New Year’s Resolutions: Start 2021 with Personal Growth
It’s a new year, and many of us are hoping for a better year than 2020. A lot of our new year’s resolutions look a bit different this year, and they may be a bit harder to commit to.
Many of us also don’t have the energy or conviction to put the same amount of effort into our goals due to fatigue and stress. Luckily, there are some fun ways you can build yourself up and focus on bettering yourself with friends this year!
Online Courses
Many colleges and sites are still offering free or discounted online courses. This was a popular way to spend time during the pandemic. Now, it is a great time to team up with others for accountability!
To make things even more fun, you can schedule study groups or discussion Zoom meetings to really reflect on what you are learning and share diverse opinions. Some of the places offering free online courses are Coursera, Harvard University, Skillshare, and edX. Coursera even offers a list of free online courses you can finish in a day! Note that if you want a certificate of completion, there often is a fee.
Virtual Workout Classes
It is pretty common for people to want to hit the gym more often for their new year’s resolution. As we continue to adapt to the ever-changing circumstances related to the pandemic, some things like staying active have been especially hard.
Luckily, a few solutions have been implemented to work around this, one being virtual workout classes! Teaming up with others to encourage each other can start a habit that will last far beyond these days at home. Many online programs have gained popularity, such as Yoga with Adriene if you are looking to increase your flexibility and balance.
If you want something fun to boost your mood and your heart rate, try a free online class video course like Move With Colour. There are also subscription-based services like All Out Studio, which gives you great workouts in different categories like no-equipment classes, strength-training, HIIT, and Pilates!
Social Self-Care
Working out, eating healthier, and learning something new are common goals we make at the beginning of a new year. However, this year is a bit different. Stress is high, there is a lot of emotional pressure on us, and taking on something new can seem overwhelming.
If things have been hard for you and those in your circle, consider setting up regular self-care nights. Break out the Zoom, facemasks, cocktails, and wine to kick back and put time specifically aside to decompress. There are many ways you can approach this; it completely depends on what will be the most healing for your group. Is having a spa-day what relaxes you the most? Then spend time every other week getting on a call with your nail polish and facemasks while you chat.
If that doesn’t sound appealing, try group meditation or group writing time with journaling or poetry.
While enjoying your new year’s resolutions with your circle, ensure you stay safe. To stay updated on the latest and most accurate information related to COVID-19, please refer to https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/index.html
Resilience: The Secret Upside to 2020
The good news about the dumpster fire that was 2020 is that we’ve got nowhere to go but up in 2021. At least, that’s what we’re telling ourselves. But as the new year begins, we think it’s time for some introspection and some virtual pats on the back. The catastrophic year is finally over, and you’ve lived to tell the tale. And in the process, you’ve developed more resilience.
That’s amazing.
And it’s something that you shouldn’t take for granted. Because it turns out, resilience is a trait that is developed, not inherited.
According to this 2012 article from the American Psychological Association (APA), resilience is born of a combination of thoughts and actions that anyone can learn. And you can strengthen your ability to weather difficulty by:
- building and maintaining strong connections,
- taking care of yourself,
- finding a motivating purpose,
- staying positive, and
- seeking professional help if and when you need it.
We were pretty gratified to read this list, because most of these bullet points are things we’ve already talked about on our blog throughout 2020. We have tried to bring you tiny rays of hope and sunshine through our posts by talking about socializing remotely, the importance of self-care, staying sane by helping others, and challenging yourself to practice gratitude.
It turns out, these ideas aren’t just for getting you through a hard day or week. They actually prime you to build resilience for the long-term.
Building resilience is like building a muscle. It requires pain, sweat and time, and the process of getting there can be a drag. But in the end, it makes you stronger and more powerful. And that’s something that will serve us all well, in 2021 and beyond.
Here’s to a positive and productive new year wherein each of us becomes stronger and more resilient. Happy New Year!
Modern Solutions for Modern Problems: Double Date Ideas, from the team at Couplr
Double Date Ideas, from the team at Couplr
If you’re like most long-term couples, you are probably well past the honeymoon phase of your relationship. Thus, you have likely experienced the unavoidable “married life” rut. The good news is there are many ways to keep it alive and thriving, with one of them being…you guessed it! Double Dating.
According to a study in Science Daily, double dating can be a great way to reignite passion for your significant other. Having another couple to share personal details with has been proven to help make you feel closer to your partner.
