Don't hate on New Year resolutions! They serve a purpose

I spent New Years Eve into 2010 by myself. I spent midnight at the movies, watching the movie Avatar. I had no friends. Being Brazilian, NYE has always had a special significance for me. It's usually a magical time when you spend the night among loved ones, you practice superstitions to bring love, prosperity and peace in the new year, and you usually kiss someone at midnight. spending it by myself watching Avatar was not my idea of a New years eve!

I remember sitting in that movie theater thinking "How did i get here?" I had moved to the Chicago area two years prior for work, and I didn't know anyone. I made a couple of friends at work, but they had both moved away within my first 2 years there. So I was back to 0 friends. I had tried making friends with my kids' friends' parents but couldn't find much in common, or other parents interested in making friends with me. My kids were spending new years at their dad's that year. I had no social options for new years. Or at leas none that felt like what I wanted or what I thought I should have.

This is where the resolution came in. When I was watching Avatar alone at midnight, I decided that I was going to make an effort to put myself out there and make friends. This was an uncomfortable resolution. At the time, I was at a high weight, I was working hard, and living the difficult life of a divorced mother of 2 that had her kids the majority of the time. I didn't have much free time to socialize, and I was always tired from work. But something inside me refused to accept the status quo of "all work and no friends".

I hear a lot about how "resolutions don't work"... but this is a story of a time when that resolution DID work. I joined meetup.com and joined a few social groups of the area where I lived. I made the effort to attend social events when my kids' schedule permitted. Some of them were awkward. I didn't make friends immediately, but I kept trying.

One Thursday evening, the kids were at my ex's and I had no plans for the evening. I was browsing meetup to see if there was anything happening that evening, and the only thing I could find was a French conversation group. It's crazy to me now, but at the time, I had no interest in picking my French back up. I knew French from when I had lived in Montreal as a teenager, and I had taken courses at Aliance Francaise prior to that. But life had taken me in a direction away from my love for languages. It was motherhood, divorce, work, and survival mode.... I can write another blog post about that: how in my 20s I was surviving and not necessarily thriving.

But now, I was ready to thrive, and I decided to go to that French conversation group even though I wasn't all that interested in speaking French again. I went because it was the only thing I could find to do with my Thursday evening that would get me out of the house and support my efforts to make new friends in 2010.

I'm so grateful to that Fernanda who overcame her discomfort and put herself out there. Attending the group at a local Panera, I met someone who would later become one of my closest friends.

Soon the other people in the group started showing up, and felt welcomed into a warm group of friendly people who were happy I was there. We talked in French and I remembered how fun it was to decode another language. I remembered how fun it was to meet people from other backgrounds and to learn their stories. In that group, there were people from Poland, Morocco, Nigeria, Kenya, India, and Laos. They were all speaking French for one reason or another. To some, French was their first language. Others were learning and actively practicing.

I came home that evening feeling optimistic, that maybe this group was where I would make good friends outside of work. The 2nd time I went was near my birthday, and the group had such a nice and friendly dynamic that one of the members decided to host a house party for everyone. I was able to go, and it happened that the party happened the day of my birthday. someone brought a cake and we even sang happy birthday to me at that house party. It was so nice! I hadn't known them very long but I felt like they were my people.

I kept attending on a weekly basis. After a while I would even bring my kids with me on the weeks when they were with me on Thursdays, and they'd have dinner and do their homework there while I was having conversations in French with that interesting and diverse group of people. French group became a priority for me.

After that first house party, each member of the group started hosting. I hosted at my house too! One of our group members was a DJ on the side, and our house parties would include dancing! Soon we'd do things outside of the Thursday evening conversation. Some of the young women that I became friends with enjoyed 80s and 90s cover bands, so we'd go to those concerts and dance.

One young woman in particular and I bonded over our love for Jane Austen novels and movie adaptations. We started going to the movies together. I went on to have movie and dinner friend dates with her and with another older Polish lady from the French group. This group was my new found family, and I was so incredibly grateful to have them in my life and to be able to call them my friends.

There are more positive things that happened in my life as a result of my finding this group of friends, but I'll save those for another story! This was a story of how a new years resolution actually worked, and completely changed my life for the better. 2010 was a good year for me. I met this wonderful group of people and nurtured Friendships with them. Those friends set me on a path to thriving instead of surviving, and eventually one of them would get me into salsa dancing, which was another life-changing choice.

So this is my encouragement to you: there is a place for New Year resolutions. Don't listen to the nay-sayers. A resolution is a resolve to do something different. If you put your mind to whatever you're resolving to do, you'll do it!

To be continued on the next blog post....

(no AI was used in the writing of this blog post)

Me and my new friends from French group at a cover band concert a few months later