Happy 2024!

I had a rewarding career in post-secondary education. Living one's life through semesters gave me the ability to start anew each term. If one particular semester was stressful, I could always look forward to the beginning of a new semester where I'd have a fresh start. New Years is the same. It's that time of year where we get to evaluate our lives, re-set our goals, and make plans for something new. It's an exciting time where hope can spring eternal, and it's hope that we need now more than ever. As our planet undergoes significant change, our souls are yearning for more. What does your soul want?

As you commence the new year, I thought this poem by Irish poet and philosopher John O'Donahue would be fitting:

FOR A NEW BEGINNING

In out-of-the-way places of the heart,

Where your thoughts never think to wander,

This beginning has been quietly forming,

Waiting until you were ready to emerge.

For a long time it has watched your desire,

Feeling the emptiness growing inside you,

Noticing how you willed yourself on,

Still unable to leave what you had outgrown.

It watched you play with the seduction of safety

And the gray promises that sameness whispered,

Heard the waves of turmoil rise and relent,

Wondered would you always live like this.

Then the delight, when your courage kindled,

And out you stepped onto new ground,

Your eyes young again with energy and dream,

A path of plenitude opening before you.

Though your destination is not yet clear

You can trust the promise of this opening;

Unfurl yourself into the grace of beginning

That is at one with your life’s desire.

Awaken your spirit to adventure;

Hold nothing back, learn to find ease in risk;

Soon you will be home in a new rhythm,

For your soul senses the world that awaits you

Taken from the marginalian

https://www.themarginalian.org/?mc_cid=15766b4a6b&mc_eid=a4198011b8