Don't Be Good, Be BETTER.
Plus, check out our monthly calendar!
MONTHLY CALENDAR: A new update to your newsletter!
After a request from a subscriber, I’ve decided to include a list of important dates in each newsletter so you know what to expect for the coming month. Now, you can plan for our video calls in advance!
January 5, 2023 at 8:30 PM EST: Book Club Discussion
January 17, 2023 at 8:30 PM EST: Watch The Young Victoria and LIVE CHAT on the Substack App!
January 19, 2023 at 8:30 PM EST: Movie Club/Girl Chat
This Month’s Movie Club Selection!
This month we will be watching The Young Victoria. If you’d like to watch it with your friends, have them join the fun by becoming premium subscribers!
This Month’s Book Club Selection
Book Club is meeting THIS THURSDAY at 8:30 PM EST. This month we are reading fiction (we switch up month-to-month), and I’m excited to get into the festive spirit. The book we will be reading is…The Christmas Bookshop! I chose something fun and easy to read as we get into the holiday spirit. I hope it makes us all feel warm and cozy!
What You Might Have Missed At Classically Abby…
Quote of the Week:
“Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today, and creates a vision for tomorrow.” - Melody Beattie
Classic Style Inspo
Is anything a better addition to your wardrobe than a jean jacket? I love how quickly a denim jacket dresses your outfit down and makes you look like you put in much more effort than you actually did. Having a denim jacket in your closet is such a gamechanger and makes looking stylish easy!
Things I’ve Been Loving: Magic Clean Eraser
These magic erasers are so great for cleaning your home! I just ordered a new pack on Amazon and I plan on using them to clean up the scuffs on my walls and other small messes around my house.
Welcome to Classically Abby!
I'm a wife, mama, opera singer, entrepreneur, YouTuber, and your guide to becoming the classic woman you've always wanted to be! Follow me on YouTube, Instagram, and Twitter to see how! And together, let's be classic.
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Happy Tuesday friends! How’s your week going? Did you have a fun New Years? Jacob and I had a very quiet night in on New Year’s Eve, and then spent Sunday at a family pool party followed by a community member’s son’s Bar Mitzvah! We finished off the long weekend by going to a pedestrian mall we enjoy and grocery shopping together. That sounds like a chore, but my husband and I actually enjoy going to the market as a date night - and Mr. Baby came along too! Speaking of which, Mr. Baby is just the MOST fun lately. He’s crawling like a champ and starting to cruise and I could NOT be more obsessed with him. On another note, this coming weekend we are hosting a Murder Mystery party and if it goes well I might write a post for next week all about how to host one yourselves!
It’s officially 2023 and I’m so excited to jump into the new year. I spent a lot of time these past few days thinking about ways I want to improve, grow, change, and incorporate new rhythms and rituals. But as I was making a plan for the new year, I came across this video by Rabbi Manis Friedman, the author of the Joy of Intimacy, a book we read in our book club a while back. In it, Rabbi Friedman discusses a really interesting idea.
As we make New Year’s resolutions, we often want to change our bad habits into good habits. “I eat unhealthily, this is the year I start to eat healthy!” or “I spend too much time on technology, this is the year I stop using my phone!” But Rabbi Friedman suggests something different. Instead of changing bad into good, why not focus on the things we’re already good at and work to be better at them? Then, instead of doing a complete 180, we are really only taking small steps forward. It’s so much easier to improve on something we are already successful at than it is to become better at something we don’t do well. Additionally, when we focus on being better at what we’re already good at, there is simply less time to fail at the things we’re bad at.
I loved this idea! I immediately decided to incorporate this philosophy into the way I intentionally approach this year. I want to share a few examples from my life, and hopefully that will inspire you, too!
Eating healthier. I’ve been thinking a lot about my eating habits lately. As Mr. Baby is nursing less, my weight has been fluctuating more and I’d like to find a comfortable weight for my body. Because when you’re nursing your appetite increases, I am still pretty hungry even though my body is producing less milk and expending less calories to do so. With all of that in mind, I’ve been noticing how I approach food. I tend to view food through a lens of scarcity - “I have to eat this free donut because I’ll never get a donut again” - rather than through a lens of abundance - “I don’t need to eat this donut right now because I can really get a donut any time I want.” But instead of trying to flip the script on all of this right away, I realized what would be a better approach for the moment is getting better at what I’m good at. I’m good at consistency. I am very happy to eat the same exact thing every single day without deviation, and to keep to that schedule. So, I made myself a menu. Every day, I’ll eat the same thing for breakfast, snacks, lunch, and dinner. If I stick to that menu, I’ll eat healthy! And I’m approaching something I’m good at by simply using it to my advantage.
Getting off technology. Every year, I make sure to keep this on my list of goals. As technology improves and becomes easier and easier to use, it becomes easier to use in a negative way. You can find yourself using your phone all day because, despite being useful, it’s also a great distraction. So, instead of saying, “This year I’m going to get off all of my technology,” I decided to say, “This year, I’m going to read and learn more.” I love learning, and it’s so important to continue educating yourself. If I focus on reading and learning, then I won’t have time to use my phone as much. Or if I do use my phone, it’s for a better reason than mindlessly scrolling.
Being overwhelmed. Being an adult is crazy, isn’t it? I constantly feel like I have so much to juggle. I have to be a wife, a mom, a homemaker, a cook, a content creator, and a community member. I mean, that’s a great list and I feel so lucky to have all these roles - but WOW! When I look at my to-do list, it can feel like it’s about to wash me away. I’m bad at keeping my head when I look at a crazy long to-do list, but you know what I am good at? Routines. I like knowing when everything needs to get done. I like having each day planned out, each week planned out, and each month planned out. So instead of letting all of my cleaning tasks pile up, I’ve picked a day for each chore. Instead of needing to cook spur of the moment, I’m going to meal plan. Leaning into the power of my routines will prevent me from feeling overwhelmed at the end of the day.
What are ways you could implement this philosophy in 2023? What are you good at that you could become better at? I’d love to know your thoughts!
I love this idea! I feel like it's something that a lot of people will find more palatable than "I need to change xyz."
I think this way also requires putting more thought into it. It's not enough to say "this is the goal" anymore, because you have to be really intentional about how you approach it and what things you're going to lean into to make it happen.
Reading more has been a goal of mine for a few years, now, and I was so excited that I actually managed to read 17 books in 2022! This year I want to continue to read more, so I've made it really easy for me to be lazy when reading. There's books and bookcases *everywhere* in my house, now, so it's just as easy to grab a book as it is to turn on the TV or pull out my phone!
Love this, my Pastor at Saddleback Church also gave a sermon on Be Better. Choosing progress over perfection.