what worked for me in 2022

Winter is for reflecting, and I like to give myself all of January to reflect back on the year that’s been. I missed sharing my list last year here on the blog, but I enjoyed reviewing the 2020 list to see what things are still working, what I might need a little push to get back to, and what things worked for that season but won’t for this one.

I’m not holding myself to 100 this time, so here is a random list of things that worked for me in 2022:

1. Living seasonally. Working for me now more than ever.
2. Walks everyday. I set a loose goal to walk the number of miles in the year. I didn’t hit the goal, but even though I’ve always loved (and needed) walks outside, I made sure to take even short ones in 2022, and my mental health was much better for it.
3. Sourdough ritual. I have mastered (IMHO) a sourdough ritual that is the best tasting while also being the laziest possible method. Is it weird that I want someone to put that in my obituary? 🙂
4. Water first thing. This one was actually on my 2020 list. I tend to have a difficult time sticking to things, but this one micro-habit has become the first thing I do after getting out of bed every morning. Even if the day goes haywire from there, I like the intention of starting my day off by caring for my body.
5. Listening more / or at least just not feeling the need to talk. I’m consistently working on being a better listener, but I’m not sure if I actually got any better at listening in 2022 or if I just gained greater discernment about when it’s better to keep my mouth shut. 
6. Morning movement. Most days, I do some mobility/yoga/stretching stuff right when I get out of bed. I mostly move intuitively, and these days, I notice it by about 3pm on days that I skip it.
7. Block scheduling. I am not one of those people that can set a by-the-minute schedule for myself and then stick to it. But I’ve discovered since returning to the office in July 2021 that I do well with splitting my days up into blocks like back in college days. Certain blocks are for house stuff, others for work, other blocks for movement, etc. Blocks are more flexible, which means that I’m more likely to stick to them.
8. Far less booze. I really enjoy craft beer. I really enjoy my husband. And I really enjoy craft beer with my husband on our porch or backyard or by the fire or at a favorite brewery. However, the more we learn about the effects of alcohol, especially on the brain, I don’t find it as enjoyable as I used to. I drink far less than I used to and make sure that, if I do choose to drink, it’s because I mindfully decide that it will in some way add to the present moment, not distract from it. Plus, I’m having tons of fun experimenting with fun mocktails!
9. Family TV/movie nights. We are in a really sweet spot of family life, and honestly, at this stage of things, I’d rather hang out with my kids than most adults I know. We’ve watched a ton of shows that we loved as a family this year, and I love the inside jokes and conversations that have come out of it.
10. Black Mountain. We fall in love with Black Mountain in 2000 on a mountain biking trip in college. We’ve been going several times a year ever since. We got crazy lucky in 2020 and bought a place (that you can rent!). So last year, we went down there more times than ever. Grant and I wondered if some of our love for the place might wear off, but the four of us only seem to love it more every time we go.
11. Yin yoga. One of my most necessary spiritual practices.
12. Audiobooks. I have never been able to focus long enough for audiobooks, which is weird to me because I love podcasts. But I heard Glennon Doyle say on something last year that reading a book is like distilling the author’s knowledge, experience, and hard work into your own brain (or something like that). For whatever reason, that made me realize that I would rather spend my listening time (which is a lot because I love long walks and as a way of making house chores go faster) reading an actual book versus listening to an interview that doesn’t require nearly as much preparation and forethought. I still love podcasts, but 2022 was the year I finally got into audiobooks too.
13. Working from home. I just really love being at home, and I’m starting to embrace that instead of apologizing for it.
14. Grant doing Costco. We don’t really grocery shop – we use our CSA in the growing season, buy local meat in bulk via a co-op or direct from the farmer, use Market Wagon outside of the growing season, and then fill in with Costco as needed. Grant took over Costco runs in 2022. He uses an actual list instead of my method of just wandering around and seeing what looks good, which means we spend and waste far less. Another reason to find each other’s strengths and capitalize on them!
15. Running again. I started running again thanks to the heart rate method, and even though I’m still going really slow, I love the triple bottom line of making running a part of my weeks.
16. Picking a stop time before bed and mostly sticking to it. Grant and I need lots of sleep, and for years, we have said that our bedtime is 10pm. But awhile ago, we noticed that that tripped us up sometimes because we really need to be in bed at 10pm, not going to back to the bedroom at 10 and then brushing teeth, showering, and any other bedroom activities (ha!). So we realized that we need to stop what we’re doing around 9:30 so that we can be cozied up and ready to fall asleep by 10. I realize this is very common sense to most people, but I guess it took us until our early 40s to actually stick to it.
