As we close out another year, we all try to reflect on ways in which we can make the next year better. I was never one to make resolutions for the New Year, as I don’t believe in waiting for a calendar year to change to make things better in my life. You make the decision and you do it, you do it now.

That being said, I do want to share with my readers and followers things I want to work on/try/improve in the year 2017. Some of which are personal and some business related. What are your 2017 resolutions? Please share in the comments below!

1. Take Up Boxing

This is a resolution I started a few weeks ago as I started training with Coach Charlie at CKO in Jersey City. I’ve always wanted to learn how to box, not only because I want to kick major butt and also stay in shape, but also because I want to improve my reflexes, coordination, and focus. While you are sparring, you have to be completely focused or else you get hit! Boxing is also known to decrease stress as you take out all your anger and frustrations on the punching bag. When I leave CKO, I feel almost euphoric. I am excited to get better at it.

2. Say “No”

I have a tendency to be a people pleaser, so I find myself biting off more than I can chew. I say “Yes” more than I should, which is a good thing sometimes, but also causes me to over-work and feel burnt out. It’s impossible for me to write about everything, go to every event, every new business opening, etc. I decided for 2017, I will only say “Yes” to things I REALLY want to do or REALLY want to write about.

3. Write More

Isn’t it funny that I run a blog and my New Year’s resolution is to write more? ChicpeaJC has grown tremendously in the last year. It’s no longer just a blog, it’s become a Jersey City resource. I have a team, contributors, and even an office. I find myself on business calls or writing proposals and contracts, which take up most of my time and in turn sucked my creativity out the window. I barely ever write for the sake of it… unless someone pisses me off and a post like this comes out of nowhere. Which by the way was one of the most read articles on my blog this year, who knew?!

A few of my followers mentioned to me that they would love for me to go back to writing about real life shit, the stuff I used to write more about. Even my fashion posts! So for 2017, I plan on opening up a little more! If there is any topic you would like me to write about, let me know!

4. Unplug

This is the toughest resolution. As I write this, I am sitting in a “casita” in Mexico, supposedly on vacation where I am supposed to be unplugging. Lo and behold, I am writing a blog post, posting on Instagram and Snapchat and god knows what other social media platform. Since I started ChicpeaJC, I’ve taken maybe a span of 24 hours off, once or twice on social media. I have a very hard time disconnecting, I don’t like not knowing what’s going on. I guess you could say I suffer from major FOMO (fear of missing out). I realize that I need to put my phone away more, especially when I am around friends and family, and to focus on the important moments or else they will pass me by. Things have gotten so bad that my four-year-old tells me to put my phone away! When she said that to me the other day, that was it. When I am with her, I no longer look at any devices. SO IF YOU READ THIS, PLEASE DO NOT MESSAGE ME BETWEEN THE HOURS OF 4:30-8:00pm.

5. Call my friends and family more often

My whole family lives in Israel and most of my childhood friends live in Montreal. Even though I call my parents every morning, I am always in a rush and stressed out that I don’t take the time to really actually engage with them. When I actually do have meaningful conversations with my family and friends, my heart feels full. I always get so entrenched in life and obligations that I just forget to “pick up the phone, baby” *sings*.

6. Uber Less/Save more money

I find myself taking up to 3 Uber rides a day and spending money on lunches, which is wasting money I can use to invest back in my business. ChicpeaJC is moving to a bigger office, and has more employees this year, which means I have no choice but to stay at a certain monthly budget.

7. Level the Fuck Up

The last few months, I’ve been struggling with deciding where to take ChicpeaJC and how to take it to the next level. Jersey City has grown tremendously in the last few years and there are many blogs now, which is a great thing of course. I believe that there is plenty of stuff to write about and it’s fun to see different perspectives. That being said, I still need to up my game. I always say that I am my biggest competitor.

When I started ChicpeaJC, my focus was mostly around culture and small businesses. Then I noticed that the only time posts went viral was when they were in list formats. “Top 10 places to eat,” “Top Things to Do,” etc. I get why people love listicles, but I fucking hate them. We pour our hearts and souls into the articles about people, businesses, arts, music, etc and writing a list takes 30 min but will get 5000 + views. It’s frustrating to say the least. Anyway, I’ve been struggling with it. I know these listicles are necessary to get more eyes on the blog, but it’s not what ChicpeaJC is about.

The other day I had an epiphany. We are not going to up our game by writing more lists. We are going to up our game by creating a ChicpeaJC Channel.

VIDEO! More video, more photos, more content. We meet so many interesting people every day, and have so many amazing conversations which sometimes doesn’t translate in blog post format. A few people have reached out to me via social media that they would love to see us do more video. I don’t want to give away too much yet, but the only channel I watch is Viceland. I want to get into the underbelly of all things Jersey City and culture.

We will still do lists. Because we know it’s what people want. But it won’t be our main focus. That is not where the heart is.

7. Be more confident/stop being so hard on myself. 

So apparently, I am very insecure about pretty much everything… I am sure from the outside it seems like I have my shit together, but really I don’t. Does anyone really have their shit together, though?

I tend to second guess myself a lot, over-think my decisions, and take pretty much any criticism that comes my way really to heart. Even when my peers tease me or joke around, I take things sometimes to a negative place when really, I should just tease them back!

I know that I should be extremely proud of myself and what I’ve accomplished in such a short amount of time, but I am always really hard on myself when things don’t necessarily go as planned. I am my own biggest critic, sometimes to a point where it’s almost debilitating.

I’ve definitely grown thicker skin in the last year and find myself being able to deal with the mean social media comments/trolling a lot better now than when I first started. For that, I am proud of myself as it hasn’t been an easy journey. Now I look at that stuff and I am actually flattered that people would take the time to write/talk about me.

For 2017, I want to stand up tall and say, “You know what, I am awesome, I am proud, and I don’t care who knows it.”

What’s your NYE Resolution?