Another year has passed and with it come the opportunity of starting our new year’s resolutions and working towards fresh goals. I love the idea of starting a new; be it a new month or even phase of our life. It portrays something that is often missing in our daily news or even in our daily conversations, Hope.
While we cannot ignore the conditions of a troubled world, be it economic turmoil, geopolitical tensions, wars and famine. These challenges have been with us in varying degrees for as long as history has been recorded. We see them unfolding, but often it feels like nothing improves at least to the naked eye, sometimes giving the sense that there is no point continuing with the charade of everything being fine.
But with the new year while new troubles may arise, new opportunities also extend their hands to us.
I find it fitting that after the month of Christmas, the season of Love, Hope and Peace we enter the new year. It’s a reminder for us to carry those values into the new year. Christmas shows us that love means sacrifice, that hope can be found even in a humble manger and that peace is something we can all strive towards in interactions with the world around us.
It’s not always easy. Personally, when I am slighted, my instinct is to defend myself, but I’ve learnt that taking a moment to pause before reaction helps a ton in clearing the mind. Small steps like this are part of why I enjoy entering the new year, even if we enter with simple resolutions like spending less time (5 mins or even 1 hour) on the mobile. Even that small change is progress.
Often, when we look toward moving forward, we want progress to come quickly and results to appear instantly. But taking intentional steps in the present makes looking back at the path we’ve created all the more rewarding.
Imagine walking on a sandy beach in haste, then walking on it with intention, taking in the ocean and life around you. Which set of footprints would be more striking?
In The Screwtape Letters, a witty book by C.S Lewis that features two demons, Wormwood and Screwtape, exchanging letters on the best way to corrupt a soul, there is a salient quote from Screwtape. ‘For the Present is the point at which time touches eternity.’
Many times, I forget the blessing that is the present day in search for something I may not find tomorrow or something that I may not need in search of my own greed and ambition.
If there’s one thing to take away from this post, it’s this:
Before the sun reaches its peak in the sky, it passes through the beauty of the sunrise, where not on the sun itself but everything the light touches, is admired. In the same way, living intentionally in each present moment can help us see both the world and ourselves more clearly.
ArrowsInk 
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