AnnaCossack

Let’s make it clear: I don’t like New Year’s resolutions. Before anything else, the first day of a new year actually isn’t special or different from any other days. You can change your life at any moment you choose and don’t have to wait the 1st of January to start doing sports / stop smoking / call your Mum at least once per week. Second, one rarely remembers his good intentions a couple of weeks after the New Year’s eve. It’s hard to keep promises given to yourself, even harder than the promises given to somebody else.

So what I’m sharing with you is not actually late new year’s resolutions but rather my plans for this year – which of course might change but I’d prefer they don’t:)

COUPLE GOALS

2017 was a particularly important year for Julien and me: we got engaged, bought a flat in Paris and moved in. The last point was very exciting but also challenging and I’m glad we got through it perfectly well, thanks to the mutual support and positive attitude.

We travelled a lot and collected fantastic memories of our time together, visited my family in Russia and showed Julien’s family Moscow and Saint Petersburg, introduced our friends to each other and organized the first parties in the new flat…

To sum up, it was a bright and emotional year, and I have even felt sad to leave it behind. Anyway 2018 promises to be brilliant as well and the highlight of it will certainly be our wedding. We haven’t fix the date yet but it’s good at least we fixed the year:))

Here comes my first new year’s resolution – or rather intention: to stay Zen and avoid wedding planning stress. I would like to keep this event very intimate rather than organize a public performance. I want to take pleasure in thinking of the details and savoring the precious moments instead of spending sleepless nights trying to arrange the seating plan. The main thing about the wedding is that it shouldn’t be perfect – it should be memorable.

So no pressure, no tension, no rush.

PHOTOGRAPHY

A hobby which became much more than a hobby during last year! I carried out several really interesting projects, collaborated with Google and started selling photos on the virtual marketplaces. I also worked a lot with private clients, which is a source of positive emotions and good energy, especially when the clients are a couple of lovebirds and we work on the love story photo shoot;) I’m glad that I’ve kept warm relations with many clients – and with some of them we even became friends!

I don’t plan to make of photography my main activity – don’t want to lose my artistic freedom and still attached to the lawyer’s job. But I’d love to continue the photo projects, make progress and improve my photo skills, so in 2018 I’ll definitely dedicate lots of time to photography – even more than in 2017.

The most important goal for me this year is to start using my analogical cameras. I have two of them: Nikon which I bought in Saint-Petersburg during our trip to Russia this summer and FET, my mother’s gift to me. These cameras fascinate me – I love their retro look and keep them at the place of honor in my room but I haven’t even finished the first 36-shots film yet…

Digital photography is my comfort zone: I manage it well and feel confident when I have my Nikon D750 in my hands. So I really have to make an effort to leave it – leave the comfort zone by leaving the digital camera at home. It’s hard, since I feel like I lose control of the image and get limited by the number of shots on the film, but I really admire analog photos and feel ready to challenge myself.

SPORTS

I told at the beginning of this article that I don’t consider sport a new year’s resolution. It’s a lifestyle, a personal choice, and you definitely don’t need to wait for the end of the year to start exercising or set up a new sport routine. I’ve been practicing fitness for seven years now, and seven years ago I didn’t wait for the 1st January or Monday or any particularly convenient day to start, just bought a pass to the swimming pool and began to swim every morning before going to work. I can say swimming is a good way to get used to the morning workouts because it’s less « aggressive » than any other type of sportive activity. It wakes you up, keeps your body in shape and takes less time than a proper fitness workout (just 30-40 minutes of morning swim will be enough).

This year I’ll keep and may be intensify my training rhythm – I exercise every day but I’d love to make each workout more efficient and add more outside running. But my principal aim is returning to my yoga practice.

Those who have been following my blog for a while know that I’m a big yoga fan. I love the feeling the power over my body which it gives me and enjoy calmness and concentration while keeping asanas. Headstand is a usual part of my workouts (and it’s a great abdominal exercise by the way!) but I don’t do as much yoga sessions as one year ago when I practiced almost every day. Get back to this tempo is my 2018 goal.

BLOGGING

Surprisingly, this blog became a valuable part of my life (I didn’t expect it at all when I started blogging) and I really enjoy writing my thoughts and impressions here. As you know, Instagram is the main social media which I use to share my photo works with you (if you don’t follow me yet, click here to discover my gallery) but writing on the blog is much more meditative. It’s a kind of diary, a travel diary first of all, but also a personal journal, and my aim for this year is this: to make my blog more personal.

I know it’s an unusual goal. You can find thousands of articles on how to commercialize your blog and make of it an efficient tool for your business, but nobody wants to explain you how to address personal subjects online. For me it’s not an easy task though.

Introvert as I am, it’s often hard for me to talk on personal topics and expose my opinion publicly. There are so many things which might be interesting to you and which I’d love to discuss but I always hesitate to bring them up. This year I’ll try to change it and become more open and direct in my writing.

Self-disclosure was always difficult for me but let’s be honest: why hiding my likes and dislikes, my successes and fails without a serious reason? This blog has never been a source of my revenues but it’s definitely a source of pleasure, so I want it to be a place of open discussion and sincere self-expression, I want to introduce topics which are significant and meaningful for me.

By the way, if you have any suggestions about what I should write next, don’t hesitate to let me know in the comments here:)

CAT GOALS 😉

This point is as simple as it seems: this year I want to get a cat.

Since my childhood I’ve always been a cat lover and we had cats at home. I admire these independent creatures, so funny but always so dignified, refined and elegant. Seeing a cat always puts a smile on face!

When I moved to France, my cat Bertram stayed with my mother in Russia. I could’t bring him with me and separate him from his flat and my mother who loves him dearly. Since then I’ve never stopped dreaming to get a cat at my place and now I finally have a chance to do it. I’d never bring a cat to a rented flat because it would mean too much risk for the furniture which is not mine, but since we have a flat of our own now, I’m ready to make my dream come true and welcome a little kitten at our place.

I’m particularly lucky that Julien and understands my weakness for cats and doesn’t mind a new fluffy member of family at home – and I truly appreciate this.

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Let’s keep it simple and do not make this list too long. If just these few resolutions are achieved by the end of 2018, it will be a damn good result!!

Photo by Valérie Semensatis