My 20 for 2020

I really like new year traditions. I love champagne and fireworks. I love looking back over all that the old year encompasses. I love how the new year encourages us to look ahead, set a goal, and meet it (or sometimes forget all about it or intentionally abandon it along the way if it no longer serves us).

In the past couple of years I’ve tried to pick no more than 3 simple intentions, (I like calling them intentions rather than resolutions) and doing all I can to stay true to them.

In 2019 my 3 intentions were:

1) Be a Reader — a success if I do say so myself

2) Be a Saunterer— with our little kids I didn’t visit and saunter in as many state parks as I would have enjoyed but I did get into the habit (sometimes forced habit due to no naps) of walking in local parks and all over our neighborhood at least a handful of times each week.

3) Be a Napper — an epic, epic fail. I honestly, no matter how tired I am, have a really hard time falling asleep to nap… unless I’m the passenger riding shotgun in the car. Ohhhh! So that’s where my kids get it!

For 2020, my intentions are:

1) Be a Racer-– I commit to registering for, training for, and (re)running those “races I’ve always wanted to run.”

5K- Runway 5K CLT Airport (October)

8K- Team Summit Foundation Leprechaun Loop (March)

10K- Cooper River Bridge Run (April)

1/2 Marathon- Rock N Roll Half Marathon in Savannah (November)

2) Be a Meditator— I’ve read about the benefits of a meditation practice over and over. Even a short 10 minutes a day can be beneficial. I commit to a short daily practice.

3) Be a Grateful Early Riser— It’s clear in this stage of life I’m not going to sleep in… ever. So, I commit to embrace it. Stop complaining about being woken up. Love on my kiddos in the early AM. Develop a rewarding morning routine that’s good for us and for me.

3 intentions is probably more than I can actually successfully tackle in a year, and I don’t want to add more to my mind, schedule, or plate. But I still like the idea of setting up smaller, more-focused, detailed goals of things I want to accomplish and commit to in 2020.

Enter Gretchen Rubens 20 in 2020

Without further ado and in order to create accountability for myself, here are my 20 in 2020:

1. Stay committed to a consistent yoga practice
2. Learn to foam roll
3. Read, read, read– not gonna set a book goal
4. Update via Instagram and blog each month on what I’ve been reading
5. Finish our family recipe book
6. Enjoy using up all my face masks
7. Visit the dermatologist for base-line skin check
8. Arm exercises
9. Write letters
10. Re-de clutter our house
11. Clean out and deep clean inside of our cars
12. Make a podcast
13. Create a rotating picture wall in living room
14. Weekly walk
15. Watch one documentary a month
16. Plant our garden 2.0
17. Calculate our FI number/year and make some higher savings plans
18. Research and try out some cheap travel & credit card travel hacks
19. Visit family
20. Tackle one house project every quarter

As I’ve apparently inadvertently taught my 2-year-old to say, “let’s do this!”, 2020!