The goal of The Parenting Passageway is to support parents in creating vibrant and compassionate developmental parenting and educational practices.  I have spent a lot of time this winter break recently dreaming and planning some ways to get this message out in a larger and bigger way, not only through the Internet, but through public speaking and conferences, and yes, the ebooks I keep promising myself I will write!

But with the New Year upon us, I was thinking about  how we can begin with ourselves. The reason for this is simple:  if we set the tone in our family, if we are the authors of our family life, the guides for our children, then there must be a way to set a foundation of being vibrant for our children.

These are the five steps I have been dreaming of this week, and I wanted to share them with you:

1. Forgiveness – of others and of ourselves.  I wrote about this process  in this post
2. If you need to, do the inner work around feeling worthy and deserving of all the good things to come.  I find some  of us struggle with these areas and secretly feel we aren’t very worthy and are just happy when things go well by sheer luck. I think this is where prayer or another spiritual practice really can help.
3. Design your year with your intentions in mind – what are your hopes, dreams, goals? Make a vision board, use a word to encompass your year, draw a picture/circle in the round to represent the months, write a mission statement.  Putting our sometimes secret hopes and wishes out there can be scary or intimidating, and yet, I think when we do, they are more likely to happen simply because we focus on them and we are more likely to consider how to make this come true.  If you schedule the time and your focus, then good things will happen.
4. Think about the why’s and how’s behind your intentions.  How will the things you want really come to fruition?  Also, is there a bigger why behind the intentions for the year – how will it help you serve your purpose in your family and the world?  
5. Set aside time for a self care/daily routine to focus on your intentions and create your own vibrant self-care  for your physical body every day as this is the foundation for family life and the things you want to create in your life.  I like many of the methods mentioned in this book and it is free on KindleUnlimited

It is going to be a terrific year!  I would love to hear the things you want to come true this year!

Blessings and love,

Carrie