Let’s face it, passion is one of the first things to go in a long-term relationship. It takes a lot of work to keep the passion train going. Not surprisingly, the antidote to breaking that “dry spell” is introducing new options.
So how exactly can you strengthen the bond with your partner via double dating? Glad you asked. See below for two expert tips.
Indoor Double Date Ideas
Play the question game
This tactic has the power to solidify a couple’s unity and increase partners’ attraction to one another. On your next date night, ask everyone in your group questions like, “Given the choice of anyone in the world, whom would you want as a dinner guest?” or “If you could go back in your life and change any one experience, what would it be and why?”. If you would rather stick to small talk, you can try questions like “When was the last time you walked for more than an hour?”.
Get Out
The typical couple spends their free time “staying in”, which can get pretty boring. Setting the commitment and feeling the pressure to make a “night out” worthwhile pushes you to try things outside of your comfort zone. Most of the time, it ends with you having a genuinely good time. Not only will you get to reconnect with old friends or make new ones, but it may be good for your relationship!
Introducing new experiences with another couple does not only break the every-day mold. Such interactions have been proven to help us perceive our relationship in a whole new light. While most of our day-to-day interactions are now online, our double dating life doesn’t need to be. Oftentimes, couples may want to hang out with others, but they run into decision-making fatigue and are not quite sure what to do. So here are some suggestions!
Put together a cooking challenge at your home!
If you and your couple friends are foodies, or just enjoy watching any of the myriad cooking shows on television these days, why not throw a mystery ingredient cooking challenge party?
Cooking challenge shows vary in their rules and complexity, so if there is a particular program that you love, feel free to adapt it to your liking. The plan laid out below allows for some friendly competition for a group of four. If you prefer your competition a little more cutthroat, invite a few more friends over to serve as judges.
The rules
Each person is responsible for one dish: appetizer, entrée, side dish, dessert. Depending on the size and functionality of your kitchen, you can either all cook at the same time, two at a time, or one at a time.
The catch
Each individual will need to use a provided set of mystery ingredients to make their dish. You and your friends can decide how best to do this – will one person do all the shopping, or will each person create a mystery ingredient bag for a particular course?
To keep it fun and manageable for everyone, don’t make your mystery ingredients too outlandish, or too disparate. A combination of shrimp, navel oranges, cocoa powder, and bok choy? Challenging, but doable. Rocky road ice cream, anchovies, turnips, and eggs? Maybe not so much.
Tips for success
Make sure your kitchen is well-stocked. You’ll want a good selection of cookware as well as butter, oil, salt, pepper, and spices. You may want to have staples on hand like Worcestershire sauce, balsamic vinegar, flour, cornstarch, and lemons. The more you have to work with, the more creative you can be! And don’t forget to plan for some fun cocktails or mocktails. You’ll need something to wash down the culinary masterpieces!
Don’t forget to plate your dishes – after all, cooking show judges never fail to penalize bad presentation. Then sit down and enjoy the fruits of your labors while you make your critiques (gently, now!). Since this is all for fun, the losers need not pack their knives and go. But you might want to make them do the dishes!
Play a new (board) game!
There’s ALWAYS a new game on the market you’ve been wanting to try. Why not now? When else do you have countless hours on your hands to actually experiment with a new game?! Find it online, order it, and spend a few hours learning how to play it. Who knows – maybe you’ll become masters at it! Here are some fun games to play with multiple people:
1. Apples to Apples
2. Cards Against Humanity
3. What do you Meme?
4. Settlers of Catan
5. Monopoly
6. Clue
7. Code Names
8. Charades
9. Pictionary
10. Never Have I Ever
Host a movie night!
We’ve all got that never-ending “to-watch” list. Sometimes, watching them with others is more fun than watching them alone! We’re sure that every couple has one. Why not share your list with another couple and find a movie or two (or five, we won’t judge) to binge-watch your night away together? Don’t forget to warm up your home and stock up on popcorn and hot chocolate!
Outdoor Double Date Ideas
Attend a beer-brewing class!
When winter just won’t go away, and spring seems just a distant dream, it can be hard to drag yourself and your significant other out of the doldrums. You may find yourself hibernating indoors, doing the same old things. But that’s no way to spend the prime years of your life!
If you’re looking to shake things up, we recommend taking your next double date to a beer brewing class. Learn something new, and a few weeks later, you can open up a bottle of home brew and toast to your friendship – and your new hobby.
There are several options for brewing classes in the Chicago area.
