Season’s Greetings: A Letter to You

Two Christmas with gold wrapping and red ribbons on a table with a Christmas tree with lights in the background and the words "Season's Greetings".
~ Julie de Rohan, eatonomy®

You’ll notice things are a little different on the blog this month. The usual features are being replaced with a series of festive-themed posts to help you through the holiday season.

And before the festivities really begin to ramp up, why not stop and take a breather?

Think about how the past 12 months have been for you and consider what you want next year.

You could carve out some time to sit down and write a letter to yourself to open on New Year’s Day (ideally on the nicest writing paper you can find).

In the letter, you might want to:

  • Acknowledge your struggles, fears and anxieties.
  • Recognise your positive qualities and strengths.
  • Express your hopes for yourself for the year to come.
  • Identify what you want less and more of in your life.
  • Offer yourself words of support and encouragement.

When you write, make sure you speak to yourself in the way you would someone you truly care about. If you feel resistance or discomfort, you’re doing something right – keep going.

Just taking the time to write your letter is an act of self-care.

Enjoy it.

Enjoy taking a break from everything to focus on yourself.

Enjoy connecting to your thoughts and feelings and committing them to paper.

Enjoy showing yourself you care.

When you’ve finished, put your letter in an envelope and write your name on it. Underneath, write the words “to be opened on January 1st”.

Consider it a lovely gift to give yourself on New Year’s Day.

(Don’t worry about forgetting to open it – I’ll be sure to remind you when the time comes 😊).

🌷🌷🌷

“We will open the book. Its pages are blank.
We are going to put words on them ourselves.
The book is called Opportunity and its first chapter is New Year’s Day.”

– Edith Lovejoy Pierce

©️ Julie de Rohan 2019.

 

Published by Julie de Rohan, eatonomy®

A binge eating disorder specialist therapist helping people struggling with compulsive eating, emotional eating and binge eating.

24 thoughts on “Season’s Greetings: A Letter to You”

    1. A fountain pen! I love it. I’m also going to write myself a letter – the bonus is that at my age I doubt I’ll remember what I wrote so it’ll be a nice surprise on New Year’s Day! Hope you enjoy writing your letter, Karen.

      Liked by 1 person

  4. This is a beautiful idea. Self care has to come first. It’s a learned behavior to speak to yourself with love but it is so worth it. It does take some practice to remind ourselves that we need to love ourselves. That isn’t something that many of us were ever taught.

    Liked by 1 person

    1. That’s so true, Mary – we’re not generally taught to be loving and compassionate with ourselves. As you say, though, it can be learned – it just takes some practice. Many thanks for sharing your thoughts, good to hear from you.

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  5. Pingback: Season’s Greetings: A Letter to You — Julie de Rohan – Keep it alive

  7. Such a lovely idea! I do something a little similar. I created a gratitude jar a few years back. At the end of each day, I take a small piece of paper and jot down what I am grateful for and place it in the jar. I also save receipts from times I’ve gone to dinner and date and write don the person with whom I had dinner with. I also save little things like a flower bud, or leaf, all of which goes into the jar. At the end of the year, I then open it, and it’s a little time capsule of all the things that I am grateful to that got me through the year. It’s my own little gifting to myself. LOL!

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    1. I love a gratitude jar. What I particularly love is that you’ve obviously made this an integral part of your life. Often we start things but don’t keep them going. This sounds like something you’ve embedded into your day and, therefore, it gives such a benefit to your wellbeing. Thank you for sharing your experience, Beckie, it’s lovely to hear.

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      1. I didn’t realize how truly wonderful it worked out the first year I did it. The holidays are a hard time for me, but that actually smoothed the rough edges down and I ended up enjoying the holidays for the first time in over 7 years, starting last year.
        That little gift of gratitude goes a long way.

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  8. This is a really good idea. It’s easy to get swept along with time and the ‘stuff’ we need to do in the run-up to Christmas. A breather and a chance to reflect would be perfectly timed right about now. Looking forward to the festive themed content! Who knows, maybe it’ll make me a little less Grinchy 😂
    Caz xx

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    1. Bah humbug! I can’t believe you’re Grinchy, Caz. It’s not often we set aside time for ourselves in the run-up to Christmas. I thought this might be a good way of taking stock of the year and reflecting on what we want for ourselves in 2020 – something to make us connect to ourselves at what is usually a frantically busy time. Many thanks for your comment, Caz.

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  11. Thank you for sharing!.. I do the same thing myself.. I usually refer to it as “letting my fingers do the walking (writing/typing) and my heart do the talking”… sometimes in the form of poetry which I often refer to as “thoughts that rhyme”… 🙂

    Until we meet again..
    May your wishes come true
    Your spirit know only peace
    Your heart know only love and
    Your life’s journey know only happiness
    (Larry “Dutch” Woller)

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