So this is the New Year and I don't feel any different

Can we embark on new creative journeys without that mean old "grindset mindset" tagging along?

Hello, dear Omni!

Happiest Gregorian New Year to you all. If you’re inundated by the same messaging as I am at the start of January, you may be feeling some kind of way about new beginnings. Maybe you feel energized to put pen to paper (or hands to keys/strings). Or maybe, like me, you are feeling a bit overwhelmed. This year, I’ve even become conscious of a fresh new pressure: the one that demands that we do nothing. It insists that we remember that the New Year was never meant to be set in winter, but was once widely recognized to align with the start of spring, when daylight becomes more abundant and we all collectively blink our little eyes open after our long, dark slumber.

But what if you can embrace both an attitude of beginning anew and moving easefully through this beginning? I credit author Rachel Ricketts’s December affirmations post with bridging this effort/rest dichotomy for me. In it, she states “even my efforting can be easeful,” and I’ve kept that energetically folded up and tucked into my breast pocket ever since.

We can choose to remain curious and open to what comes. We can light a candle or take dance-party movement breaks to get the vibe right as we bring new work into the world. Or we can grind our way through the process, shaming ourselves at every turn. It’s up to us, so why not make the act of making progress into a good ol’ time?

I can’t claim to be any kind of executive function expert (I’m procrastinating RIGHT NOW), so I won’t give advice to that effect. That said, I will share a resource that I love, one that is very much in line with this gentle approach to creation I’m espousing this year: the bounty of posts and webinars created by Yumi Sakugawa. The one I’m taking currently is called How to Move Through the Resistance of Completing Your Creative Projects and Expand Your Inner Cosmology of Ideas, and it’s keeping me from beating myself up so much, empowering me to take stock of my emotional landscape and ground myself instead. While this is a paid, prerecorded webinar, there are others available for free, and the beautiful, illustrated posts on Sakugawa’s Instagram account are inspiration enough on their own.

Yumi Sakugawa also happens to be based in Los Angeles, and though her home appears to have been spared by the recent fires, many were not. Here are a few resources to continue to support our creative community in LA:

Guitar Center has grants available through 2/28/25

We Are Moving the Needle (a cool organization to check out, if you haven’t already) has multiple services available for wildfire victims, including studio time

And here’s an interactive mutual aid map

Take care, Omni! We look forward to all you will create in 2025.

Love, Meredith

p.s. Don’t forget to check out this month’s Four Track Challenge and put some of these tips to the test!

We love you, LA! (Photo by Victor Creed on Unsplash)

Recommended Resources

Here are some fun coloring pages to embrace a little play before getting down to business

Call and Response

What are some ways you can infuse your space with joy before delving into your latest project?

Let us know in the comments and be sure to interact with other folks who comment, you never know where you’ll meet your next collaborator!