If you have been reading my blog posts for some time, you will not be surprised to see this entry! I have a tradition of writing a back to school based blog post every year. If you look back at the past year’s entries, I bet you would notice a lot of the same words and information. I don’t look back myself, as I like to feel I am giving this year’s fresh perspective, even though many of these thoughts are thoroughly ingrained in me and come out year after year.
This year, as always, the spirit of back to school hit me at about the third week of August while buying school supplies for my kiddos. I always recommend buying yourself some new school supplies as we move into the fall. It just plain makes it more fun, and being the huge fan of the fresh start that I am, I believe fresh supplies, especially blank notebooks, are so full of possibility, it just adds to the excitement. This year I found a really cool Moleskin notebook with a format that allows me to organize my daily schedule and projects.
At this time of year I like to start fresh, like a new school year. I first look at where I have been in the last year. What were my hopes and dreams? How far have I come in realizing them? How many of them are still important? What do I want to keep and drop? What new things do I want to add to the list?
I review my life in these categories:
health
financial
social
community
family
business
spiritual
and the biggie for me at back to school time- the mental/intellectual area of your life.
In that mental area, I spend a lot of time, thought, and energy. This time of year is PERFECT for that, we are actually programmed from an early age to be looking forward to learning new things at this time of year.
So I want to challenge you to really delve into this area this year.
What have you been wanting to learn or deepen your learning about, but haven’t done it yet?
What new thing(s) would you like to try?
What challenges would you like to set out for yourself? (trying something different every day is a good one, and really expands your thinking AND gives you plenty to talk about in social situations. :))
What books do you have around your home that you have been wanting to read, but have not? What books have impacted you greatly in the past that you would like to re-read and deepen your study of? Look around and begin to create your curriculum. YES! You get to create your own curriculum now!
What is the theme of your learning- is it in one area, or different areas? I like to set out a theme for each month of the year and read books around that area to immerse myself that month. Examples that I use are financial/prosperity month, health and fitness month, coaching month (to further deepen my expertise), yoga month, love month, parenting, creativity month, fashion month, writing month, etc- whatever areas I am itching to deepen my understanding and education of. I can also set up field trips, meet with people, and watch films, etc to add to my school experience- makes it so much fun!!
My back to school learning is taking a real twist this year as I have enrolled in a 9 month yoga teacher training that begins next week. I have seen what magic a regular yoga practice has brought into my life over the past couple of years. I am so excited to take my depth of understanding to new levels throughout this training through reading, practicing, listening, watching and being of service. I am not sure what will unfold, but I am in the full wonder of what it will be and how it will seep into and compliment everything else I am already doing in my life. I am excited about how my spirituality is about to soar once again to a whole new level. I am open to the learning and possibilities this journey will offer.
Get yourself inspired to learn some new things in the next year and use the perfect energy of this time of year to give you momentum. Take some time to think about the questions above, write out your answers and make your plan- maybe you’ll put it in your new notebook!