Ok, so this post is a little late, but its still January so we’ll call it still the beginning of the New Year. 2014 ended in such a blur, that it took me too long to get to this. The only thing I remember about Christmas, is thinking “well, thank goodness that’s over.” Ok, life happens, we get it.

But life shouldn’t just happen. Life shouldn’t be something tolerated or survived. I don’t meet my final day and think “thank goodness that is over,”

So I am quitting my never-ending-to-do list for other people. I’m stopping volunteering for extra work because I worry about what people will think if I don’t step up. I’m no longer taking on extra work because I think that sometime, somehow, somewhere, this will benefit my career in the end. Guess what: it won’t, it hasn’t, and no one cares but me.

So, my year of saying no is beginning where I take stock of what I want and what I need, and all the things that don’t matter. Just as you need to discard items — clothing, toys, cars, — to make room for new ones; I need to discard some activities to make room for ones I want.

No to volunteering for extra committees at school. Yes to writing more. No to taking on extra student tutoring. Yes to seeing my friends more. Yes to spending more time with kids. No to slogging through miles on the run to check off the training list. Yes to enjoying a beautiful run in a new park. No to driving further than needed for dance lessons because I worry what the dance teacher would think if I switched to a studio closer to the house.

NO to existing. NO to surviving. YES to living.

Happy NO Year, my friends.