New Year’s Day

Entering A New Year

Now that we’ve passed the official reset point experienced at 12:00 a.m., how do we approach new year’s day? For many, the three words don’t make a difference: it’s just another day in the life of Mark, Sally or David. But it shouldn’t be just another day. New year’s day is about starting the year in the right state of mind: motivation, belief and drive.

Motivation is the fuel that powers your intentions, actions and outcomes. Motivation is a state of mind: it comes and goes and so it needs constant acquirement in order to benefit from it. Utilize motivation to make the first day of the year better than the last: rewrite your goals on a piece of paper and mentally stimulate yourself to achieve them at some point during the year.

But remember that motivation is simply not enough. New year’s day should also be started in a state of belief. The power of belief will set you on the right course moving forward from day one of the new year. What’s motivation without belief? Anyone can be motivated to do something, but if there’s no belief behind the intention, odds are that it won’t get done.

Are you ready to drive the new year forward? Besides motivation and the power of belief, you need drive. Drive is the stamina that propels you forward: it gives you strength to keep pushing when all you want to do is give up. If you don’t have your mindset in drive, then you won’t get very far. Sometimes you may even end up reversing course (no pun intended).

Some of you may agree with everything listed above, but despite that, you still say, “Dr. Sinu, I am so depressed and hopeless, it makes no difference that we’ve entered a new year!” Mental illness is like a virus: it has a great potential to worsen and uncontrollably take over us.

But how do you defeat this virus? You talk to people, take psychiatric medications, meditate, exercise, eat right and stimulate your mind by remaining busy and preoccupied with meaningful and engaging activities. You might not feel the same level of drive on new year’s day as others do, but this doesn’t mean that you aren’t starting the new year off on the right foot.

The intention in your heart is what matters the most. Sometimes the mind is weak and still recovering, but if the blood in your heart is potently alive, then you are in good shape! For those whose minds are weak, you must utilize your heart even more to get things going. The good news is that your heart is more powerful than your mind!

On new year’s day, whether we have a mental illness or not, we must all use our hearts to start off the new year with the right intentions.

Are you Ready? (This is Defeating Stigma Mindfully)