Weekly Inspiration: Happy New Year!

This week's inspiration is appropriately focused on the new year that begins tomorrow. I love the start of a new year, bringing with it a fresh start and hope for a better future.

Here are a few links to help inspire you to have YOUR best year yet - yes, even while chronically ill:

First up, my kind and compassionate friend Toni's article from 2013 that is still very relevant, My New Year's Wishes for the Chronically Ill, published on Psychology Today. Toni's wonderful list of wishes for us, her colleagues in chronic illness, is inspiring in itself, and it can also serve as a guideline to bring more peace, joy, and compassion into your life this coming year. Toni is the author of three wonderful books, any one of which can provide ample inspiration for the new year: How to Be Sick, How to Wake Up, and  How to Live Well with Chronic Pain and Illness (links are to my reviews).

One of my favorite sources of inspiration all year round, TED Talks, brings us a unique list: 10 TED-Ed Lessons to Inspire Your New Year's Resolutions. Whether you want to cut back on sugar, learn a new language, or be kind to the environment, this list offers 10 inspiring short videos to get you started!

And if some of those resolutions about learning new things seem out of reach for you because you are housebound, then check out my article from the ProHealth website on Keep Learning - Even from Bed! with dozens of links to awesome online resources for classes, how-to videos, virtual museum tours, and more. Maybe one of your goals for the new year will be to visit a different museum each month online, without leaving your bed, or learning to knit or taking an online class in a subject you're interested in.

Finally, I have written here on my own blog and for ProHealth often about setting goals when you are chronically ill. You may not be able to train for a 5k or plan a trip overseas or some other "typical" resolution, but you can still set goals to help you improve your life and increase joy in every day. This Throwback Thursday post on Setting Goals for the Chronically Ill has links to take you step-by-step through a simple process for setting - and achieving - measureable objectives, even if you are bedridden. I'll be following those steps in the next few days to set my objectives and targets for 2018.

And if one of your goals for 2018 is to improve your health, then take a look at this blog post on Effective Treatments for ME/CFS - this is a summary of the treatments that have most helped my son and I over the past 15 years. You may have been told there are no treatments for ME/CFS, but that's  not true. It's just that most doctors don't know how to treat it, but it IS treatable. With the treatments summarized in that post, both my son and I have improved dramatically over the years, and we both live fairly normal lives now - still limited by our disease certainly but full, active lives.

Happy New Year! Here's to a healthy and happy new year for us all (I'm toasting you with my herbal tea!)