Here we are beautiful butterflies at the beginning of a brand new year. It's a blank slate.

I tend to be a worrywart and so at the beginning of each year I worry about what kind of challenges

are around the corner. Mostly I worry about my kids and my grandkids. For example, are they going to

be safe? Are they going to be healthy? Are they going to be

fulfilled in their life? Are they going to be at peace? I don't have any control over any of those things.

So where I struggle with anxiety is over how I am going to manage my own feelings if things take a turn

for the worst for any of them. The ones that I

love the most, I don't like watching them suffer. So at least part of me tends to wallow in this

kind of thinking at the beginning of every year. I always wonder, I wonder what my family will have

suffered by the end of this year. I know it's kind of morbid, but part of me does that,

okay? And I guess I've just kind of accepted that that part of me is going to always go there at the

beginning of every new year. However, there is another part of me that is very excited about what I hope

I can become this year. And that's the part of me that looks at what I can control and what I can make choices about.

Like, what can I do to take care of my health, what I eat, what I do to get exercise, how I spend my time,

what I choose to read, what I choose to watch, what I choose to listen to, what I choose to

focus on, who I choose to hang around. I have all of these choices in front of me, and then I feel

motivated and powerful when I see, you know, that I do have choices and I do have control over

some things and that I can control

somewhat who I'm going to become during this next year. I think sometimes we can think about things

that we would like to see happen in our lives and there's a part of us that says, I can't. I can't

stop eating those chips and cheese. I have a part that says that all the time.

I can't stop arguing with my kids. I can't read that book. I can't go to that class. I can't listen to that podcast.

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