Back to It

The opening paragraphs of last week’s All Stitched Up! saw us exploring the idea of making sure we don’t always let the seemingly urgent come before the important as we resolved to approach the year before us a little differently. After penning those words, we realised that ‘life’ had indeed gotten in the way of some of the things we once made a priority.

One of those priorities was setting aside the time to read the words of others as we looked for thoughts, ideas and inspiration as to how they approach the life before them. Much of this we’d then share with you through this very newsletter. It turns out we had a folder of emails from such people we’d not gotten around to reading and we realised just how much we were missing them!

Our resolve? Get reading! And that we have.

So, over the next few weeks we’ll continue reading and then share some of the bits and pieces we find along the way.

We hope you’ll find them as informative and inspirational as we did.

David Hieatt’s opening email of 2022 asked a simple question, ‘What do you want to learn this year?’ He was curious to know what we most wanted to learn about during the year before us. After reading his email, we were curious to know what we most wanted to learn about as well, as it wasn’t something we’d previously considered!

Although we’re yet to resolve what that will be, his question has given us something to ponder. We often think about what we will do or achieve in the 365 days before us, but rarely, if ever, do we deliberately set out to learn something new. We wonder what we’ll come up with?!

The title of Hannah Brencher’s first email this year was ‘Vegetables’, which piqued our curiosity instantly! Hannah then went on to unpack the idea that while she usually chooses a word for the year that is ‘weighty, theological and cerebral’ – such as home, rebuild, vision, prepared – she joked with friends as they passed around a plate of green beans and butternut squash on New Year’s Eve that her word for 2022 would be vegetables.

After giving it some more thought, Hannah settled on the word as she realised for the first time that ‘every new year doesn’t have to be a reset of your entire life, it can simply be a new beginning or a shift in a different direction.’ And so, for Hannah, this will be a year of more trips to the farmers’ market, home-cooked meals and challenging recipes.

We love that both David and Hannah encouraged us to think about the ‘not quite so new’ year before us in a different way than we had in previous years. Here’s to learning something new and simple shifts in different directions…