Life and all of its delicacies

The holiday season is falling behind us and the cold desolation of winter is coming upon us. It is hard not to feel nostalgic this time of year--to look back on the past year, at all of its faults and successes and see in the foggy distance the makings of a better man or woman. It is this time each year that we assess our inner selves, and see what is lacking. That is why I am a true believer in New Year's Resolutions. The change of seasons, the renewal of the snow and biting rain upon the frozen ground, can also represent what is going on inside each of us. We have had our celebrations, our reunions with friends and families, and there is not much left beyond us but the cold isolation that accompanies January through March. We become snowed in, darkness falls quicker and so we are left to deal with ourselves--without the noise and distraction that spring and summer bring. Less interaction with others outside of our family, more interaction with our inner selves. I believe this time of year brings a certain clarity, but it also begs the question why? For why is it only now, at a certain time each year, that we should be able to grasp the change and pen it down? We need our resolutions to sustain us through the year, to infiltrate our patterns of everyday life and cause change where we need it. Those last ten pounds might not come off, and you might not sit down and write 1,000 words each day (like I every year say I will do) but what about changing our resolutions? Instead of focusing so intently on the actions we know we should be taking to better ourselves, what about focusing on the internal man or woman? Change begins within, and I believe that kind of change can be found in a quiet mediation time each and every day. We need the quiet and in our modern day, the stillness is something that has been lost. We know what everyone around us is doing and thinking throughout the day through our various forms of communication (cell phones, facebook, twitter, BBM) but do we really know what our inner self is feeling and thinking? We've lost something in this great age of technology and that something is ourselves. This new year, and each year after it, let us try to access the heart and soul of what lies beneath those last ten pounds and maybe we will see that the changes we hope for each year will come naturally. This year, instead of a running list of resolutions to eat better and to exercise, or to finally submit my writings for publishings, I'm going to make my list short and sweet. Setting a time aside each day to pray and think, a time to sit in the quiet peace of the chilly morning and know my heart a bit better. To know thyself is to know others. To know others is to know the heart of God. "Peace to surpass all understanding" may be something we find in our morning stillness.