New Year's Resolutions

Nashville notables share their plans for the year ahead.

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After nine months of wishing for a new year we finally made it to 2021.

To celebrate, we checked in with some of the incredible personalities who graced our issues in 2020 to find out their resolutions, hopes, and plans for the year ahead.

MICKEY GUYTON

Country artist

My New Year’s resolution is to give myself grace and not be so hard on myself. I’m coming into motherhood and I know I won’t be perfect. My goal is to be OK with not being perfect.

DEE PATEL

Managing Director, The Hermitage Hotel

My hope for 2021 is to see more humility and flexibility. 2020 was a year that required us all to pivot, forcing us to embrace reality and empowering us to recognize both opportunity and clarity that comes from a crisis. How we embrace and champion these opportunities will define our narrative and craft how we tell the story of overcoming adversity to our grandkids and loved ones for decades to come.

KRISTIN CAVALLARI

Founder of Uncommon James, TV personality, Author

I hope for 2021 that we have more peace, compassion, and empathy. I think we all need a little more love right now.

DAVID W. ADAMS

CPA/PFS, CFP, Founder and Principal David Adams Wealth Group

In 2021, I am hopeful of getting back to “normal” or whatever that means going forward. Personally, I look forward to continuing my Retire While You Work™ goal of three to four international trips a year, and business-wise I long to have clients back in the office to truly connect, hug, and laugh with. I miss that energy!

MARGOT MCCORMACK

Owner, Margot Cafe & Bar

I think my answer last year was to think big. Unfortunately, I didn’t really have the chance to fulfill that plan. 2020 had a different idea—to think small. I think many of us have reveled in all this new free time. Time well spent with family or alone. Baking, reading, gardening, exercising, watching movies. The things we say we would do more of if we only had the time. Perhaps it has allowed us to define and carve a new path. Working from home and Zoom calls may become the norm. I don’t think my generation has truly ever struggled or suffered the way generations past have. I have been impressed with the resilience people have shown. We can all use a more down-to-earth approach. I hope we can all push through with hope and fortitude intact.

SHY CARTER

Country artist

In 2021 I want to be the best father I can be to my two amazing children. I hope to be able to spend lots of time with them, having fun and teaching them about life and love. I hope it’s safe for me to perform for people as much as possible, and I want to get as much quality music out into the world as I can. I’m super excited for 2021, and I want it to be a year of success all around. I hope to bring my kids on the road with me sometime, and I hope to have big No. 1 songs!

DR. ALEX JAHANGIR

Chair of the Nashville COVID-19 Task Force, Orthopeadic Trauma Surgeon

In my COVID role, my hope for the upcoming year is for people to stay safe and healthy until we can get everyone vaccinated and finally move past this pandemic! More personally however, I do have a goal for the upcoming year. During the pandemic, one outlet I have found to keep balance is to “ruck.” A simple description of rucking is that you get a backpack, put some weight in it and start walking. You can find me doing this regularly around Radnor Lake, and I even completed my first Goruck event here in Nashville earlier in November (a 12 mile trek around Nashville). My goal for the upcoming year is to complete the GoRuck Bataan Tough event in Nashville in April. This is a 12-hour, overnight event and something I never would have even considered one year ago considering I had not ever even completed a 5K!

CARRIE UNDERWOOD

Country artist

In addition to wishing all of us health and happiness, I hope that in the new year we will remember the lessons we learned in 2020 about learning to adapt and valuing the things that are truly important in our lives.

FIONA PRINE

President Oh Boy Records/Humanitarian and Activist

In 2020 the world experienced a collective grief, and for America in particular a time of fear, frustration, social unrest, great loss—and to our credit—a relentless resilience. My hope for 2021 is that we channel all that energy to come together and hold each other up, help each other heal, and recognize our common humanity. Nothing is guaranteed to us in this world other than we have only each other

ALYSSA ROSENHECK

Photographer and Author of The New Southern

Our shadows teach us everything about our light. Its intensity, its range, and the distance we have to travel to be our own agents of change. 2020 was shadowed with uncertainty, hard truths, and extremes. 2021 is an opportunity to recognize our internal power to connect deeper to our community and change the world around us. 2021 is an invitation for us to do this together—side by side.

ISAAC KIRK

Director of Diversity and Inclusion, Third Coast Comedy Club

Traditionally I don’t make New Year’s resolutions. Every day is an opportunity to reflect and be better than the day before. However, 2020 has forced us collectively to change our routines and the ways in which we connect and communicate with each other which has unearthed a lot of fears and insecurities in me. So I’ll be in the trenches fighting my fears. My biggest of which is that I’m not intentional enough as a dad. I do the flagship things, help with homework, help coach their various sports teams, and assist in robbing other kids on Halloween. But I need to be more proactive with the emotional labor of parenting. Secondly, I need to be a better neighbor and community member. 2020 happened to everyone and has presented us all with monumental challenges and growth opportunities. I want to hear other people’s stories of pain and triumph. Actively listening helps people feel seen, which in turn helps them feel loved and I don’t mind being responsible for more love in the world. Lastly, I’ll get back to storytelling. I love the energy and connectivity that comes with performing. It’s a shared experience that stimulates everyone differently and that’s as close to magic as I’ve ever seen.

KRISTIN G. NGUYEN

RN, Intensive Care Unit at Vanderbilt University Medical Center

I have lofty hopes for 2021. I hope the COVID-19 vaccine becomes widely available as soon as possible. (I will be getting mine as soon as it is available to me.) I hope our nation can unite against this invisible enemy, trust science again, and do what we all need to do to defeat COVID-19 with less death than anticipated so we can all get back to a more normal life.

CARLY PEARCE

Country artist

I learned so much more about myself and my strength in 2020. As I look to 2021, I am determined to continue to live with the inner strength and bravery that I didn’t even know was inside of me. Oh, and I wouldn’t mind having another hit song or two!

VIVEK SURTI

Creator and Chef, Tailor

It’s hard to say how we will approach the new year. While I certainly hope 2021 is better than 2020, my resolution is to stay calm and patient as we continue to navigate this pandemic and to be a helpful resource to my friends and fellow business owners as we try to keep our operations open.

TUWISHA ROGERS-SIMPSON

VP of Brand and Partnerships, National Museum of African American Music

As I reflect on 2020, I am grateful for all the time for reflection and the number of changes it yielded. It prepared me to walk into 2021 with the goal, wish, and prayer to take better care of my mind, body, and spirit. This will enable me to harness more inner peace and continue to be a blessing and consistent example of grace and love.

NICOLLE GALYON

Songwriter

Every year I pick a word for the year. It’s a way to give myself focus and intention. Last year my word was Foundation, which got me back to the basics of my songwriting craft, my values and quietly busy building my newest label & publishing endeavor, Songs & Daughters, from the ground up. And thanks to the crazy circumstances, I got to do it all from the foundation of my hometown in Sterling, Kansas. If 2020 was a launching pad, then 2021 is a time to bounce. So my word for this year is SPRING, which means to arise from something or to rapidly move forward. I am fully ready to watch the things I built a “foundation” for in 2020 start to “spring” up in 2021. I think we all are.

SHAUN BURROUGHS

Co-owner, BUILD Nashville

At the top of my 2021 New Year’s Resolution and goals, is to be honored by Nashville Lifestyles, for the 4th year in a row, as Nashville’s Best Builder. Secondly, I plan to increase the number of homes we build by 25% and retain at least 5 of them as long-term rental properties. My hope is that the virus is short lived in 2021 and small businesses and families in this community are able to get back to doing what they love. Regardless, I have set an intention to stay positive and optimistic, throughout any new changes 2021 may bring.