In the new year, reflect, yet look forward

As we enter a new year, we tend to reflect on the previous. Have we accomplished what we set out to do a year ago? Did we make a dent, at least, in those never-ending projects? Did we even care if the answer was no?

It is funny how we analyze, judge, even pick apart what we did or did not do in 365 days. All the promises and plans often end up as negotiations over time. The weight of importance, or urgency, fades as we decide what we can get away with not doing or conveniently forgetting about. This year, beautiful promising 2021, we look at the previous year differently than we ever have before.

Oasis, an English rock band wrote a song called “Don’t Look Back in Anger” in 1995. They had no idea all the tragedy that our world would see, only where we had come from. The woman in the song looks back on her life without regret. The lyrics even state, “She raises a glass to it”. The singer continues: “It’s about not being upset about the things you might have said or done yesterday, which is quite appropriate at the moment. It’s about looking forward rather than looking back.”

Fascinatingly, the lyrics hint about the Bed-In’s from 1969 where John Lennon and Yoko Ono promoted peaceful hotel stays in protest of the Vietnam War. Similar to Sit-Ins but inviting musicians and others in and writing anti-war songs, hence the birth of “Give Peace a Chance” and promoting Public Service Announcements.

2020 was one big Bed-in for many of us. Quarantined, we stayed in our pajamas reaching out to each other only via technology. Musicians wrote songs about what was happening around the world. We started angrily, we started worried — we were lost. Eventually, we began looking within and letting go. Beauty became what our eyes would see as we looked out the windows. We shifted plans and created again.

We found love in things we hadn’t ever before, or we rekindled a lost love for talent. We watched birds eat from the feeders. We dug in the Earth. Secrets became shared as we realized that everyone else was going through the same thing. Life opened up during a year that we were told to close down. We collectively raised a glass to one another.

My New Year’s resolution will be a collective one, I am sure, with all of you. Collectively, we have come together in the sentiment of empathy and understanding. We yearn to give peace a chance. We are not looking back in anger. We miss hugging, handshakes, and smiles. We miss dance classes, water aerobics, and live music. We miss festivals, conventions, and operas. We miss the roar of a sports stadium and believe it or not, traffic jams after a concert. I can’t express to you how good it feels to converse with strangers.

To emerge from 2020 like a butterfly. To become one with the world. We have the opportunity to give peace a chance and make Mr. Lennon a happy man. Don’t look back in anger. Make 2021 real. Leave the Bed-In. Get out of the pajamas and open your heart to new friends, new opportunities. Soon we will be able to hug again.

Soon we will be exercising and dining together again. The music will fill our souls soon enough. Smile, because those faces are going to need the practice. Welcome, 2021!

Laurie DeBruin CCH,CRR is the owner of Chrysalis Reflexology Hypnosis & Enrichment Center. Reach her at (517) 648.1980.