There’s a reason why we every year we do that “resolution” thing at the new year. It has to do with hope.
The turn of the new year is a false sense of new beginning. But it’s one we love to embrace. It’s proof of the enduring human spirit and our attachment to hope. Every year we set out goals then resolve to do more good things, or more of a good thing.
Ultimately most of us fail. And we even KNOW we WILL fail when we set our goals! And yet.
We might NOT fail! And after all, one cannot fail at something one hasn’t even attempted. And this time it’s for realz.
Everyday, everything you can possibly imagine is available. (If you aren’t sure about that, please, just open the Amazon app for a hot second.) The reality of this truth is almost unbearable. It’s easier to make excuses for why we can’t, won’t, shan’t be able to grab the golden ring this time or that one.
We all seem to float through life with a certain amount of willingness to believe: in God, in ourselves, in the goodness of humanity. Some people are inherently more cynical. Some people we know are everlasting bastions of positivity. Most of us swing somewhere in the middle, depending on mood and time of month. How do we face down our resolutions, in this case?
Curiously, the state of the world and its availability to you changes very little, despite one’s chosen attitude. Today, it may be 8 degrees Fahrenheit. But the White Mountains and their hiking trails are still there, available for hiking. Tomorrow, 5:45 a.m. will arrive again, and offer itself to me. I may either wake to it and use the time, or I may lie in and sleep. Either way, 5:45 a.m. has been there. Available.
For me, the stopping occurs when I consider my own ability to change the world. Can I move a mountain or stop time? Nah. But I can change my own choices. And what I do affects others. There’s repeated proof of that, in every human who was ever a child of a parent. There’s proof of that in every movement that ever occurred that succeeded.
So now unto the day, which seems to unfold without effort and promises to send another replication of itself again tomorrow. When I fail to succeed today, don’t worry: mañana mañana. It’s hard to see this day is one important shard of this life’s mosaic. What if I forget to pick it up? What if I forget to gather today into the tide of my one wild and precious life? Is today the day I let myself down?
The questions blur themselves into stone. Another resolution freezing in place.
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