Sitting in my comfy chair on New Year’s Eve, I reflected on the year 2015. I found this entry from a year ago on my “blog”:

<No, I have not made any New Year resolutions for 2015. It is too demoralising when I break them half way through January. However, I have accepted my Tai Chi instructor’s “100 day Challenge”. I have to do the Chi Kung (Standing Meditation) daily for ten minutes daily for one hundred days – starting back at “one” if I miss a day. To that I have added the “8 Treasures” exercises (Qi Gong). Doing these exercises outside makes a great way to start the day. The trick is to go outside BEFORE breakfast – if I leave exercising any later I always find an excuse to postpone it! I am also continuing with my walking, although I think the “10,000 steps daily” that I set myself is over ambitious. According to my “Fitbit”, 2,320 steps is one mile and I can walk 3 miles in an hour which gives me 6,960 steps – nearly 7000. Daylight hours in winter are limited to about eight – so do I really want to walk for another hour?>

Did I make the 100 days? Yes: I continued to try for the two hundred day challenge but somehow got lost along the way. Why DO we do this to ourselves? Exercise makes us feel good – so why don’t we do it every day? I blame the short winter days. The minute it grows dark I go onto ‘hibernation’ mode. My ‘fitbit’ records are evidence that I no longer walk the distances that I achieved in the summer. But all is not lost! Tomorrow is another day, as the saying goes, so I can just start again.

Meanwhile I have been reading one of the books I received for Christmas.  “the life-changing magic of tidying” by Marie Kondo. She is a very wordy writer, with so many repetitions of the same concept that I nearly gave up on the book. Then I had the bright idea of ‘googling’ her ‘Konmari method’. Pictures say so much more than just words. Two days ago I heaped every garment, hat, belt, pair of shoes and handbag that I own onto my bedroom floor.

Wow! Today I struggled down to the charity shop laden with four bags of items that no longer give me joy – much of it stuffed into my capacious shopping trolley. Marie’s philosophy is to handle each item in turn and ask the question, “Does this item give me joy?” No, of course my clothes do not generate strong emotions in me – they are just clothes. However if you pick up a garment, feel it and think about it you will know if it gives you joy or if it is time to part with it. Why on earth did I hang on to two scruffy black sweat tops for so long? And half a dozen belts which I never wear? And that jacket which is too small?

I felt positively light- hearted after depositing my load at the charity shop, ready to finish reading Marie’s book and then to tackle books, papers and photos. A happy New Year and best wishes for 2016 to you all!!

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