January is a tough month. It’s cold, it’s dark and it’s rainy, you know the drill. You might be skint after Christmas or feeling delicate after the New Year celebrations, and your body composition is probably 70% cheese, 20% Quality Street and 10% unbranded prosecco (mine’s 80% tea, 10% Strepsils and 10% honey & lemon but them’s the breaks).

Right about now, just about every magazine is also trying to give you a massive guilt trip, but I say ‘no regrets!’ Let’s just move on and try some kind-to-yourself ideas with one new thing to do every day, broken down into small and manageable steps. If you aren’t a resolutions kind of person then this is a perfect, non-overwhelming strategy to give yourself a nice little boost over the space of one week, helping to take your mind off the winter blues.

Alternatively, if you are working on a big personal project as part of your New Year’s resolutions, more power to you. This week-long challenge, starting properly on Monday 6th of January, may suit you too, as you should easily be able to fit it around other plans.

There’s at least one completely free activity to try each day, so you can join in even if you’re low on funds. If you have a little more to spend there are a few extra ideas for life-enhancing products and services you can treat yourself to, but nothing costs over £10.

Winter Wellbeing Challenge Schedule

Now’s a good time to mention that ‘wellbeing’ is a very broad subject area. It covers basic self care, most aspects of health, leisure time, hobbies and interests, positive psychology, personal development, creativity, work, the home environment, culture and society, and relationships.

That’s definitely more than you’d realistically be able to cover completely in the space of a week, but the seven days of the challenge have been chosen give you lots of different tasters to use as a jumping off point for the rest of your year, helping you to feel refreshed and inspired for the start of 2020.

• Monday: Make the most of daylight
• Tuesday: Be a little kinder to yourself
• Wednesday: Something to look forward to
• Thursday: Take a worry dump
• Friday: Get out of that rut
• Saturday: See your bigger picture
• Sunday: Pause, reflect, decide what’s next

Join me on Monday for this brand new challenge!