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New Year's resolutions for the family's soul

This year, rather than repeat that promise to diet or plan to pay off your credit card for the umpteenth time, why not turn your thoughts to a deeper commitment?

The Christmas holidays are not always happy. For every white Christmas, a blue one corresponds. For all the sentiments of goodwill expressed, ill-will still bubbles up within families, and anxiety attends our traditional, seasonal over-spending and over-eating. Whether the New Year rings or rumbles in, many of us feel ready to pledge some form of abstinence; resolutions are designed to undo the excesses of the past month.

But rather than the usual diet and exercise promises, let's get down to the basics for truly nourishing, achievable New Year resolutions now. Take a 9-step approach to adding more love in your life and your family.

• Bring on the laughs
  Put more humour into your life. Rent a comedy film once a week, and giggle family-style. If you have a child within the ages of 10 to 15, watch her sense of humour emerge now.

• Schedule a weekly dinner
  Even if you have to add it onto the kitchen wall calendar, plan a family meal. Aim for participation. Let different family members decide the menus each week. Alternate cooking, or cook together. This kind of a meal delivers emotional nourishment - a commodity we all need, but teens especially.

• Commit as a family to volunteer within your community
  This can be as simple as cleaning out your wardrobes regularly to donate clothes and toys to a local charity shop or shelter.

• Make race an issue
  In our first book, The Roller-Coaster Years, we note: 'The world is becoming a smaller place and in order for our children to live and work in the next century, they have to develop an appreciation and tolerance for people who are different'. Mostly we all avoid the issue of race. Why not discuss it instead?
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