New Year’s Eve is always a tough holiday for me as it reminds me of my death – it reminds me that life is impermanent and it is constantly changing. It reminds me that we need to continue moving forward and to not hold onto the past. The past tells us where we have come from, but it does not define us. Every New Year brings the possibly of change – it brings is a new celebration, and a new breath of life. Or we like to think so.
Most of us forget our New Year’s resolutions and become consumed by the monotonous routine of daily life – working, paying bills, tending to our family and friends, and possibly juggling classes, work, and a social life, and hopefully getting enough sleep in between. Most of us keep moving because the clock continues to tick and we are afraid that we will never have enough time to get anything done. When the clock constantly ticks in our ears, and in our subconscious, we forget to relax and take care of ourselves.
This New Year, I invite you to pull back from watching the ticking clock, and counting the hours that pass by. I encourage you to step outside and take a breath of fresh air. I encourage to you forget about the clock for just a couple of seconds so that you can enjoy the sacred moments that pass by us that go unseen and unfelt. In our fast-paced society, it feels almost impossible to pull back, breath, and collect our thoughts. When we don’t have time to process, our health begins decline on many levels – spiritually, mentally, emotionally, and physically.
Western culture works as a machine, which never slows does and constantly continues to run – burning the oily memories of our ancestors – literally running off of fossil fuels which contains the history of the Earth. When the parts break down, we just replace with new ones and throw the old broken parts away – forgetting where we come from. The machine needs to slow down so it can receive the repair that is really needs.
Take this New Year as the year to do self-repair – find where things are running slow and dragging you down, and repair it. If we do not try to begin to work on ourselves then the machine will start to become rundown and eventually break. The Earth and every living creature is counting on you! Let there be many new New Years to come!