I don’t know about you, but every New Year’s I find myself either extremely frustrated or just completely indifferent about the turning of the old year into the new. By this point in time, I have been jaded in relation to the stereotypical New Year’s goals: lose weight, be a better person, exercise more, be more active in the community, make better grades, etc.
It’s not that I don’t think that these things are possible because they are. However, any goal a person makes is going to require them to be willing to make a change about their lifestyle and persistent enough to maintain their self-control all the way down to their core. It takes discipline and patience through the good and bad days.
The bad news is it’s typical and certainly easy for us to slip up not soon after we start our new journey whatever that may be. It’s because we’re only human.
I believe in hard work. I believe in persistence. And I believe in having faith that you will get wherever you want to go.
But sometimes unexpected things happen and it throws us off. And the sad truth is that we're never ready for the change that is about to take place.
Some of us always have a backup plan. Some of us don't.
Sometimes we find ourselves bitter and angry or sad and lonely about our circumstances. Other times we discover that we thrive in our journey of adaptation because we discover what we are capable of and gain a new confidence in ourselves.
Point is that we all handle the course of our changing years differently.
And, I am no longer naive enough to think that everything in this life is certain.
What I do know is what's right in front of me. That my hopes and desires along with my support system will always help me through the mountains and valleys of my life.
So through all the unknowns, the place I find certainty is in the love I have for my Savior, my support system, and my passions.
Recently I came across this poem that spoke volumes to me because I relate so well to the stage of life that the speaker is reflecting on. Accordingly, I couldn't help but share it with you all.
In reference to "High Wire Darlings" (a combination of essays and poems)
“Sometimes you’re 23 and standing in the kitchen of your house making breakfast and brewing coffee and listening to music that for some reason is really getting to your heart. You’re just standing there thinking about going to work and picking up your dry cleaning. And also more exciting things like books you’re reading and trips you plan on taking and relationships that are springing into existence. Or fading from your memory, which is far less exciting. And suddenly you just don’t feel at home in your skin or in your house and you just want home but “Mom’s” probably wouldn’t feel like home anymore either. There used to be the comfort of a number in your phone and ears that listened every day and arms that were never for anyone else. But just to calm you down when you started feeling trapped in a five-minute period where nostalgia is too much and thoughts of this person you are feel foreign. When you realize that you’ll never be this young again but this is the first time you’ve ever been this old. When you can’t remember how you got from sixteen to here and all the same feel like sixteen is just as much of a stranger to you now. The song is over. The coffee’s done. You’re going to breath in and out. You’re going to be fine in about five minutes.”
By the end of this essay, I was shaken because it made me realize how indulging in the little things is what makes me happiest — drinking coffee and listening to music. Then there's that one instant where a certain song lyric hits your heart and makes you feel things that you hadn't intended to.
Then there are our relationships that affect us every single day whether we notice it or not. The ones that have stayed and the ones that have left have molded our hearts and minds for our days to come.
And those old relationships affect the new. They affect how we approach people. They create a foundation of our expectations in unexplored territory with our developing relationships.
And when or even if we realize these things, then one day we'll look up and not recognize where we are or how we've even gotten there. But we won't know where to go because we are in this in-between place.
A place where we are trying to establish a life of our own but crave familiarity. And that familiarity feels saturated with strangeness because as much as we hate it, it has changed with us.
So we try to live alongside the change but the people we want to call in this moment may not be there anymore. We've loved and lost, and for some, it is no longer acceptable to contact this person.
But in this moment, we're also trying to gain.
Gain perspective. Gain knowledge. Gain experience. Gain hope. Gain new relationships.
You acknowledge that you're an adult but you still feel like a teenager. And you don't know what happened to that teenager who once knew nothing about the world.
There are moments when you want to run and hide from the truth because it's all just a little too much.
But when the coffee finishes and the song ends, it's time to come out of hiding and return to reality.
A reality in which we must move forward.
Love our neighbors, family, and friends with a love that they should not question. Work our hardest at the things that occupy our time. And trust our Savior in ways that are contagious.
For me, this reality is always evolving, always changing.
And so this year, I hope to gain perspective and love others well. I hope to learn how to be vulnerable with someone in ways I've never known. I hope to accomplish new horizons but be thankful for the old.
And I pray that even if my horizons take more time than I envision for myself, that I gain a newfound thankfulness and patience for where life has led me.
Because time is relative.
Everything will be fine in about five minutes.
So I figure, everything will be fine in a year no matter where we are.
