What I Learned in 2019 

A new year is full of resolutions and fresh starts. It’s exciting, right? But let’s be real, it is also a season of disappointment with unmet goals and dreams that we hoped to have accomplished by now. It can be a season of fear and expectations can overwhelm us if we focus on the unknown. We see a bright future, big possibilities and hope. At the same time we experience our humanness, failures, and unmet desires. It can be tough to balance these differing emotions at the same time and find peace with them. 

I have been mulling on this. I have lived enough life to know that basing hope and joy on dreams is a house of cards sure to tumble. On December 31st I jotted down things I learned and am still very much learning. 

Here it goes…

• Our first and foremost priority is to care for ourselves. Nurture our soul so it can thrive, be vibrant, and full of love. No one can do it for us – it is something we each must do for ourselves. Life lived well starts with this. 
• We are human. We are not perfect and never will be. We are not neat, clean, and well oiled machines. Expecting ourselves to perform as one will cause disillusionment, frustration, and resentment. It will cut off our very hearts and true potential. Grace for ourselves is so important. 
• Things never go as planned. Never. Plan on it. Enjoy the adventure! The scenic route is more beautiful, inspiring, and thrilling anyway. 
• How it’s done is more important than what is being done. Met goals taste bitter if the method to get there was out of alignment with our soul. 
• Vision cycles. It is vibrant and strong; then it fades and gets cloudy – this is SCARY, but hang on and lean in. The fade is purposeful and it is taking us somewhere, so respect the vision and hold it loosely because it cannot be forced. The key is to TRUST it is there and it will come when timing is right. When we are ready for it. 
• Life is always moving, changing, and shifting. Fighting the current of change is useless, it is stronger than us and fighting it will exhaust ourselves and others. If we dig in our heels and refuse to move with it we become stagnant. Feel the movement and step in with courage, that courage will enable others to step forward also. Ride it, appreciate it, and allow it to take you around the next bend – it could be something that takes your breath away. Change is incredibly vulnerable because there is no certainty how it will end, but change is good. We are allowed to, and are supposed to change. Change is beautiful.

2020 is alive, it is potential, it is an opportunity. It is golden morning sunbeams of hope. It richer than a glass of red wine, pasta dinner with friends, dark chocolate, and deep cobalt blue paint streaked on a clean canvas. Feel the WONDER. Yep, we will fall on our face. We will make mistakes. We will miss deadlines and overcommit and not get enough sleep. We will let people down and we will forget what’s most important. We will feel discouraged. We will doubt ourselves. But we will get back up again. We will learn. We will become stronger, wiser, and more graceful. We will learn to live with open hands instead of strong arming. We will do it all with tears, laughter, and a grin on our face. 2020 will be a “successful” year if we show up with our whole heart, pause instead of react, dance with the ups and downs, feel joy and sadness because all feelings are a gift. 2020 will be a “successful” year if we see the beauty in the many mundane very normal days. Most importantly, 2020 will be a “successful” year if we follow our light, even when the light is only a glimmer, with our WHOLE being.

2020 friends – shall we do it?