A gentler approach to starting 2011
Many of us have girded loins, done our planning, set our jaw – and we’re all set up for 2011.
And many of us know just how… dispiriting New Year’s Resolutions can be, an iron bar with which to beat ourselves up some time in the near future.
Here’s a delightful poem from Canadian poet, Tanya Davies. I’m particularly struck by the wisdom in these lines:
permanence is difficult to motivate
and the ability to succeed crumbles underneath the pressure to change
and it’s not that we can’t change
it’s just that to set expectations so high while desiring such a rapid pace
is kind of unsustainable, it makes failing a fail safe
What if personal improvement was not a time-specific commitment
and instead of a fresh start we just kept living
if life was more a circle then a series of beginnings and endings
Here’s the whole poem. And you can hear her reading it here – and this is the best way to experience the poem.
Let’s Go Around Again by Tanya Davis
Last night, we sang auld lang syne
we kissed the ones that we stood beside
and at the stroke of midnight
we all agreed to put that year to bed
we wake up this morning with another fresh beginning hanging over our tired heads
Sooo… what next?
it is time for resolutions, I guess
ok then, starting this morning I will weigh less
beginning today I will lay my addictions to rest
I will overcome
I will not succumb
I will do my best
Words like these are surely being uttered all across the land
people with a concrete reason to forge ahead with a new plan
but there is a flaw in the origin, from the get-go a seed of discouragement
grows from I can to I can’t
Because, although the symbolism is here
all of us with our fresh calendars
our new page
permanence is difficult to motivate
and the ability to succeed crumbles underneath the pressure to change
and it’s not that we can’t change
it’s just that to set expectations so high while desiring such a rapid pace
is kind of unsustainable, it makes failing a fail safe
What if personal improvement was not a time-specific commitment
and instead of a fresh start we just kept living
if life was more a circle then a series of beginnings and endings
and we could still have goals but
perhaps we would just differently tend to things
without an external pressuring
or an internal festering if our resolutions hold on our motivation’s goals was lessening
… we would still grow, we could mend things
by no means
I am dismissing what the new year brings
the kisses or the revelling
the symbols or the reckoning
the reflecting on things
I like to celebrate with strangers on a concrete occasion
and have something sincere to say to them, especially
Happy new year
I’ll take a new page, too
but all I have to do with it is be here
not suddenly improve
2010 can pack it in and 2011 can begin and I’ll be the baton passed between them
carried along
c’mon everyone
let’s go around again.
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And just because it’s so good, here’s her marvellous other poem about being alone.
- It’s (almost) 2011. Stop! Go!
- A plunge into 2011 (and a request for help)
- 11 ways to get focus for 2011
- Start Your 2011 Off On The Right Foot
