Resolution: Fulfillment

We are just past the holiday season, and the New Year gives us the emotional permission needed to just relax. After the travel, the baking, the wrapping, the cleanup, and all the many thoughtful things we do for one another during this special time, it’s time for you.

Which brings me to the ubiquitous New Years resolution. Whether you bother to make one, the secret isn’t a dramatic change to your lifestyle mixed with sheer willpower. The secret is to find the thing that you need to be more fulfilled, give yourself permission to do it, and give yourself permission to have days that miss the mark. The good habits you want result when you are otherwise fulfilled.

This is a conversation we often have with families that are acting as the caregivers for their loved ones. If you are a caregiver to others, do not let yourself burn out by putting all your love into their needs. If you do not take care of yourself, you cannot take care of them to the best of your ability. Stay sane, so they can stay safe. A resolution to find ways to be a bigger part of the communities that you love is really a way to give yourself more relaxation and fulfillment. There are times in life that isn’t possible. Children need your help even when they are middle- aged, doctor appointments need to be kept, taxes need to be paid. But you need to attend to yourself, too.

If your resolution is to stay active, even if you slow down a bit, then you have found a secret to success in aging. We often see clients try to push themselves to the extreme, shoveling their driveways or gardening in 90 degree heat well into their 80s. The other extreme is to retire and just stop finding a purpose to do much at all. If you don’t stay active to a degree, you will slowly lose the ability to do so.

If you resolve to see friends and family more, that could be done by setting a monthly dinner with the grandkids that you thought would be pushy to ask for, or a weekly lunch at the senior center that you were nervous about because you’re not that old and really you don’t know many people there. But you will immediately become more involved in the lives of those around, and your life expands because of it. Your meals are warmer literally and emotionally, when surrounded by friends new and old. You immediately have a reason to get up, get dressed, and get to it! It is an opening to be there when the joke is told, or the movie plans are made, and when all the little things that make life enjoyable happen. All the little moments seem so much more important than the fancy Thanksgiving sit down, don’t they? Think about your holidays. Was it the roast on the table and the cloth napkins that made the day special, or sitting around the kitchen helping make the meal and chatting idly? So give yourself permission to find the things that bring you joy, and welcome them into as many of your days as possible, between all those appointments you must keep.

Attorney Halley C. Allaire is principal in the law firm of Allaire Elder Law, a member of the National Academy of Elder Law Attorneys, Inc., with an office at 271 Farmington Avenue, Bristol, (860) 259-1500, or on the web at www.allaireelderlaw.com. If you have a question, send a note to Attorney Halley C. Allaire and your question may be discussed in a future column.