Happy New Year!

One of the great things about my place of employment is the access to discounts for restaurants, movies and museums. New Year's Eve, my mom and I decided to take advantage of this perk and use it to visit Portland's Japanese Garden. One of Portland's many gems, the garden is the sort of place I always forget until chance takes me on a drive past its gates. Luckily, I was recently reminded of its presence as I was taking a stroll through Portland's Rose Gardens, which are conveniently located across the street.

Its design influenced by Shinto, Buddhist and Taoist philosophies, the Japanese gardens are restful and tranquil - the perfect sort of place to contemplate the passing of the old and the coming of the new. As we walked, talked, and sometimes just listened to the sound of the birds and running water, I found myself thinking about things I would like to accomplish this year. A friend of mine insists that being my fabulous self will set a lot of things right. While I do plan to embrace this plan, I have a few more specific things that I would like to accomplish in 2007, Year of Fabulousness:


1. Make time to meditate, pray, write, create something (it's all one, really) every day.

2. Make time to move every day (starting with 3x a week is okay)

3. Begin my "Going Places" photo project (a photo to represent something significant for each month of the year + extra photos for special occasions that will go into the 2007 album)

4. Embrace what life has to offer, "Don't die with your music still in you", Just Say Yes (a Jenvention, TM Jen, Inc.), etc.

5. Fight back, fun Martina! Let go, get over myself and just have FUN.

6. Treat myself just as well as I treat other people, because I am far meaner to myself than I would ever even think of being to anyone else.

7. Try something new at least once a month. (In light of this, I declare January Blogstravaganza month wherein I will attempt to post a day for 31 days.)

8. Figure out what I want to be when I grow up

There you have it. As with everything, these goals may be tweaked after more thought (some are, after all, pretty vague), but here they are as they apply today.

So, if you are still reading after all that, here is your pay off. You are my favorite. Really, you always were. Those other people who started reading and didn't finish, well, just between you and me, they should be banned or at least shunned. Let me tell you, if I were Amish, there'd be some shunning going on. But you, you're different. I could never shun you. You stayed, so I say to you: Happy New Year! May it be filled with all the abundance, happiness and love that your heart can carry!