Well, 2012, it’s been real. The world didn’t end, the sky didn’t fall, you touched our soul, broke our hearts, opened us to all kinds of love and joy and loss and growth we’d never imagined even probable.

So where do we go from here?

What are we looking for?

Resolutions are a tired subject when it comes to the transition from one year into another. Cleaning our slate, reading more books, losing X amount of weight, drinking 16oz of green juice each day. Not to say these aren’t fantastic goals (especially the last one!), but whenever we talk about resolutions, there is something big missing.

Resolution talk is stale. We don’t need another article on ‘Your To-Do List In The New Year,’ and I don’t intend to write one. Because the ideas and supposed-tos of what our resolutions will look like stick to the walls of our brain and sit there until they start to calcify, harden, become so objective that if we are so disciplined as to actually keep the commitment, we start to forget why we even started. We go through motions to check them off our to-do lists. And if we let up, “slip” up one day, then where do we go? The notion of “getting back on track” lasts year-round. After every holiday, every vacation, every stressful day, we say to ourselves: Tomorrow I will get back on track.

We lose sight and we fall so deep that we don’t know what the track even is. We make the same vows over and over.  We make our resolutions superficially, instead of taking cues from the feeling we yearn for in our hearts.

What if we change the way we view those faux-pas? What if they are actually PART of our track?

This is the first year I am not resolving to get down to a certain number on the scale. Or read a certain number of novels. It’s the first year I’m not quantifying anything, actually. I don’t care if I read 5 new books, drink 3 green juices per day, hold a headstand for 60 seconds in the middle of the room. Really, I don’t. Because every time I’ve quantified my goals, one of two things has happened: I’ve missed my mark, or I’ve hit my goal and forgotten why it was so important on my glorified to-do list in the first place.

So what am I resolving as we Break Out of 2012 and Break Into 2013?

I am resolving to check myself when I feel I am not being fully self-expressed. I resolve to check myself when I am emulating instead of being my own success story.

I am resolving to notice my reactions when family arguments arise and take a step back and try to understand – not agree, but understand. Because family is the only constant we have in our lives, and even if we don’t agree or get the validation we so crave, they’re still the only ones who have snapshots of our past lodged in their minds. We get so frustrated when they’re not our friends. But they’re not meant to do double duty. If they do, that’s awesome. But they’re meant to be our roots and our constant. Life is so transitory, these are the characters in our story that will be there forever. That kind of permanence is so very rare.

I am resolving to take care of myself from the inside out. I am resolving to notice how I feel in my body and act accordingly. When we work from the inside, the outside takes care of itself. Always.

I am resolving to honor my path and “track,” and sit in my disappointments and bummed out moments and the voices in my head that mimic, that taunt and make enemies of friends. If we have everything we need inside of us, then that means what rattles and chills us to the core is what we need, too. I resolve to view myself as whole and worthwhile when I slip and fall and bruise my soul. The process of searching for the scrapes, stitching ourselves up and healing is a big part of the “track.”

The green juice will be sipped, the body will transform, the books will be read. But it will be because of the relationships we’ve come to revere, the process we’ve dived into, the feeling we’ll have when we are actively moving forward.

What are your resolutions? How are you Breaking Out of 2012? Leave a comment below, start a conversation, make a friend, inspire one another.

I am resolving to learn, love, serve, feel, break, build, act, and Be – instead of exist checking off a to-do list.