New Visions

2017 both flew and dragged by. At times it seemed like it would never end and other times it seemed I could barely keep up with all the goings on. The fall was particularly challenging as Hope struggled with everything and I was on business travel 5 days a week for several weeks on end. By the time the holidays rolled around I was finishing up a huge project for work, trying to get a jump on some 2018 projects, and jump through all of the requisite holiday hoops.

I barely got the Christmas cookies baked. I never got our holiday video done (Grammy commented that she was looking forward to seeing it. Yeah, well, so was I).

I did manage to overhaul my eating habits in the middle of the holidays and up my exercise which resulted in some much needed pound shedding before the new year.

Mostly, as the year wound down, I focused on me and Hope. It was clear after the rough fall months that my steady presence was critical for Hope’s emotional health. My daughter was under my left butt cheek for a solid two weeks. She was affectionate. She was communicative. She was less anxious, less depressed and as close to stable as I’d seen her in months.

And we leaned into all of that. It was one of the best holiday seasons we’ve had since the creation of our little family.

We capped off 2017 with a decadent dinner downtown. We dressed up. Hope fretted about how fancy everything was. Our server was amazing at just helping Hope to soak up all the special of the night. It was magical right on through dessert!

On New Year’s Day, I began working on my vision board. I failed to create one for 2017, which might be why sometimes I seemed goal-less in some areas of my life. I decided to get back to this particular tradition in 2018, so I fired up Powerpoint and thought about what I wanted for 2017.

Thinking about what you want for a year of your life is cool but challenging. I try to really zero in on me–this is my vision board. I am cautious not put things I want for Hope on it, this is really about me and me alone.

After a few hours of pondering I came up with several major areas: adventure, freedom, creativity, health and companionship. All of this rests on a year of possibilities. I found images conveying all of this and put them on my slide. Then, I saved it as a picture.

Since I’d decided that this year’s theme would be the year of possibilities, I set about to get Hope to join me in doing her first vision board. I sent her mine as a model. She thought it was cool, but just didn’t know where to start.

Admittedly, I nagged her and told her how I came up with mine and how she could just do the same.

Will I ever learn that Hope and I are *not* wired the same?

Bless her heart, she sent me a bulleted list of some goals for the year rather than a vision board.

I sat down to read it and nearly cried.

My Hope is maturing in ways that weren’t clear to me. I knew she had recently confided that she was a bit overwhelmed by the future–prepping for college and adulthood. I wasn’t prepared to see a list that tackled all of that head on. Hope’s list was the most cogent, mature thing I’d ever seen her produce; it was specific, it was optimistic, it was forward thinking. It was everything that every parent wants to see their kid lay out for themselves for the year ahead.

I desperately wanted to post it as is everywhere, since that who “sharenting” thing is real, but I only shared the list with a few close relatives who would really appreciate how awesome Hope’s goals for herself really were.

I gotta say that I also felt like…I must’ve done some stuff right on this journey for her to get here. We have so much farther to go, but man, that list was like a winning lotto ticket.

I took Hope’s list and reinterpreted it in pictures for a vision board. I sent her a couple of drafts to see if the images I chose were in line with what she had on her list. I made a couple of gentle recommendations on a few additions which she greatly appreciated. Within a day or so her board was finished and I saved her board as a picture just like mine.

Vision boards are useless if you’re not going to post them as a reminder to yourself throughout the year. I typically post mine in several places–my bedroom, bathroom and maybe a small version in my office. Sometimes as my screensaver.

I sent Hope her vision board picture and then I sent both of our boards to Costco for printing in multiple sizes. I framed one for each of us to put in our rooms. Hope really seemed to dig having this visualization of her goals for the year. So did I.

Fuzzy to protect our privacy!

I’m hopeful that this is a practice that I can instill in her to do every year. I know for me, even if I don’t do everything that’s on it, I make progress towards getting it done. Redoing my bedroom was on my 2016 board; it didn’t get done until the end of 2017 but gosh do I LOVE my new bedroom. I got there…eventually.

I am excited about the possibilities and adventures that are in store for me and Hope this year. I’m also glad that we have some guideposts in place for us to measure our individual progress.

It’s going to be a great year.