We are all accustomed to making New Year’s resolutions at the beginning of the new year. We often ask ourselves: “What didn’t we achieve last year?” and ” Can this be made into our new, New Year’s resolution?” But maybe, instead of beating ourselves up about what we haven’t achieved, we can try a new approach to resolution drafting. Have you heard of glimmers?
What are glimmers?
A glimmer is a term coined by Deb Dana, a licensed clinical social worker who specializes in trauma. Deb first used it in her book, The Polyvagal Theory in Therapy. Glimmers are brief, often unexpected, moments of joy, beauty, happiness, connectedness and peace that we experience for a flicker of time. Glimmers appear in various settings and affect different senses. Here are some examples of glimmers:
- In nature, looking at a beautiful landscape, noticing the ‘greenness’ of the grass, listening to the birds singing, smelling spring in the air, etc.
- Noticing someone’s kind gesture towards others, listening to a nice story retold by someone,
- Feeling loved by pets; noticing their unconditional love and warmth
- Unexpected pleasant sounds like your favourite song playing on the radio, a baby laughing or a squeaky sound of snow underneath your shoes
- A feeling of something pleasantly familiar from your childhood brought about something in present reality
What can glimmers do for us?
Glimmers can do a lot of good for people’s wellbeing. Deb Dana describes it like that :”There’s an energy that happens around a glimmer, and then your brain marks it as well.” Glimmers, therefore, are not just fleeting moments of happiness. Rather, they are capable of forming a pattern in our brains of feel-good moments. This, in turn, can start out a process of accepting that good moments are part of life as much as bad moments are. Glimmers are as beneficial for healthy people as they are for people who have suffered from trauma.
Glimmers open up our brain to receive more positive emotions and that can bring about the feelings of relaxation and healing. Through very little steps, the brain can be retrained to look for more positives in life, in general. How so? Dana says that once we notice a few glimmers, we instinctively start to look for more. With time, finding good in our reality becomes a pattern, which forms a habit of optimism.
Finding glimmers instead of writing New Year’s resolutions?
Dana encourages people to regularly collect glimmers. You can photograph the best moments and keep a record of them. You can keep a glimmer journal. You can make glimmer-journaling your New Year’s resolution. It is an interesting twist on resolutions, because instead of fixing something or kicking a bad habit, you are building a positive habit minus the sense of guilt.
Writing your glimmers down is a powerful method of multiplying them. You will often find that the more you appreciate your glimmers and the more often you write about them, the more often you will come across new ones. It is like you become wired to find more magic in the world.
Finding glimmers doesn’t come naturally to everybody. You can set a reasonable intention to welcome glimmers into your life. Tell yourself that you are open to finding glimmers in this and this scenario, and see what happens. You can, for example, say something like: ” I am open to finding glimmers during my walk from work today.” It may not always work, but it is important to keep trying and make it a regular thing to find glimmers. Practice makes perfect, after all.
Share your glimmers with others to multiply them
Dana also encourages people to share their glimmers with friends and family. She says that sharing glimmers creates a deeper sense of connection with your loved ones and helps you get to know them better. She says that instead of asking your family members: “How was your day, today?” you can ask: “What glimmers did you find today?”
Finding a glimmer buddy is great for establishing a deeper connection with your friend, but it also re-shapes your whole friendship. Instead of sharing the complaints and the difficult parts of life, you can now share the beauty of the world. Doing this together is even more exhilarating than doing it yourself.
Coming back to New Year’s resolutions….
Making a habit of finding glimmers could be one of your New Year’s resolutions. That doesn’t mean that it should be the only one. We still have to fix the parts of our lives that need fixing. There is no way around this. So, how do we start?
First, write down ten goals that you really want to achieve in your life.
Second, arrange them in terms of importance. The most important goal in your life is assigned number one.
Third, concentrate ONLY on number one this year.
Fourth, make detailed step-by-step plan on how to achieve this goal.
Fifth, make a schedule outlining when you are going to work on your goal. Set up a deadline by which you are going to achieve each step.
Sixth, follow through and reward yourself when each step is completed.
Good luck!
Have a happy New Year! Much success to you!
