In the first edition of The Sunday Spark for 2026, I look back on my 2025 theme of intentionality and discuss plans to focus on health in 2026.

Welcome to the 144^th edition of The Sunday Spark, a series with weekly thoughts and highlights, nuggets of learning, and a quote of the week. In addition to my focus on health in 2026, this week’s edition looks at hedgehog highways, music therapy, and advancements in textile recycling.

On my mind this week: Focus on health in 2026

In a recent post on my retirement coaching site, I discussed the value of choosing a theme for the year instead of big goals or resolutions that are usually abandoned once the January enthusiasm wears off. I’ve taken this approach for a few years now, and it has worked well.

For 2026, I’ve chosen health as my theme. More on that later, but let’s first look back at 2025.

My theme for 2025 was intentionality. Being newly retired, I recognized a need to make sure I was spending my time on the right things. Without the time pressure of work, it would be easy to let the days, weeks, months, and even years, just slip away. A focus on intentionality would keep me moving in the right direction and spending time on activities that align with my values.

Here are some ways I lived more intentionally in 2025:

• I started the year by rereading Joshua Becker’s terrific book Things That Matter. Check out my review of this terrific book in this post.
• In February, I did a social media audit and closed a few accounts. I also stopped playing some of the mindless online games that were taking up too much of my time.
• Then, I successfully gave up my personal social media for Lent. And, when Lent was over, I made a thoughtful return. Months later, I’m spending much less time on social media and sticking to my daily time limits.
• Every morning, I dedicate time to prayer, reflection and quiet time before doing anything else. On the rare occasion when I don’t do this, I notice a difference for the rest of the day.
• In the fall, I reviewed the various subscriptions I was paying for—saving $150 a month by cancelling and consolidating some subscriptions.
• I completed my memoir project and printed it in a photo book for my daughters for Christmas.
• And I spent more time reading with a total of 65 books read, including 17 non-fiction books and 3 biographies.

Getting back to basics in 2026

As I pondered my theme for 2026, I decided to go back to basics. In the last four months of 2025, I had some minor health problems which made me realize the importance of good health. It sounds cliché, but without health nothing else matters. With that in mind, my theme for 2026 is health.

When I look at my health habits, I already do a lot of things right. I exercise and walk regularly. In recent years, I drink very little alcohol. I stay on top of my regular health screenings. And, while I’m not a great sleeper, I do keep a consistent sleep schedule.

But there is one major area where I need to do better—nutrition. I don’t consistently get my required servings of fruits and vegetables. And regular readers know that sugar and candy are an ongoing struggle for me. Those two areas will be my primary focus in 2026. Along with nutrition, I need to get back to my goal of 400 minutes of physical activity a week after getting off track when I hurt my leg.

I’ll share more specific plans in my first monthly goals update of the year on Tuesday, but you can expect to see nutrition goals make a regular appearance alongside my fitness and other goals.

Motivation is key

My motivation to focus on health is to be able to travel to visit my daughters. With Colleen now living on Prince Edward Island on Canada’s east coast, and Laura moving to Australia later this year, I need to do everything I can to stay in top form.

To keep my theme top of mind, I made a digital vision board. I made it the lock-screen image on my iPad, and I have a printed copy beside the chair where I do my writing.

Here’s to a healthy 2026 for all! What are your themes or goals for 2026? Let me know in the comments below.

---

Let’s keep in touch! Join my mailing list and I’ll email you when I add a new post.

---

Christmas highlights

It’s important to celebrate big milestones and simple pleasures in life. Keeping the trend going, here are some highlights and simple pleasures of the two weeks since the last Sunday Spark:

• Both daughters arrived home safely for Christmas. We had some tense moments when Laura missed her connection in Vancouver on Christmas Eve because of bad weather, but Air Canada got her on a flight to Toronto an hour later.
• I got a lovely card and Christmas gift from the choir. It was unexpected, but very much appreciated.
• We had a wonderful Christmas Day. We spent the morning at home, and then we went to my sister-in-law’s place to celebrate with my husband’s family. Our great-nieces and great-nephew were so much fun.
• Colleen gave us all matching Cowristmas Vacation t-shirts so we wore them on Christmas Day.
• More bad weather meant we had to postpone our Boxing Day dinner with my mum, sister and cousin. We got together on the 27^th instead. It was kind of nice to have a quiet day at home in between.
• On Sunday, one of our daughters’ friends came over. We played games and had pizza and wings from our favourite local pizza place.
• In keeping with the theme of Christmas 2025, bad weather disrupted the girls’ travels back home. Laura’s flight was delayed two hours, so she missed her bus connection in Kelowna. She had to take 2 buses to get home, making for a very long day. And Colleen’s flight to Charlottetown was also delayed by two hours so she didn’t arrive home until 2:30 a.m. We were sad to say good-bye to them, but grateful for the time we had together and that they both arrived safely at their destinations.

Things I learned this week

Life is all about learning. Here are three things I learned this week:

Hedgehog highways play a role in conservation efforts

Over the last 25 years, the U.K.’s hedgehog population has declined by one-third. An interesting conservation project called “hedgehog highways” helps urban hedgehogs travel between gardens so they can more easily find food and shelter.

The initiative involves cutting tiny holes in garden fences to allow the hedgehogs to travel freely. It’s estimated that 120,000 of these highways connect 240,000 gardens. And it’s having a positive impact on hedgehog populations.

(Source: Reasons to be Cheerful) 

How music therapy relieves pain

Music is one of the oldest healing tools on the planet, dating back to many ancient civilizations.  Research shows it can decrease pain perception by 20%. But how does it do that?

A new study at University of California, San Francisco shows high pain levels signal activity spikes in the orbitofrontal cortex. This area of the brain is highly impacted by music, giving the brain something to focus on other than the pain.

As to which type of music has the biggest effect, it’s whatever music the patient likes best. Queen anyone?

(Source: Reasons to be Cheerful)

Improvements in clothing recycling

Swedish company Circulose has developed a process to turn old textiles and fabric into a material that can be used to make brand new clothing.

Their machines shred old clothes which are further broken down and bleached using chlorine and ozone. A lye solution dissolves zippers and buttons, and the plastic content of the raw material is removed. Then, other machines press and dry the pulp into mats, which are spun into fibres to produce new textiles.

This is a huge leap forward because previous textile recycling could only turn old clothes into products like cleaning cloths or upholstery fillings.

(Source: Reasons to be Cheerful)

Quote of the week

For 2026, the Sunday Spark will feature a quote that struck me during the week. To kick things off, we have a quote from the wonderful Dr. Jane Goodall.

Don’t lose hope. If you lose hope, you become apathetic and do nothing.

Jane Goodall

---

I’d love to hear what you think about any of this week’s topics. Drop me a comment below and let me know your thoughts and ideas.