Dear 2021,
It’s not fair to your really, the expectations we’re piling on your unborn name.
And really, we were only in her youth when we were ready to send 2020 away.
But the clock will strike midnight, we’ll lay 2020 in ready grave, and celebrate your birth—
And a pandemic will likely still exist.
And expanses of American west will still lay bare, scorched; ravaged by fires.
Racial disparity will still exist. Stocks, bank accounts, a full wallet, jobs jobs may or may not exist.
And on January 1, 2021, you and I will wake up as exactly the same people, programmed exactly the same way as you and I went to bed the night before; on December 31, 2020.
Here’s the catch.
You and I, we’re not responsible for all of our programming.
There’s been a whole lot of 2020 (and maybe a whole lot of your whole life) that’s been completely outside of our control.
Life will continue to evolve, present situations we could never predict.
But you know what you are responsible for? What I’m responsible for?
Mindset.
Fixing it.
Reprogramming.
That’s 100% on you. On me.
Not dependent on 2021 working some magic or on 2020 fading away.
Let go of needing to control outcomes and possibilities.
The happiest people don’t have the most, they’re not the richest, their lives don’t have the best circumstances— but they do have the best mindsets.
They know happy isn’t something external you wait for, it’s something to be right now with whatever you’ve got.
How do we achieve happy, fix our mindset?
The best way the reprogram, to heal, to unlearn the lies destroying your spirit—
Practice gratitude.
Gratitude is a discipline; we may not always feel thankful. Tears may fall, circumstances may be hard. But there are always little things to be thankful for— and it’s this practice of gratitude that gives you permission to live a little larger, fall in love with life a little more— the life you already have.
You start to forget about the have -nots. Gratitude helps us grasp ahold of hope. Takes some of the hurt out of our hardships. Helps us trust in the beauty of a future we cannot see. Gratitude is the only thing that can help us in the now— to fall back in love with our lives right now; to change our mindset, before it’s too late, before we are looking over our shoulder at the missed beauty of a past gone by and we are falling in love with what has been lost.
Let’s practice gratitude now, before we lay 2020 to rest.
“Give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.” 1 Thessalonians 5:18
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