The Pursuit Supply Company
The Pursuit Supply Company at 4316 W. Irving Park Road stocks supplies for all your quirky food-related DIY hobbies, and they also offer classes. In addition to beer brewing, you can take classes in photography, wine-making and coffee roasting!
Brew & Grow
Brew & Grow (3625 N. Kedzie Avenue) offers both beginning home brewer classes and advanced classes, should you decide this is a pastime you’d like to get explore further.
Gnome Brew
At Gnome Brew, 2026 W. Montrose Avenue, you can learn to brew your own beer in just one hour. If you really want to geek out on home brewing, you can also keep your eye on the shop’s events calendar for free public lectures. Other events include the home brew bottle share meet-ups they host on the second Thursday of every month.
Make It The Best
And if you’re looking for a memorable and light-hearted Valentine’s Day double date, Make It The Best at 9030 S. Hermitage Avenue has you covered with an evening of winemaking, dinner, and dancing on February 14. The shop also offers beer brewing and wine-making classes throughout the year.
Enjoy a great activity with friends and stock your fridge with drinks for the next get-together at the same time!
Take a food tour!
Chicago is well known for its extensive range of cuisine. While there are many well known stops, a lot of the best eateries are hidden away and hard to find without guidance. Taking one of the many famous food tours around the Chicago area can help you discover new favorites that you will keep coming back too, and who doesn’t love sharing the experience of good food?
Chicago Food Planet Tours
Chicago Food Planet Tours are critically acclaimed by sources like USA Today, Chicago Sun-Times, and Bon Appetit. They have a range of different tours for you to choose from that include everything from tours of the West Loop to a Chinatown tour. These tours range anywhere from $50 per adult to $75 per adult, and take anywhere from about 2-3 hours. These are pretty extensive tours, with some of them taking you to 5 different locations!
Bobby’s Bike Hike
Are you and your double date looking for a bit more activity in your day? Bobby’s Bike Hike provides food tours both in a walking format and a biking format. One of their better known options is the Bikes, Bites & Brews tours that they provide, which are 4 hour 12-13 mile trips! Their walking tours are often within the 1-1.5 mile range, which makes them accessible to any level of physical fitness. The prices of these tours vary from $48.75 per adult to $69.75 per adult. They also offer private tours, if that is more your style.
Rebecca Wheeler’s Tours
If you and your double date are looking for something led by a specialist, Rebecca Wheeler’s tours are exquisite. Rebecca Wheeler is a traveler and a cooking instructor. She can lead you through Chicago’s neighborhoods and share her deep knowledge into the culture and history of the food and locations that you visit. All of these tours are private, which makes them much more intimate than a large group tour. Currently Rebecca offers tours of Argyle (Southeast Asian cuisine), Chinatown (Chinese cuisine), and Devon (Indian and Pakistani cuisine). For 4 adults, the price per adult would be $93.75, but this price lowers for every adult you bring with you!
Geek out at the Adler Planetarium!
Adler After Dark
The Adler Planetarium hosts a popular 21+ event once a month that transforms the museum into a prime adult entertainment hotspot. You are allowed to peruse the museum itself in the company of other adults rather than the rambunctious families that usually occupy the space. If you have never been to the planetarium, they have a large variety of exhibits that are all expertly designed. The Astronomy in Culture exhibit takes you through the history of astronomy and teaches you about old tools like the astrolabe and how people used them before navigational technology existed.
Chicago’s Night Sky
Another popular exhibit is Chicago’s Night Sky. It focuses on the problem of light pollution and how we can change our design philosophies to lessen the problem. This area includes the Historic Atwood Sphere that lets you see what the night sky would have looked like in 1913 without any light pollution. The Atwood Sphere is also the oldest planetarium on exhibit and recently got refurbished. Other popular attractions at the Adler Planetarium includes the Clark Family Welcome Gallery, the Community Design Labs, and the Doane Observatory. You also have access to unlimited sky shows in one of their state-of-the-art theaters.
Other Adler Events
Along with all of these great exhibits, the Adler Planetarium hosts live entertainment, lectures, and special guests depending on the theme of the month. They also provide themed alcoholic beverages, as well as food from their café. The food isn’t your usual basic fare. They often have an impressive menu including a hotbar stew, soup, and daily specials that range from turkey and goat cheese wraps to astro burgers. The price of these tickets are $25.00 per adult, but if you happen to be a member, they are only $12.50.