With the new year (new decade!) approaching, I’ve been reflecting on where I’ve been and what I’m moving towards. Though progress isn’t confined by a calendar year, a flip of the calendar provides a natural point in time to think about endings and beginnings. Like many people, I find it helpful to choose a word for the year—a centering word around which to orient.
My word for 2020 is: create.
I’ve had an intense fall and December was no exception. Some of the intensity was from good things—completing my 18th marathon (a Boston qualifier), working on some impactful projects, cheering on my kids as they develop in their passions and pursuits, fun holiday celebrations with family and friends—but much of it was not. I went into the holidays feeling burnt out and stuck.
There are some understandable reasons for my “stuckness”. Mostly because I can’t immediately change some circumstances I’m in. I’ve felt depleted by some responsibilities I am committed to for a season which have grown emotionally draining. At times, I’ve been resentful. But yet, I feel like I need to complete them. So, I’m here for now.
I was driving in the car the other day running some errands, turning over a frustrating situation in my head that I’ve turned over many times recently. I was listening to a podcast featuring one of my favorite poet/philosophers - David Whyte. The spoken words of his poem Close pierced into my swirling thoughts —
“Close is what we almost always are—close to happiness, close to one another, close to leaving, close to tears, close to God, close to losing faith, close to being done, close to saying something or close to success, and, even with the greatest satisfaction—close to giving the whole thing up…
…Human beings do not find their essence through fulfillment or eventual arrival — but by staying close to the way they like to travel, to the way they hold the conversation between the ground on which they stand and the horizon to which they go. We are in effect always close—always close to the ultimate secret—that we are more real in our simple wish to find a way than in any destination we could reach. The step between not understanding that and understanding that is as close as we get to happiness.”
These words immediately resonated with me. In my current circumstances, I’ve felt close to many things. Close to breaking through. Close to giving up. I was reminded that this isn’t just me in my own personal here and now. It’s life. We are always close to something. Usually not quite there yet. And often never arrive because when we get to where we thought we wanted to be, there’s something else. And we are closest to happiness when we embrace that what is most real is found in how we find a way.
I have a daily writing practice. Each morning, while our house is still quiet, I make myself a cup of coffee and go sit in our study, curled up in a big cozy chair under an oversized blanket with my journal and pen. Writing for me is process oriented - a practice to get thoughts out of my head and onto the page as a way of making sense of what’s going on in my life. I rarely share finished writing. I don’t often even re-read what I write.
Randomly however, I flipped back to the start of my current journal, the pages of which are now almost all full, to re-read some of my scrawled words. In some ways, I felt defeated realizing how much of my writing from the past few months was focused on the same issues I’m still wrestling with. I thought I would have “solved” them by now. In other ways, I recognized threads of insight emerging. I’ve been writing my way through finding a way.
I noticed how often in my writing, when I was feeling “stuck” in life - I would scrawl the word CREATE in the margin, and circle or underline it. As if my instinct knew that somehow that was the way out.
The word create is powerful for me because it also encompasses other emerging themes in my life—trusting my own voice, creating boundaries… Creating anything demands that you honor your own voice as your unique contribution to the world. And, it’s impossible to create anything—art, space, opportunities—without setting boundaries. Intentionally detaching from some of what is to focus on creating something new.
I recently purchased a new art piece for our study. I love it. It’s a piece by my friend (and a creative inspiration)— Serrah Russell (Sawers). Among her many creative talents, Serrah creates incredible collage—beautifully and intentionally juxtaposing contrasting photos against one another.
This is how we get out./
How to build a new world while still in the old one.
—collage by Serrah Russell
I bought the piece without knowing its title.
Serrah later shared it with me:
This is how we get out./
How to build a new world while still in the old one.
What a beautiful visual reminder to me of my intention for 2020. I can’t get out of my ‘old’ world right now. But I can create something new in the one I’m in. And that process in and of itself is the way out.
Here’s to creating in 2020.
XO,
Amy