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Do This Before You Cement Your New Year’s Resolutions

I’ve just sat down at my desk for the first time in three weeks, my fingers limber, my mind sharp, my body rooted in my seat. It’s incredible how far three weeks of rest can go toward clear thinking and new motivation.

The last three weeks in a nutshell 👇

Three days of skiing—by myself or with my kid
Reading the entire collected works of Taylor Jenkins Reid
Proselytizing about the NYT Cooking App (only $1.50/month!)
Cooking everything with chili crisp
Visiting my sister’s newborn triplets at two different hospitals
Stocking my freezer for winter with highly experimental home-cooked meals
Upgrading my sons to single beds (they’ve shared a queen since birth)
Crafting with the clothes my bro was wearing when he died
Saying goodbye to my blond hair, and hello to an extra $2K/year
Cleaning forgotten corners of my house
Upgrading jewelry I bought that wasn’t functional
Putting on a 10-song living room concert for just two ppl
Paying my kid in screen time to shovel the driveway
Attending a class with Kim Krans to pull cards for the coming year
Epic amounts of laying by the fire playing dragon match game

It was maybe THE BEST EVER. I only opened my laptop once, to attend the Kim Krans workshop. The holidays gave me space to remember what’s actually important that I want to be doing - singing, tending my home, being with my precious loves - all things my business supports by giving me time, money and flexibility.

This year I’m letting the year’s themes be emergent, and nothing helps ideas emerge quite like time away from the desk. When you set goals for the coming year from a logic-informed place, before you’ve had time to take space and reflect on the last one, resolutions often lean toward what numbers you want to hit, how many hours you’ll work, your physical exercise routine, or whatever else you think you should be doing.

What emerges after you’ve had time to reconnect to yourself is often very different. It’s the difference between “Earn $20K on my next launch” vs. “Take a 10-minute sunset walk to increase my REM sleep”—a seemingly disparate goal that very possibly may lead you to the same result or better, and in a way you can actually live with. ​
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TBH, I still hoped to arrive at my first day back with a fully-formed plan for all the ways I will be a better, stronger Tarzan in 2026, but they’re still in emergence. As I write these very words, I’m realizing that what’s most important is to keep the channels open so that the wisdom I need can flow through at exactly the right time. I’m taking notes as things flow in.

My biggest wins last year had nothing to do with business, but they had everything to do with me showing up as the person I need to be in order to make my business (and my life) work. They were things like quitting Candy Crush, teaching myself to ski, getting the TV out of my bedroom, and becoming a person who journals every day. Truthfully, those things give me much greater pride than anything I did in business. I’m grateful for my former self that had the wisdom to reach further than, “Make five hundred thousand dollars,” (which we almost did last year).

That’s it for today.

I’m easing my way back in gently. I cleared my inbox last night, uncharacteristically opening my email on a Sunday evening. I did this twice over the holidays, so it wasn’t a big job, mostly just swiping left on a lot of newsletters.* For some people, keeping “inbox zero” sounds like something reserved for people who wake up at 5am and drink a gallon of water a day, but for me, it’s the path of least resistance.

I haven’t even opened my inbox yet today. I wanted writing this email to Reader to be the first thing I do because the one thing that has remained solid while the world spins around me is writing these emails. That’s one habit I’m thanking past Tarzan for cultivating.

Over to you.

I’d love to hear two things—

a) What’s one thing you’re celebrating past Reader for?

b) What’s one thing you want to be celebrated for at the end of 2026?

Hit “reply” and share.

XO,
Tarzan

Tarzan Kay Kalryzian [she/her] Did someone forward you this email? ​Subscribe here​. Follow me on ​LinkedIn​.

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*Note that I’m not responsible for administration, including checking the company inbox. That’s almost a full-time job! Also, when you take three weeks away from sending emails, your inbox naturally gets a lot quieter.

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