I usually mention that I thrive on “to do” lists. It helps me to stay organized, and I just love being able to cross things off of that list as I go through my day.

I’m not really a New Year’s Resolution type of person. I tend to take stock of each year as I approach my birthday: celebrating the good, wincing over the bad, and choosing what I would like to do more of in my next circuit around the sun. When it comes to resolutions, I leave those for Mondays. I vastly prefer my new week’s resolutions over taking an entire year at one time.

This year, I did realize that one thing needed to be done with the new year. As a teacher, my lesson plan book is the yearly planner that still gets used even in a pandemic. With the advent of the new year, I finally started using some of the “extras” in that planner.

I set a reading goal for myself: one piece of fiction and one piece of non-fiction each month. As an English teacher, I find myself reading more and more history books to teach a fuller context for our reading in class. So, I am playing with that this year. My non-fiction is predominantly history (instead of true crime, I must be growing as a person, haha), but I am finding some of the “strange but true” topics particularly interesting.

I had to set a Monday through Friday schedule that is ironclad. When my days had to change to include breathing treatments that last half an hour at a time, I realized I needed to really spell out the hours and minutes of the day.

And, of course, my writing time. That is built into the ironclad schedule. There are still so many stories to tell, but waiting for a day that I am less busy means that those stories will never be told.

There is never quite as much time as you think. Don’t wait. Do it now.

Blessings to you all.