How to Lift Your Spirits After the Holidays

I’ve really enjoyed my holidays this year. It was fun to relax with family, eat good food and watch new movies.  But now it’s back to cold, dark days and work. I love my job, but even I struggled with going back this year.

So how can we keep ourselves motivated now that the ‘fun’ part of winter is over? Here’s a list on how to have a good time while getting back to the grind.

Party More – A friend of mine recently told me that her New Year’s resolution was to say yes to more cocktail party invites. Isn’t that brilliant? Sometimes we get caught up thinking we’re too busy to go to something, or nervous that we won’t know anyone there. In reality every new person you meet is a new opportunity. So get out there more for 2016!

Treat Yourself – The January sales are upon us so why not treat yourself to a little retail therapy. Look around for a good bargain and go for it. I know most people are trying to cut back after Christmas, but even if you just treat yourself to something small the benefits are great. It’s important to take care of yourself and a good sale doesn’t last forever!

Plan A Vacation – I know I give this advice a lot, but it’s really just so much fun. On a cold, wet, winter’s day there’s no better morale booster than to imagine yourself drinking cocktails on a beach. I normally go on vacation in November, but it doesn’t hurt to plan early!

Create A Vision Board – Each New Year I create a new vision board. It’s a fun tradition that I really look forward to doing. A vision board is a collection of photos, words and ideas that you’d like to see more of in your future.

Last year I put a vision board together and included a picture of a woman writing out thank you notes. I just wanted a lot of things to be thankful for. And wouldn’t you know it — I was that woman in the photo! I filled out tons and tons of thank you notes for people who helped me with my Listful Thinking book launch!

This year I’m going to do a digital vision board because I don’t have a good place to hang my paper board in my new apartment. DreamItAlive.com is a great place to start.

What are some of your tactics for getting over the winter blues?

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My new book about lists, Listful Thinking: Using Lists to be More Productive, Highly Successful and Less Stressed recently hit the shelves!  The power of a simple list is pretty amazing.  It makes you feel more in control of every aspect of your life and makes you a better version of yourself.  I know, because it's worked for me! 

Oh and some really successful and organized authors like David Allen, Julie Morgenstern and Gretchen Rubin have endorsed the book too! 

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Paula Rizzo is an Emmy award winning television producer and founder of the productivity site ListProducer.com.  She's also the author of Listful Thinking: Using Lists to be More Productive, Highly Successful and Less Stressed.  Follow her on Twitter and Facebook and get a free chapter of her book by signing up here.