Thoughts for the New Year

From one of my favorite characters in literature...

"She stirred in her chair and sighed. "It's a funny thing," she said thoughtfully, looking with wide, faraway eyes into the low, red flames. 'The thing life is fullest of is the thing we find hardest to believe in. New beginnings. The incredible gift of a fresh start. Every new year. Every new day. Every new life. What wonderful gifts! And when we spoil things, and life goes all wrong, we feel dismayed, because we find it so hard to see that we can start again. God lets us share it too, you know. Only God can give life, it's true - make a new baby or a new year - but he gives us the power to give each other a new beginning, to forgive each other and make a fresh start when things go wrong."

Spoken by Mother, The Hawk and The Dove, Penelope Wilcock


And from C.S. Lewis...

"If we let ourselves, we shall always be waiting for some distraction or
other to end before we can really get down to our work. The only people who
achieve much are those who want knowledge so badly that they seek it while
the conditions are still unfavorable. Favorable conditions never come."

"Learning in War-Time", The Weight of Glory

New Year's Resolutions, these "these mad-cap capers with our own human wills, these frivolous encounters with our personal resolve," as The Autumn Rain excellently phrased it. When we make these (and I haven't for awhile), we seem to expect some amount of superhuman strength to come from the New Year, so we can carry out these resolutions as we never did in the years before. We fail, inevitably, and wait for the next year to make yet another long list of resolutions.

But if I could choose one resolution, it would be to persevere. And springing off that premise, I would have a list.

There is a beautiful frame right above my bed, a gift I brought home after my past visit with my dear friends. In lovely calligraphy, there is this quote, also from Mother (Hawk and the Dove).

"I would say that because we all have our failings and weaknesses, because each of us is only human, a friend - a good friend - is someone who helps you to persevere. When the going gets tough and you're on the point of jacking it all in, the people you will remember with thanks and love are the ones who helped you, in those moments, to persevere."

And with that thought, I hope to start this new year.

May you all have a blessed New Year.