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2014: The Way Ahead and That Impending Question…
Well folks, it’s here! Can you believe it?! The clock struck midnight and 2014 gracefully pranced onto the stage (or not so gracefully, depending upon the level of drunken stupor). Father Time strikes again, and in his wake blesses us with yet another rotation around the sun (at least we hope).
Shooed from the theater that life is, 2013 now rests its laurels with bygone years that encompass the history of our souls pacing to and fro on this sometimes zany planet. But with no legs to stand on, the past is just the past. It helps us look forward, if we choose to let it, but it’s the present that will do the heavy lifting on the way ahead.
And so it is that that infamous question comes knocking at our sometimes creaky New Years doors. We tremble; we shake lest we stir at the countenance this catechism poses. For some it’s akin to O’Malley knocking at Scrooge’s door – God forbid that we open it, God forbid that we stare it in the face! After all, isn’t life complicated enough without forcing ourselves through such anxious introspection? Isn’t it complicated enough that each New Year we must ask ourselves what direction we’ll be taking?
Ah, but therein lies the risk. The infamous question of direction waits on no one. Ignore it at our peril and we shall reap the consequences. Attend to it with thought, consideration and contemplation, and we may yet be blessed with a spirit that propels us forward through another year on life’s journey. Its nature demands clarity and resolution – a clarity and resolution that is often lost as the months fade through the year, that is, if we are careless with its keeping.
For those of us brave enough, we open the door and welcome its entry. We take a deep breath and garner what power we can, and dive deep within to discover a map of possibilities. Valleys, mountains, oceans and forests lay before us – arrows pointing this way and arrows pointing that way. Straight roads and winding roads, fast roads and slow roads, smooth roads and bumpy roads – all there, begging for our choosing. Some we recognize and some we don’t. Do we dare, or do we dare not? Will we take action, or we will by our inaction, go back to bed and decide to live another day?
Life is decision and action. It implores us to take stock, it implores us to weigh and consider, and it implores us to act with passion, and above all, it implores us to have direction. Anything else is aimless. Anything else is a rudderless sailboat at the beckon of any calling wind – and God willing that we don’t want.
So this New Years, as it does every New Years, it behooves us to ponder what direction to take. Then, and only then, can we rest assured that 2014 will be a year of meaning, regardless the path chosen for the way ahead…
Have a Happy New Year!
For more, check out The C.A.T. Principle: Change, Action, Trust – Words to Live By, a 2014 Global Ebook Awards Nominee available at Amazon.com and Barnes & Noble.
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