Emily in France 🇫🇷 A New Year, a New Outlook

I'm not one for New Year's resolutions.

Even in the best of times, I'm not one for New Year's resolutions. Years of battling eating issues (and working in an industry where people actually have Rejection Competitions) quickly taught me that goal-making is an art... and one best approached carefully, particularly for those who, like yours truly, have a tendency to be an eensy bit hard on themselves. To make a sweeping resolution that is out of one's control – to lose 20 pounds, to finally publish an essay in the New York Times – can be to set oneself up for feelings of failure and inadequacy when, despite efforts, the resolution doesn't come to fruition. But even carefully worded resolutions (much like carefully worded magic spells) can have inadvertent unpleasant ramifications.

Consider the resolution: I'm going to eat healthier this year. Great! But what does that mean? OK, so you edit: I'm going to eat more vegetables this year. How many? Fine, I'm going to eat six servings of vegetables per day. Great. It's precise. It's actionable. And... it removes you from the 'why' that led you here. Suddenly, you're gorging yourself on broccoli to make good on your resolution, and then when, one dreary day in February, you opt for a comforting bowl of mac and cheese instead, it feels like you failed. Never mind the fact that skin has cleared up, or you've lost five pounds, or you discovered a newfound love of red cabbage, by February, your "resolution" was a bust.

It's pressure in any year. In 2021, it's a recipe for disaster.

That's why, for years, I've picked, not a resolution, but a word that I want to define my year. One year, it was kindness; another, it was creativity. This year, it's authenticity.

I want to be authentic with people around me, particularly when it comes to saying 'No.' I'm not the only woman – or the only person – who has a hard time with this word, and I'm aiming to use my power of 'No' judiciously to keep from burning out. But I also want to be authentic with my 'whys.' Not that anyone needs an excuse to say no, but I often find that my reasons just don't feel "good enough." So I'm going to ask myself the real reason I need to say "no" – to a Zoom hang because I'm already burned out, to work I don't have the bandwidth for, even to my last coffee pod because I don't have time to go get more – and be honest about it. (Hopefully, this will also make it easier for me to say 'yes!' to things I really want to do!)

I also want to be authentic to myself. I burn out easily and then lose myself in mindless activities (read: YouTube holes), instead of doing time-tested things I know work to help me recharge: reading, going for walks, journaling, learning something new. I'm not resolving to tick a box in any of these categories, but I am going to make a list of things I know make me feel good (and a few habits – watching TV in bed, drinking too much – that don't) so that I have a cheat sheet that will help me be nearer to my most authentic self.

I hope, too, that that authenticity comes through in my writing. One bizarre positive side effect of this pandemic has been that I have more time for fiction, so while my agent diligently seeks a home for book #1 (book #2, to those in the know), I'll be hard at work on book #3!

I hope that some of these not-resolutions inspire you this year, and I hope you're all treating yourself tenderly as we march into 2021.

 

Things I'm Writing

1. French cuisine has seen a major, long-overdue overhaul in the past few years, with small plates seemingly divorced from terroir supplanting the heartier bistro fare of yore. But to hear experts on the ground tell it, things are coming full circle in exciting ways. More for AllRecipes.
  2. While I'm not resolving to learn a new language, I have found joy in brushing up on my Spanish with online resources. And if you're looking to do the same for your French, I rounded up some great tools for Business Insider.

3. Restaurant dining won't be coming back any time soon, so be sure to stock your pantry with winter staples! Here's my list of must-haves for Eat This, Not That.

Things I'm Reading

1. Maya Angelou's poetic memoir I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings finally came off my to-read list – and not a moment too soon. I'm hoping to read even more classics this year: I posted a list of works I'm coveting from Dickens to Woolf on my book-stagram, Emily Reads.

2. There's a mystery afoot in American grocery stores: where has all the bucatini gone? This piece for GrubStreet investigates with a gravitas I'm happy (and frankly, given recent news cycles, wholly relieved) to see used for pasta.

3. New Year's Eve looked different this year – and one New Yorker essayist thinks this should sound the death toll for future expectations for the holiday for the future.

A bientôt !

Emily in France