2014: The Simplicity Project

On Tuesday, I talked about all the wonderful and not-so-wonderful things that happened in 2013. Today, I’m gonna talk about my goals for 2014.

My overall goal for 2014 is to pursue simplicity. A friend of mine tells me that I tend to overcomplicate things a lot. And I do. I like to analyze things and figure out what they mean. I like to have personal headcanons and interpretations of things I watch and books I read. I live in a world that wants to compartmentalize everything and where people want to define themselves by superficial labels.

In the end, though, I am discerning my vocation and whatever God wants me to do, I have to surrender myself to His will. So for that reason, I came up with The Simplicity Project. Based on Gretchen Rubin’s The Happiness Project, I want to pursue simplicity in the hopes of finding what God is calling me to do.

Now for me, simplicity doesn’t mean going with the flow or following the herd. My role models for simplicity are St. Therese of Liseux and Pope Francis. Like St. Therese, I want to do everything with love for God in mind and like Pope Francis, I want to go out into the world to help those who are less fortunate, even if it’s just through my prayers.

As part of my simplicity project, one of my new year’s resolutions is to take a photo every day for 2014. I looked online for photo challenges and found the best one: 365grateful, a photography project by Hailey Bartholomew that started on flickr and is now in the works to become a documentary. 365grateful is simple: take a picture of something you’re grateful for everyday. I created a new blog on Tumblr to put all my photos (plus reblogging stuff from other photography/vintage tumblogs): http://365grateful2014.tumblr.com/.

I will end this post with a prayer from St. Ignatius of Loyola because I’m reading some stuff on Ignatian spirituality as part of my discernment.

Take, Lord, and receive all my liberty,

my memory, my understanding,

and my entire will,

All I have and call my own.

You have given all to me.

To you, Lord, I return it.

Everything is yours; do with it what you will.

Give me only your love and your grace,

that is enough for me.