5 easy ideas to start the New Year off right!

The New Year is upon us. Whether you’re gathering up with family or friends, or staying at home with your family or alone, I have these ideas ready for you to start the New Year off right. Sometimes thinking about writing down resolutions gets boring and stressing even, right? Well, these 5 ideas are different, and I’m excited to get to them!

1. 52 week envelope challenge
I’m really eager to try this idea along with my husband this year. You need 52 envelopes, 1 for each week of the year, and you need to label them starting with $1, and all the way to $52. Each week you’ll grab the envelope that you feel comfortable adding that amount of money in it. You can start with the $1 envelope, or whichever you can afford to save that week. Once the year is over you would have saved $1378!

If you’d like to save twice as much, grab two envelopes each week. Reuse them after you’re done with the 52 envelopes and you’d have saved $2756.
Adapt this challenge to your currency of use. You could also skip the envelopes and download a free printable to the 52 week savings challenge.

2. Play the 30-Day Minimalism Game
Living a minimalist life is honestly hard. Doing this 30-day minimalism game helps you achieve a ton! The Minimalists came up with this challenge. We’ve done it twice at home. Joshua and Ryan, the minimalists, laid out this idea which helps you get rid of 465 items! On the first day you get rid of one thing, on the second day two things, and so on. As The Minimalists say: anything goes!
You can donate, trash or sell the items. The first couple days are easy, but as the month goes, it gets harder. Stay in track! I’ll be sharing my journey on my Instagram stories.

3. Set reasonable goals
Shor term goals are much more manageable. If you’re thinking about a long term goal you’d like to achieve, break it down into smaller goals that would ultimately help you achieve that bigger goal of yours. Setting goals that we know that we’re most likely to achieve them gives us a different mindset. For instance, I’d like to stay more organized this year, so I’ll start with our house, and aspects of my life that I can actually control. I’m getting a planner this year!

4. Create routines
It doesn’t matter if it’s something small that you do for yourself, or for someone else. Setting up a routine helps us achieve goals, as well. For daily routines they can be as simple as trying to achieve a movement goal, a certain amount of steps (if you have a tracker), clean your kitchen every night, and so on. These routines can be divided into health, mind, family, friendship, personal development, and anything else you can come up with. Focus first on routines you actually need, and then routines you want.

5. Drink more water
Self care is so important. Here I am telling you about it and ignoring a lot of the times my needs. Well, drinking water is the most basic form of self care. Water delivers oxygen throughout our bodies, and it boosts skin health. Our digestive system depends on it, and water helps our bodies flush waste! Here you’ll find a great article where you can read 15 benefits of staying well hydrated.
I have an app on my phone that sends me reminders to drink water every hour, and you can also track how much water you’ve drunk during a day. Click HERE to check out the app I use. It’s really easy to set up, and you can even access it on your smart watch.

Starting a new year sometimes can be overwhelming. Seeing everyone else with their list of goals and resolutions laid out can be intimidating. Following one or all of my ideas this year can give you a great start to new beginnings. Most importantly, keep in mind that you don’t need to start on January 1st! Take as many days as you need so that you start off right.

What else would you add to these 5 ideas? Share in comments!

Happy New Year!

♡ Michelle | con limón, please

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