As I say good-bye to 2016, I am ready to move forward. It can be so easy for a mind to wander to the hard parts. There have been a lot of those, especially in the last six years, but especially the last 12-15 months. The end of 2015 was so physically and emotionally difficult that it was the first year that I did not even bother to set one single goal for 2016. This is normally my favorite time of year. I love fresh slates and new beginnings, but this past year, pretty much started out in survival mode. Who am I kidding? Most of it has been survival mode. By the fourth quarter, it had begun to take a turn. Almost a whole year from when it all took a hard and scary turn. I am finally starting to feel better and able to do more. Healing is a process, but I am finally moving forward. I vacillate between being overjoyed and still a little shell shocked at what I have gone through and of the recovery process ahead. As the new year dawns, it reveals the struggle I have with focus after such a traumatic year. I am still healing and still a little shell shocked. But I am standing. Literally and figuratively. And the thing is, this is my one and only life here on earth in this place and this time. I do not want to waste it being shell shocked or focused on a time that was unbearably physically and emotionally difficult. I just don’t.
But it’s hard. You know, to do the work, the mental and physical work. But I’m not a stranger to this. Well, maybe the physical part reached an all time low (and this is coming from the person who could barely use her hands at all for almost all of 2013), but I have lived and thrived through hard stuff for years, so it’s back to basics. Starting. Baby steps. Doing the right things. And I know the more I do these things, the better it will all be. The better I will be.
So tonight and over the course of the next week or two, I’m making lists, setting goals, and being intentional with my focus for the upcoming year. I am making a plan. And I know the more I do these things, the more it will begin to feel like my life again. And in some ways even more than it has in the last 11 years. I have a pretty exciting story to share about that in another blog post.
I will be blogging and sharing more on what I am doing this year. I will be writing more, posting more, taking more pictures, spending time with my inspirational journal, and focusing on all the good I can find, create, do, or be.
Happy new year to all the beautiful warriors out there walking your own brave paths! This year will be our year. To everything there is a season. It’s a new season.
What are your plans for the new year?
Hi. Thanks for the beautiful true words. Yes. You do have courage to take actions in your life. I wish you all the very best for the new year and good luck 🍀, love and peace.
Hi Dinushika! I wish you the very best for this year, too.
Ah… what a WONDERFUL BLESSING to read your words and I join you in those baby steps, my dear friend!
Your strength and relentless faith is INSPIRING. Your heart is reflected in everything you write and everything you create. I cannot WAIT to read more, see more, soak in more of all you have to offer this world. It needs you. Oh, how it needs you. <3
Oh, my sweet friend. I just love you to pieces, Christine. God is my ever present hope. No matter how hard and how scary, He is there. I know we would all rather not go through the hard stuff, but if I’m going to go through it, I can’t imagine for one second doing it without Him. Over the few years, He has shown up in some pretty amazing ways, some big, some small, but you know it is Him.
Here’s to a year of taking all the baby steps we need to get to the next place. Love you. xo