New Year’s resolutions are a bit like babies: They’re fun to make but extremely difficult to maintain.
2010 is nearly over…2011 is approaching rapidly. What does it mean for you?
For some, 2011 will mean graduation…marriage…the birth of a child. Maybe, like me, 2011 mean a change in location or job. For my father, as I mentioned before, it means retirement. For others, maybe 2011 is not starting out the way they would have hoped.
A new beginning. A chance to start afresh. To turn the page and begin a new story. To take the bull by the horns. To turn over a new leaf. We say them. We might even believe them. But is it enough?
What would you like to change in the new year? What are you willing to do to make it happen? Is it something that is within your power to change? If not, are you willing to accept it and move forward anyway?
Obviously, some issues run much deeper than others, but have you at least thought about how 2011 might be different for you? What steps you might take to achieve the change you desire or the progress you want to make? In other words, do you have a goal in mind?
Each year, millions of people resolve to lose weight, exercise, eat healthy…to read more, watch less tv, spend more time with family and friends. To find a new job, to do their job better, to work on their marriage, to go back to school.
But what is the key to success? What makes some people able to commit to change and see it through? In 2 Corinthians 5:17 we read “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come; The old has gone, the new is here!”
The old is gone…I think that may be the step that most of us miss. Getting rid of the old…whatever the old may be. Maybe it is a belief or ideal…maybe an emotion or feeling. Maybe its something tangable…a vice that we need to be rid of. Before we can move onto a “new”, we must determine the “old” and deal with it accordingly.
For last year’s words belong to last year’s language
And next year’s words await another voice.
And to make an end is to make a beginning.
~~T.S. Eliot
What will next year’s words have to say? Will its voice be your voice? Will you make yourself heard? To make an end is to make a beginning…what is it you need to start in the new year?
My prayer for you is not that all your dreams come true, for I have wished for and received things that weren’t what was best for me. But that in the midst of reality, you might find the courage to do what needs to be done, the wisdom to know which path to choose and the peace to accepts them both. May God walk with you and bless you in 2011.
The changes in our life must come from the impossibility to live otherwise than according to the demands of our conscience not from our mental resolution to try a new form of life. ~~Leo Tolstoy
Writes 4 Him 