Strange as it may sound, New Year on 1st January is not the only New Year that we follow in India. Many of us have a new year in April which is the official start of the Lunar Calendar that all Hindus follow, while some of us mark the New year in October after the summer harvest which is what many of the business community follow. But whatever it is, tradition demands that on the last day of the year, one does a recap of all that has happened in the year. A time to count all one’s blessings, a time to reflect on what went wrong, a time to remember all that happened right and a time to set out the trajectory for the new year.

So like every year, 2023 started with the good intentions of

1. Blogging more regularly - I posted 28 posts in the year. I wrote 26.1k words. I had 35 likes and 16 comments and I have only 24 subscribers. This is a dismal report card and if I were scoring myself, I’d give myself E for Effort.
2. Losing weight – Once again this was a losing battle with disastrous results, I actually gained a pound or two which is par for the course – two pounds every year. If I don’t put a stop to this, I will soon burst.
3. Reading more books – I can’t remember exactly how many books I read because after January, I stopped keeping count of which books I’d read in that month. I can also hardly remember the stories or the content of the books I read. So again this gets a miserable rating of a C
4. Meeting friends I hadn’t met for the past several years- This is one intention of mine that I did manage to succeed in partly because I joined a WhatsApp group where I discovered many friends from my childhood. I also made a special effort to reach out to a friend and am happy that we did reconnect. So for this I would give myself a B.
5. Begin painting again -It’s been five years since I bought myself an adult painting book and sadly I haven’t gone beyond two paintings this year. At the rate I’m going, I will probably be still painting for the next ten years! So once again I score a D for disappointing.
6. Getting back to the piano and playing Hanon’s exercises every day – This didn’t even get off the ground and remains an idea in my head.
7. Bending down and touching my head to my knees – well my Yoga practice was consistently inconsistent and even though my head doesn’t reach my knees, my head is bending lower. I also managed to do some stretches that have brought relief to my aching limbs so even though I am not very regular, I have improved in my flexibility so I can give myself a B.
8. Walking every single day – Once again, my performance was better than 2022 because even though I didn’t walk every single day, I did manage to improve my step count and it is higher than what it was last year.

Well, actually the list can go on and on and on because almost every year, I resolve to become a better version of what I was the year before but sadly it never happens.

But it isn’t all a rabbit hole. There were lots of positives too

1. Managed to see more of the world – Actually this has been the best year ever for me as regards travel. I began the year with a trip to Bhuj. Towards the end of the year, I visited New York and then Egypt. All these trips were memorable and have restored my confidence in travelling whether solo or in a group.
2. Began the process of decluttering – CoVid taught me that many things in my life were unnecessary and I promised to declutter my life. But it was only in 2023 that I consciously began cleaning up. Many of my clothes that were kept in the hope that I would fit into them, were finally given away to other people.
3. Consciously keeping account of money spent – For years I used to spend money and note down very cryptically amounts and items. This actually was meaningless because at the end of the month I had no idea of what the figures represented and what the ‘items’ were. So finally I developed a system whereby I would send a WhatsApp message to Hubby Dear giving a run down of the expenses I had incurred that day. This also helped me control my ‘impulse’ purchases and also helped cut down unnecessary trips to the bazar.

So all in all, I can look back with a sense of satisfaction and hope that things will definitely be good in 2024.

Ciao,