Every year, as January 1 approaches, people in many countries around the globe reflect on the year that passed, and plan their hopes and dreams for the year that’s coming. The goals we set for the person we’d like to be in the new year are called “resolutions,” and I, for one, am tired of breaking them.
Every year I resolve to lose weight, yell less, achieve more, write in my blog once a week, take better care of all sorts of things from animals to laundry to my mental health, yadda yadda yadda. And every year I forget these goals after a couple of weeks.
While I do still have some goals for myself for 2025, what interests me more are the goals that perhaps we ought to set as a people: the human race.
I’m a spiritual seeker, and for years, I have heard folks in spiritual modalities from across the globe talk about a new age. A new church, a new spiritual era, an age of awakening, a new astronomical age, a second coming, whatever. Every faith system seems to have some version of this. And year after year I think we are approaching some massive awakening, where people will come to their senses (myself included) and shift into a more compassionate world with goals that revolve around love and peace instead of weight loss and promotions (though I would love those last two things also, how could they not bring more love and peace, right?).
Now I do believe these things are happening, but slowly, the way grass grows. And I wonder what condition we’ll be in when the wheat is ready to harvest. Today, I write from Stratton, Vermont, where the weather has warmed up enough for rain to fall and the snow on the mountains to melt, rendering skiing near-impossible. Vermont has also been the unlikely—or so I had thought—victim of serious flooding twice in the last few years. This is a state that relies on tourism, and it is not alone in its struggle to trudge on despite the weather.
Our changing climate hurts all of us. To claim we have no impact on our environment means also that we have no choices, that we are powerless victims.
Is that how we see ourselves? If so, we can never awaken. We can only haplessly crash into those around us, experiencing life by accident, with no stake in the game and no meaningful triumphs or struggles. No meaningful life.
I believe it is our duty while on this planet to cultivate relationships. I think there is no higher calling. We are here to love, to experience love, and to experience the hard things also that make love significant and precious. We are not just here to love each other, but to love the world we live in, its creatures and plants and weather and geography. We ought to be in awe.
To be in awe is to gaze at this tiny blue planet, apparently alone in the cosmos, a bright speck of life amidst darkness. What a miracle. How did it all begin, how did it get here? And how could it not be our job to care for this living organism that supports us?
I don’t write this to tell you all how great I am at caring for planet earth. I have deep anxiety about the massive carbon foot print I leave in my wake. I have work to do.
But I guess what I’m hoping to say is that awakening often starts small. With awareness, yes, but also with curiosity, reverence, awe, wonder. To get anywhere near peace and love, we must hold those other things too. With wonder, we can speculate about what we see, in our environment but also with other humans. With curiosity, we can learn the “why,” and the “how.” With reverence, we can hold compassion and take a beat before we define the things we see. And with awe, we can see the magic in anything.
Remind me that I waxed poetic about awe and wonder and reverence the next time you see me yelling at my kids. Hopefully, I can savor the small things better in 2025, and become the awakened person I wish myself to be, or at least grow a bit more in that direction.
Wishing you all a happy new year!
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