may you be healthy, happy, and holy... and keep on re-creating
“In the ancient understanding the web of life inevitably becomes worn and torn in the course of a year. The world becomes diminished by mistakes, misdeeds and losses and needs to be renewed.” ~ Michael Meade
Today is January 1st, 2024. To me, it really sounds like a number from the far future, even more so than when we celebrated the new millennium in the year 2000. Holy shit, that was 24 years ago - an adult person’s lifetime length of time?! And I do not remember where I was and what I was doing at the time. I do remember who I was with, and I wish I didn’t remember that. Anyways… No matter what they say, I personally love reflecting on the past - not because I wish things didn’t end and certainly not because I wish I was in my twenties again - but mostly because I like to remember where I have been at times, what I have been doing, what was my world like back then, what was going on for me, how different was I and how have I been changing since.
It’s not 2024 yet when I am working on this post. It is a few days prior to the new year’s eve. Every year I find myself reflective at this time, as I am assuming most of you are as well. Aside from reviewing the past year, I was also trying to remember what I did for New Years Eve previous years - it’s been a quiet evening and the fire ceremony with guests and colleagues in a retreat center in rural Portugal where I was living and working in 2022, a beach party in Nusa Lembongan (a small island next to Bali) in 2021, staying at home and joining a SLAA online meeting (Sex and Love Addicts Anonymous) in 2020, a dinner with a new hot date in 2019, in Hanoi - alone, anxious and lost in 2018, can’t recall the NYE in 2017, in a silence solitude retreat in 2016 and 2015… This year, I’ve decided to welcome 2024 with a very new community that I recently became a part of - a fun, loving, open-minded, curious, kinky - a breath of fresh air. Like the ugly duckling discovering his tribe of majestic swans and realizing that he has always been one of them - this was my experience when discovering this community, and embracing this feeling that I have always belonged, and that I have just found home that, for some reason, I was removed from for a while.
I spoke about renewal in my previous post; renewal that comes with the winter solstice. Today, we are in a similar realm - the one of re-creation. When we think of the past year, I am sure that I speak for most of us when I say that, globally, collectively, it was filled with so many conflicts and tragedies, and left many of us with anxieties, mentally and emotionally drained, and spiritually confused and maybe even in doubt. It seems that we would all benefit by leaving all that behind. But, rather than just turning a new page, turning our heads away and forgetting about the past as if we are not going to learn anything from it, we could start from the beginning of time, a new countdown. Everything can and is starting over. But it’s like a second chance to do things differently this time. So, while we are preparing for a whole new year, a new beginning, let’s not forget experiences and lessons from the past.
“By symbolically participating in the dissolution of time, people could be temporarily delivered from their faults and failings and have their original life potentials restored. This deeper understanding of starting anew did not depend on resolutions for the future as much as on acknowledging the mistakes and losses that occurred during the passing year.” ~ Michael Meade
How do we, then, avoid dragging those past mistakes into the future, along with the feelings of guilt and shame around them, and instead - through reflection and forgiveness - release them all and move forward renewed and different, changed? We probably all know by now that without letting go of the old ways, of the old mistakes and behaviors, there is no meaningful change as one cannot really connect to the new energy of creation and renewal. Forgiveness - for ourselves as well as for the others - seems to be the magic component, if we are to visualize a new and better world, and a new beginning.
In his most recent podcast episode, Michael Meade speaks of an ancient thought that the renewal of time - the renewal of the calendar - used to be seen as a renewal of the world. According to the old tradition, in the end of the year the time would stop and we would enter a period of timelessness, somewhere between Christmas and New Year’s Eve. And, so when the New Year would occur, people would be as if they stepped into a completely new world. Isn’t this amazing?! This chance to wash away the past, leave it behind, then spend some time in this bardo - this state in between - only to begin again, anew.
As it was mentioned before, in order for re-creation (renewal) to occur, a sense of chaos needs to happen first. In most creation myths, as Meade shares, chaos leads up to cosmos. Chaos was always considered to be a “divine primordial precondition from which everything else occurs” and according to creation myths, creating and destroying happens almost simultaneously. Cosmos means “order”; it means a “proper arrangement of things”. Chaos means “gaping void”, a “blackhole”, a place from which things emerge. Chaos is there from the very beginning, and it can appear at any time, in any place, and in any relationship, as well. Once it appears, if we don’t find the energy to tolerate it, we won’t find the energy needed for re-creation that is buried in the times of chaos.
There is an ancient story from India, story of Prajapati, who is recognized as the god of creation, and who, as the story goes, created the world twice. His role differs within the various Vedic texts and he is seen as the one who made heaven, earth, water, and all beings; he is the god of all creatures; the chief of gods. The story describes the “two hands of creation” through which the world re-creates itself from emptiness and loneliness as well as pure abundance,
from love of all forms as well as fear,
from sorrow as well as joy,
from freedom of expression as well as pain,
and from despair as well as wonder. The story shows us that we all assume both of these ways of creating the world. Being human can embrace the feeling of being nothing more but a small particle in the vast enormous cosmos; and at the same time human experience can feel like going back home to that moment when the conception of the world start revealing through us.
