Thoughts in the new year.

At times like these, at the beginning of a brand new year, I look back on my life and I see a mixture of both fortune and misfortune, victories and failures, joy and pain. Some parts of my life give me a sense of pride and accomplishment and I feel so much gratitude.  But other parts of my life fill me with regret, and sadness.

What to do with this sense of regret? How do I process it? In what file in my mind do I sort this? The past is gone. I cannot change it. It's there, irrevocably. Mercilessly. Somehow, this reminds me of the all-ness of reality. The all-encompassing universe. There is nothing "outside" it, so therefore, everything in it belongs. Trying to exclude, deny or repress any part of it will cause an imbalance, a disturbance and subsequently, a problem.

Energy can not be created, or destroyed. Only transformed. It can be used, re-used, and recycled. We could look at all our life experiences that way. They are like energy, actually they are energy. We cannot get rid of them, but we can transform them, and they all, whether we like it or not, mysteriously belong. They play a role in the weaving together the story of our lives. Even if we have had life experiences filled with failure and pain, they too can be transformed into valuable life lessons. They can strengthen us and serve as tools that break us open to deeper places. We can recycle any hardship into new and usable energies and experiences, insights, power and motivation.

Nietzsche said, "You have it in your power to invest everything you have lived through- your experiments, false starts, errors, delusions, passions, your love and your hope- into your goal, with nothing left over (my emphasis)."

I love how he says "with nothing left over", meaning everything is usable. Even our worst nightmares, and disasters can be transformed into something positive if we so choose.

"I assure you, I'm not put together at all. Nor am I broken. I'm recovering- finding the beautiful in the ugly and stitching it into my life." -Rachel Wolchin

I went to see the movie Wild, based on the book with the same name. It's a story based on the actual life of Cheryl Strayed, who felt the urge to walk the Pacific Crest Trail, alone, in order to return to wholeness and to make sense out of her life. One of her final conclusions, after thousands of miles of walking and, after looking back on her life with all its ups and downs, was "What if yes was the answer instead of no? What if what made me do all those things everyone thought I shouldn't have done was what also got me here? What if I was never redeemed? What if I already was? How wild it was, to let it be."

It all belongs.

Here are the lyrics of one of my favorite songs, that resonates with what I have written in this little New Years message.

“I lived” by One Republic

Hope when you take that jump
You don’t fear the fall
Hope when the water rises
You build a wall

Hope when the crowd screams out
They’re screaming your name
Hope if everybody runs
You choose to stay

Hope that you fall in love
And it hurts so bad
The only way you can know
Is give it all you have

And I hope that you don’t suffer
But take the pain
Hope when the moment comes
You’ll say…

I, I did it all
I, I did it all
I owned every second
That this world could give
I saw so many places
The things I did
Yeah, with every broken bone
I swear I lived

Hope that you spend your days
But they all add up
And when that sun goes down
Hope you raise your cup

I wish that I could witness
All your joy and all your pain
But until my moment comes
I’ll say

I, I did it all
I, I did it all
I owned every second
That this world could give
I saw so many places
The things that I did
Yeah, with every broken bone
I swear I lived

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0rxydSolwU

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