A new year. A clean plate. A blank slate. Tabula Rasa.

As we have now crossed the threshold of another calendar year, and 2019 is now fully underway, folks are now without a doubt looking at their lists of New Year's resolutions and are either full of hope and optimism… or they are already blowing them all off. A true, and kind of sad fact. I saw a statistic a while back that the majority of people who make resolutions for the new year keep to them for maybe a month, or two, or maybe even three maximum, but after that, they all lose track or motivation.

There is no need to really think twice about it: 2018 was awful. I do believe that there were good parts, even great ones to the year, but 2018 was an overall shitty year fraught with peril, drama, polarization, threat, and God knows what else. The country is more divided than ever. The government is currently under the longest shutdown in U.S. history. Needless to say… tensions are high and lots of things look bleak.

One thing is needed now more than ever: Hope.

We need to latch on to hope. Keep it alive. More so than anything, I believe that 2019 is the year of REDEMPTION. Our country. Our people. Myself personally. We all are set up to travel a road of redemption this year. To right wrongs. To open eyes. To elect officials. To hear voices. To heal. Live and let live. To feel. To be OK with your feelings. To give yourself the time you need. To forgive and forget. To make the world a better place. To start piecing it all back together.

In order to redeem the world, we need to start with our own personal journeys of redemption. That is why I am NO LONGER making RESOLUTIONS. I am making PROMISES.

No more making of meaningless resolutions. Goals that hold no value. Things that we say we will do and then just let them go as if we never even wanted to make changes in our lives. But if we were to make promises. To ourselves. To each other. To the world. Maybe we would want to keep them going. To make real changes. In ourselves, and the world. To start the redemption. To keep the fight going. Keep the fire going.

I invite you to do the same. To start making the promises you want and need to make. Let's all start making promises. Let's make this the year of redemption. Let's do it together.

Let's get it trending: #IPromise.