17. Less plans/more spontaneity with gathering. I love to plan. I’m the planner in pretty much every friend group I’ve ever been a part of. But over the past few years, as our evening schedules have gotten fuller, we’ve been finding that we need more rest and less structure than before. So I try to make less plans and give ourselves the option of reaching out to friends at the last minute if we feel up for socializing. This means that we socialize less because, on the occasions when we do wind up with a free night that we want to have people over, said people probably already have plans. But also, sometimes they don’t, and our get together feels more spontaneous and less stressful. Or more often, we end up with a free night just the four of us at home, which is dreamy. I’m sure this is a season-of-life thing, but I’m enjoying it.
18. Less day-to-day news; more longform reads. At the beginning of 2022, I was totally immersed in the news – too much so. Some of the stuff going on personally likely contributed to me using scrolling as an escape, but I put up some better boundaries in the second half of the year. I tried to stay off the merry-go-round of Twitter hot takes and instead use longer form journalism to keep up, which is by its nature, slower and less reactive. It was better for my mental health, but I also feel more informed about some of the bigger trends and more impactful stories that I was probably missing because they aren’t as click-baity.
19. Dumping the scale. I think I actually stopped using the scale in at least 2019, but I actually dumped the thing in 2022 and even asked my doctors not to weigh me, which felt a like my own teeny way of protesting diet culture (read Virginia Sole-Smith on this and everything). 
20. Planning meals-ish. Both kids are in travel sports, so our evenings are very puzzle-like. I have a very loose meal planning formula that I’ve used for years, but this year, I actually planned out our meals on Sundays because eating as a family as much as possible is very important to me. It goes against my nature a bit because I like to be more spontaneous and make what sounds good, but, for this season at least, setting a plan on Sunday nights has made it easier for us to plan family dinner around the kids’ schedules.
21. Leggings with pockets. Because I got back into running this year, for awhile I was running with my phone in my hand, but loved to run with my one pair of leggings that had pockets for my phone. So I just bought some more leggings with pockets instead of forcing myself to wear what I had. I save the non-pocket leggings for gym days. What a concept.
22. Scribd. I subscribed to Scribd during my Seminary of the Wild certification because several books were recommended but only certain chapters, so I didn’t want to necessarily buy all of the books. But I found myself getting enough use out of it that I have stuck with it. I got a deal where it’s only $5 a month, so I don’t know that I’d pay more than that, but I definitely get my $5 a month out of it. This is also mostly how I listen to audiobooks.
23. Game nights. We still love our games, especially when we’re in Black Mountain. Recent faves: introducing the kids to Wits and Wagers (they are OBsessed), Cover Your Kingdom (but start with Cover Your A$$ets if you haven’t yet!), and getting back into Blokus. 
24. Rosewater on my desk. I usually keep rose water in the fridge, which, admittedly, feels decadent but I bought a replacement bottle of this and Grant put it on my desk for me. It somehow stayed there, and now I love it because I find myself giving myself a little spritz throughout the day. It’s especially helpful on those long days full of Zoom meetings and in the winter when my skin dries out faster anyway. I need things to be obvious and in front of me in order for me to actually use them, which is why I also keep a half dome roller and some yoga balls on my desk.
25. Soft pants. I complimented a fellow yoga teacher at the studio on her pants before class one day, and she said, “I’m all the way done with constricting myself these days.” Umm, can I tell you that I’ve thought about that comment at least twice a week pretty much all year?! So I got rid of a bunch of pants that made me feel constricted. I’m HSP, so it doesn’t take much, and instead of beating myself up about that, I just got rid of the stupid hard pants and bought new soft pants (or sitting down pants, as I learned they’re called, which I love!). 
26. A short morning prayer of your own. After reading Andreas Weber’s Matter and Desire a few years ago, I started a new prayer first thing in the morning, while I’m still in bed trying to talk myself into getting out of it. It’s simply this: Thank you for this fresh, new day; help me be alive to it. Weber talks beautifully about aliveness, but the prayer is just my own. I highly recommend some kind of first thing in the morning ritual that maybe would only make sense to you – and takes approximately six seconds.

I would love to know what worked for you in 2022, so I can steal your ideas (or at least test them out on myself!). If you want to read my list of what didn’t work for me in 2022, it’ll go out next week to newsletter subscribers, so make sure you’re subscribed!