Hello and Happy New Year! I hope your 2015 is off to a spectacular start.

Inevitably during this time of year we are looking back at last year, seeing what did and didn’t happen, and looking forward to this year (whether we make resolutions or not) thinking about what we want moving ahead. There’s always a lot of energy around changes (big or small), doing everything you didn’t do or stick with last year… or maybe finally doing things you haven’t been able to do yet for many years… no big deal.

At first we are full of inspiration and determination, we imagine big changes happening right away and everything going smoothly, and we all know how long that usually lasts… but what about in the months and days after the euphoric New Year’s buzz wears off and we have to make our dreams happen the way they actually come to life – with small everyday decisions and courageous steps forward – a process, over time… how do we stay connected to – and get – our dreams then?

If we’re any good at this life thing we’re always growing and changing – sometimes faster… sometimes slower – so it also makes sense that our dreams will change with time as we change. What we wanted ten years ago, or sometimes even just one year ago or last week, might not resonate as deeply with us anymore as we evolve and grow.

When we imagine our dreams it’s usually some future picture where we have everything we want and things are going perfectly. Well, I’ll let you in on a little secret, even when you do have your dreams, it’s never going to look exactly like that picture. And having and living our dream is a process just as much as getting to them, so how do we stay connected to our truth and our dreams along the way, to help make sure that next New Year we have far fewer ‘should have’s’ or ‘wish I woulda’s’ and far more ‘this is so amazing’s’?

I can’t speak for anyone else, but my personal compass is love.

We often think of love in relation to feelings about other people – family, romantic partner, your best of friends – but probably not consciously so much in relation to other aspects of life… but for as much as we might overlook this emotion, and energy, in other areas, it’s actually a magnificent tool for staying in tune with our own energy and our own truth in life.

And just to be clear, I’m not talking about the lusty hormonal passing crush ‘love’, or the complacent, fall into a routine, not happy not sad but familiar and safe ‘love’; I’m talking about the fall in love with your best friend can’t get enough love, the kind of love that makes you feel inspired, free, challenged, stimulated, excited, and always want more – just to name a few…

Of course those are all things that I want with another person (duh), but I also work to have that level of fulfillment in all of the other aspects of my life as well…

Since the really big dreams might take a while to completely come to fruition (somehow it’s always longer than we’d like), love is a great self-check to see how things are going and how we are progressing. While you are on the path moving closer and closer to connecting with whatever dream you have – are you still feeling challenged, are you still growing, are you still inspired… as long as the answer is yes, even if you haven’t totally fulfilled the big dream or goal all the way – you know you are still aligned and getting closer to it. If not, it’s a good way to tune in and start to make adjustments, within ourselves and life to realign – with love, and our real truth – so that we know we are still connecting with what we really want and what’s really right for us.

So this year, check in – are you in love with your whole life? If not, change some things – a.s.a.p. Make love your compass, even if it means changes that feel scary, because why waste another year being anything less than in love with your own life. It might just take you closer to your biggest dreams than you’ve ever been before.