So, maybe we don’t turn our heads away from the chaos of 2023. Maybe we actually look straight into it, bare with it, tolerate it to say the last, and move from it with a sense of deeper understanding, a sense of connectedness, forgiveness, and an intention to start anew and do better.
“This being human is a guest house.
Every morning a new arrival.
A joy, a depression, a meanness,
some momentary awareness comes
As an unexpected visitor.
Welcome and entertain them all!
Even if they're a crowd of sorrows,
who violently sweep your house
empty of its furniture,
still treat each guest honorably.
He may be clearing you out
for some new delight.
The dark thought, the shame, the malice,
meet them at the door laughing,
and invite them in.
Be grateful for whoever comes,
because each has been sent
as a guide from beyond.” ~ Mewlana Jalaluddin Rumi, The Guest House
Many years ago I stopped doing a traditional list of new year’s resolutions, and turned towards setting intentions instead. Reflecting on a past year and daydreaming and setting the intentions for the year ahead - this has been my ritual. Intentions seem to be more forgiving. They’re also somehow more sacred to me than a resolution that will have me judge and criticize myself first time I “fail” to do what I resolved to do. So, what do you get to re-create in the year ahead? What do you wish for yourself and the world in the new year, and what does the new year expect of you this time around? What was the past year about and what is to be created in the new year? What are the biggest lessons and risks taken in the past year, and why will the year ahead be great for you? What do you wish to discover and when will you be the bravest?… And, in the end, release all the expectations, and forgive for what has been done, as forgiveness is to “abandon all hope of a better past”.
“And now let us welcome the new year, full of things that never were.” ~ Rainer Maria Rilke
There is a wonderful journaling technique, a tool, that a dear friend and a colleague shared with me recently - it is called Year Compass - it is a free journaling tool for reflecting on the past year, and setting the intentions for the year ahead. Feel free to take a look at it and use it, if you like. Some of my reflections and intentions…
The Past Year, 2023
The biggest lesson I learned… there is so much you don’t know about yourself yet.
What am I most grateful for? For being alive again!
Three of my biggest accomplishments - getting off anti-depression meds, letting go and accepting my life, and staying curious, curious, curious…
Three of my biggest challenges - depression, meaninglessness, and fear of financial insecurity. (depression can teach you things)
I owe forgiveness to myself for not loving me more in the past.
I am slowly becoming willing to let go of the heavy feelings towards my parents and their relationship and pain; of the expectation that everyone will like me, support me, love me and understand me; of the need to justify and defend myself and my choices, decisions, and actions; of the insecurities around my work and career choices; of the insecurities around my looks, my body, beauty and sexuality; of the expectations that I should always be well, happy, and joyous; of the habit that I can do everything on my own and I don’t need to ask for help; of the addict/alcoholic identity and mentality; just to name a few…
The past year in three words: Despair - Opportunity - Adventure.
The Year Ahead, 2024
My word for the year 2024 is “marvel” - marvel at people, marvel at situations, marvel at experiences… marvel at life itself. What is yours?
May you be healthy, happy, and holy.
May you receive what you need in 2024.
May you keep on re-creating.
“No, 2024 perhaps won’t be your best year yet.
Nor will it be the worst.
You see, a year is a mosaic of absolutely everything.
Joy, fear, heartache, loss, beauty, pain, love.
Failure, learning, friendship, misery, exhilaration.
Each day, each moment even, is a tiny shard of glass in this beautiful, confusing creation.
2024, like all the years before, will be another mosaic to add to your wall of art
A wall that shows the life, you are continuously gifted.
A wall that shows you are human.
A wall of survival.
I wish you many broken pieces of glass this year, my friends.
Because this is living.
And before you march on in to another year of ‘everything’, pause to look back, at the work you have created thus far.
It is quite something.
You are quite something.
Now on we go, my friends.
Onwards we very much go.” ~ Donna Ashworth
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Stay safe. Marina
Lovely article. My perspective counts the onset of each day as a rebirth into my new life. My morning meditation encompasses the visualization of myself in my mother's womb, sensing the warmth of her love. It is in this place that I affirm the mutual love and gratitude I have for my family, friends, and adversaries as well. My birth into each new day is then filled with confidence, hope, and gratitude, helping me live in the moment and not shackled to the ill memories of the past where fear maintains its strangle hold. Thank you for your words--Joe
I like your reference to ‘intentions’ in place of ‘resolutions’. You’re right about them being a more forgiving, softer movement towards somethings without the residue of guilt and shame. It’s almost like intentions are not in ‘time’.
Very nice!! Thank you!!