1. Apple pie oatmeal, one part oats and one part pie. Asiago bagels. Clementines. Roasted vegetables. Breakfast burritos.

2. A chance to reflect and contemplate. I spent some time yesterday morning working my way through the prompts I shared with you. I got really clear about what I wanted the next year to feel like, where I wanted to focus my energy, effort, and time. I also realized there was one pretty big thing I need to let go, and even though it’s going to be really hard it’s clearly right, can feel in my gut that it’s true.

3. A whole new year. I know that you could see it like a moment in time that doesn’t have any inherent special meaning, but I choose to see it as a moment in which I can pause and then begin again.

4. Eric taking the dogs running when it’s too cold to walk. I haven’t been running in a long time, so I can’t go with them. Usually we share the walking, but I haven’t been able to go in the morning for the past week because of the weather. I’m so grateful that Eric is strong enough, kind enough to do it for me. I think he’d probably want me to tell you he likes it — but even for a guy who is in good shape and likes it, every morning for a whole week in the super cold when you usually don’t is rough.

5. Self-Compassion Saturday: the eBook. I’m so happy to finally have it done, to be able to offer it. And I’ve gotten such good feedback. Turns out, even though it was a whole year after the project ended, New Year’s Day was the perfect day to give it away.

Bonus Joy: laughing with Eric, afternoon walks, teaching yoga, reading, new calendars, blank notebooks, texting with my brother, a movie and lunch with a friend, a writing date with another, a fresh start.

1. Getting to see the sun rise. This is good in the smaller sense of being up early enough to see it, how beautiful it is, but also in the larger sense of how lucky I am to be alive for another day, to be here with eyes that can see.

2. Sweet Sam. He turned five this week. We don’t really know when he was born, only when he was found roaming a tiny town in Wyoming with his brother. No one claimed him so he was sent to Fort Collins. We saw an ad his foster mom posted on Craigslist and picked him, adopted and brought him home. When he lost his first baby tooth, we counted back 16 weeks and gave him his birthday. He is so patient and sweet, but also so strong.

3. The end of Fall semester. Today is the last day of classes and next week is finals week. Even though I’m not teaching, there’s still a particular energy on campus this time of year — a mix of relief, exhaustion, and joy. People are giddy with the almost being done, the promise of a break.

4. All the cool stuff we see on our walks. Just the normal stuff — the trees and the river and the sky — is amazing, but then we get the added bonus of things like deer, wild turkeys, beaver, and the occasional fox or owl.

5. Christmas music. Not all of it. For example I had a doctor’s appointment last week and some of the stuff they were playing was awful. But there’s other Christmas music that’s so good I could listen to it all year, like Daniela Andrade‘s Christmas EP.

Bonus joy: the way you can call anyone at anytime if you have a cellphone with you, mashed potatoes the way Eric makes them, long hugs in the kitchen, cuddling with Sam, how cute Ringo is when he’s asleep or couching, good news when you’ve been worried and waiting.