it) which has continued to date, or my sunrise time resolve which turned me, the avowed anti-morning exerciser, to working out at 7am four to six times a week.

So, while I think any day is a good day for resolve and I avoided January 1 type resolutions for a long time, I decided to make resolutions for 2011.  I mulled them over in January and blogged about my 11 for 2011 in February because I found making those resolutions very grounding and wanted an easy place to refer to them, which I did, about every few weeks. 

Before I share more on 2012, it is time to recap 2011:

1. Adopt a meditation practice – 50/50 – I attended several meditation classes in the Spring, and sat for up to 15 minutes at various times throughout the year.  There were weeks I found it natural to practice meditation, but others where no matter how many reminders I wrote down and scheduled reminders I programmed and time I carved out, I could not commit to it.  I wrote a little bit more about this as part of the self-care retreat I co-hosted with Cheryl this summer. 
2. Increase aspects of self-care – when I wrote this, I was thinking about little things – like lotion and makeup and flossing.  In those respects, I would say the outcome was mixed, but 2011 was the first year where I actually worked out consistently an average of 5 to 6 times a week, which is important to self-care as well, so I am deeming this resolution an overall success
3. Be more disciplined about my time – I get more sleep than I did when I wrote this resolution, and I have been able to maximize my time more in terms of fitting in more movement in my life, so I think this was an overall success as well, though of course it still does not come naturally to me.
4. Have more stare-at-the-wall or stare-at-the-sky or stare-at-pretty-flowers time – this was sadly a fail. I can think of a handful of times I did that in 2011 – I supposed I could call that at a success since that was more times than in 2010, but I was hoping for more on that front.  On the other hand, I reconnected with my creative side, which is also a form of restoration, and I also made moving more of a regular practice.
5. Be out and about more and take greater advantage of city living – I am going to call this a success as I had some splendid days out and about, like my birthday, or this week, or that week.
6. Follow professional goals – As is the practice on my blog, I never discuss my work, but I would say this was a success as well.
7. Be more personal in my blogging – based on the feedback I have received from many of you, this has been a success as well.  I have enjoyed sharing more about myself and my life – while in some ways it makes me feel more vulnerable (I have been recognized a couple of times this year from my picture on the blog)  it has been worht it.
8. Declutter and/or fold clothes 10 minutes a day, outside of the existing kitchen declutter/maintenance –  This was 50/50.  Some weeks I definitely met this goal, but right now, well, let’s just say I am staring at a large pile of clean laundry that needs folding.
9. Streamline trying out new recipes – This was a definite success – I have finally broken up with the never-ending Sunday cooking marathons.  While I initially used a book or a couple of blogs as the organizational principal (ie cook from the same book for a month or week) I ended up moving away from that and just generally simplifying in the kitchen.
10. Mind/body – Another success – though the meditation piece was inconsistent, the movement piece far surpassed anything I could have imagined a year ago. 
11. Bake on average once a week & learn to make my own chocolate – this was my fun goal.  I did not bake once a week, particularly the second half of the year, but I made some fun desserts (especially when adopting bloggers) or for recipe testing or a few recipes I created, like this Grain-Free Vegan Chocolate Tart or this Rustic Cranberry Spice Pumpkin Biscotti. There were also many chocolate recipes, though of course, I still need to make something that involve melting cacao butter.

And there it is – 2011 in a nutshell.  The picture above is actually of my 2010 inspiration board, but it is one of my favorites because two years later, so much of what is on the board ended up happening.