The days between Christmas and the new year are some of my favorite days every year. There is a hush after the flurry of activity and excitement. The pace slows if I allow it to, and there is time for sitting and pondering, for recollection and quite conversation. I resist the urge to create more excitement or to be more “productive.” Body, mind, and spirit all need to do the work of regeneration and repair that come with genuine rest.
Of course, there is the call to make plans, to set goals, to firmly resolve in the face of a new calendar year. This can be a call worth answering if one answers with a spirit of calm curiosity. Where is the Lord leading? What is his desire for your well-being? Look on the year past with compassion. Notice the ways you’ve grown. Look at all the ways you’ve made progress in relationships. Let yourself look back for a few moments, being gentle as you examine what went right and what was a grand opportunity to learn. Congratulate yourself on doing the hard work that is necessary in the teachable moments life presented.
And if — in the quiet contemplation — you notice something about yourself that you wish to change, ask yourself why that habit persists. Don’t shame yourself; no one was ever motivated to change from a place of shame. If you stay up too late scrolling on your phone, is it because midnight is the only time of day when you have a moment to yourself? Is it because you don’t like to be alone with your thoughts in the dark before bed, so you bombard yourself with light and information until you are so tired your eyes close despite your effort to forestall the dark and the quiet? Instead of condemning yourself and sternly resolving to change the habit, meet yourself with compassion, and answer the need. You might find that the habit changes without effort or consternation.
As you make time for conversation with dear ones and you talk about the year to come, remember that people are not projects. You are not a project. Your spouse is not a project. Your children are not projects. A new year is not an opportunity to demolish and renovate a human being. Let your best goal for this quiet week be to understand one another. Resist the urge to “fix” someone else. Before you offer your opinion or your idea for a solution, make sure you truly understand the person with whom you are talking. Understand so well that that person would agree that you know his or her heart and you comprehend their struggles. Only then can you venture into the sacred territory of compassionate consolation or empathetic counsel.
The same holds true for those conversations you hold inside your head. Don’t berate yourself or bemoan your plight without the fullness of your life. Take inventory of the good. Evaluate the opportunities to grow. Celebrate the successes — especially the successes that come from embracing the process and sharing the journey over barreling toward the goal with reckless abandon.
This was a challenging year. You learned so much. Pour another cup of tea, curl up by the fire and look with joyful hope upon what’s to come.
Foss, whose website is takeupandread.org, writes from Connecticut.
