Photo: Christie & Rosemerry shortly before the pandemic began. (Yes, that is one of Rosemerry’s poems on Christie’s tights.)

For creatives, the new year is a chance to look back on what we’ve accomplished and how we’ve grown in the past year, and also a chance to dream about our creative endeavors in the future. In this episode, Christie and Rosemerry have a conversation about how to do your own “year end report,” how a magic wand might help you identify your goals, and how two questions from Motivational Interviewing can help you verbalize why your goals are important to you. We talk about bonfires--both literal and metaphorical, a few of our own goals, some of our skepticism around goals, and our mottos and themes for moving forward. 

Motivational Interviewing

A story Christie wrote about how to make New Year’s resolutions

Christie’s 2021 New Year’s resolution

Christie’s Instagram and Rosemerry’s

A little new years goal advice from our episode 28 guest, Holiday Mathis. “Do not set targets for results that are beyond your control. Keep asking yourself what can be done to help this along. Set targets for what you can produce, actions you can take, miles you can move.”

_____

Bonfire in the Heart

by Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer

I throw in any tallies

I’ve been keeping,

the ones that record

who did what and when.

I throw in all the letters

I wrote in my head but didn’t send.

I throw in tickets I didn’t buy

to places I didn’t visit.

I throw in all those expectations

I had for myself and the world last year

and countless lists of things I thought I should do.

I love watching them ignite,

turn into embers, to ash.

I love the space they leave behind

where anything can happen.

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit emergingform.substack.com/subscribe