New Years’ Resolutions: My Hiking Goal For The New Year

I made it a task to go outside and hike somewhere, no matter where I was, what I was doing, or how I was feeling. The signal in my cellphone cuts out in the backcountry, and I’m forced to take a break and focus on a new challenge — having a good time, seeing some cool things, and reflecting on what is going on around me.

Last year, I took some time to explore the universe from a number of different perspectives. I hiked nearly every weekend, and I reshuffled my life for a fresh look at the world. I took a year away from writing and lived what felt like a thousand extra lives. I jokingly call it my arsenal of content for the thousands of stories that I could write about.

I’ve taken a moment to jot down notes about all of the places that I have seen, the people that I have met, and the “lives” that I lived all at once. The cold holiday season of 2022 made shelter more enticing. This, naturally, creates more writing.

I realize that I need to bring the two together again.

Writing only encourages more writing. When you are creating a life where you get paid to write and have time to write for yourself, you have to make an effort to write and begin imagining writing in other places. This is the advice from so many writers that I finally took to heart. Set aside time to write and…