Go Team 2026: Three Things

Hey Team,

Welcome to 2026! Look at you, rocking this new year already!

As you probably know, every January I post daily encouragement posts to help all of us (including me!) find our footing in the new year.

These posts aren’t just cheering you on (but I do a fair bit of that!), they are intended as gentle reminders that it is ok to find things challenging and that doing things in your own time and your own speed is a great way to approach new ideas.

And to get us started, here are three important ideas that will be woven through this month of posts:

1) You’re good. Just as you are. You don’t need to be fixed.

I get really squicked out by the whole ‘New Year. New You!’ and ‘Improve Yourself!’ and ‘Become A New Person’ vibe that permeates this time of year.

I know that most people probably don’t take it as literally as I do (Neurodivergent? Me? Whatever do you mean?) but, to me, it feels like those messages are telling people that they aren’t enough, that there is something wrong with them, that they need to be ‘better.’

I don’t love that for us.

So, instead, I would like you to know that you are GREAT as you are.

Sure, there are things in your life, in your approach, or in your day-to-day that are frustrating, tiring, or unsatisfying, and you may want to shift those things to make your life smoother, more fun, or more interesting but those things aren’t YOU.

There is NOTHING wrong with YOU.

You can expand your life and your routines and your capacity in any way you choose.

If those expansions help you feel good or help you feel more satisfied, forge ahead.

But please, please, please, don’t feel that you NEED to do these things to be good enough.

You are already good enough. You are, in fact, great and anything else you do is just adding to your magnificence.*

2) The daily gold stars are for everyone. You have nothing to prove.

You can approach the new year in whatever way works for you and I will award you gold stars for your efforts.

(Yes, I know that many people only expect gold stars for results but my ADHD and I do not approve of that. We have little or no control over our results, and results take a long time. Our efforts though? We have control over those and they are happening right now. So I like to award gold stars for our efforts – big and small – so we can feel encouraged to keep moving towards the things we want for ourselves.)

If you find the ‘clean slate’ feeling encouraging and helpful, then go right ahead with your goals and plans and activities. Gold stars for you!

If you find all of that a bit overwhelming and you want to move slowly into the new year, the meander along at your own pace. Gold stars for you!

If you are just carrying on with what already works? Gold stars for you!

If you are waiting to figure things out? Gold stars for you!

Gold stars are for effort of any size or shape.

Even the teeniest effort counts AND your effort doesn’t have to look like anyone else’s.

3) You don’t have to have everything figured out to get started.

I know, some people have their plans for the year all set out and they are ready to dive right in on their schedule right away.

Others have just a vague idea of some things they might want to do this year but the details are sketchy at best. **

And many of us fall somewhere in between those two.

But here’s the thing, you can move towards the future you want either way.

If you have a plan, do the next step in your plan.

If you are just working from a vague idea, then you can do anything and it will help you wrap your mind around your goal.

For example, if you want to get stronger but you don’t know exactly what that means for you yet, then do one leg lift or one arm circle. Sure, it won’t make you instantly stronger but it is a step in that direction and it gives you a little bit of momentum.

Or if you want to have a meditation practice, you can take one long, slow, breath and focus carefully while you do. It won’t give you instant inner peace but it’s not going to do you any harm and it will probably feel pretty good. And, again, you’ll have done SOMETHING that moves you closer to where you want to go.

And really, even the most detailed plan is just doing the same thing – it’s ok to figure things out day by day.

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So, Team, there are three key elements to get you started and here is your first gold star.

Please remember that you get a gold star for your efforts no matter what those efforts look like today.

You may have jumped out of bed for a workout, you may have decided to spend a little extra time breathing slowly over your tea this morning, or you may do anything in between or beyond – any of those efforts are about taking good care of yourself and they earn you this gold star.

Go Team Us!

Please be kind to yourself out there.

*For any readers (like me) who have to immediately react to comments like this with a “You don’t know who is reading this! They may not be great!” or with a bunch of thoughts about why this doesn’t apply to them, consider these two things

1) Great doesn’t mean perfect. When I say that my readers are great, I mean that they have lots of great things about them and that they are fundamentally good people doing the best they can with the resources they have. I firmly believe that most people are pretty damn great but they just don’t realize it.

2)If you think that my comment about *YOU* being great doesn’t really apply then maybe you can consider the possibility that it *might* apply instead of trying to tell yourself that it is a fact. Maybe approach it like this: “What if Christine was right and I am doing better than I realize? How would I do things differently if that was the case?”

** This is where my ‘Planuary’ approach to the year can come in handy.