A Late (But Is It Late Really?) Start to the New Year

“Three things will last forever—faith, hope, and love—and the greatest of these is love.”

1 Corinthians 13:13 NLT

Happy New Year everyone?

Here’s what happened.

When I took my break for the holidays, the plan was to come back with a hot, fresh post in the first week of January to properly ring in the new year. And then writer’s block said, “Oh no, sweetie. You won’t be doing that.”

And, well, it made a compelling point. Because I really had no idea what I was going to write.

I didn’t have any New Year’s resolutions. There was no list of goals for self-improvement to speak of. Not a vision board was created. I didn’t even have a vague sense of what I wanted 2023 to mean for me.

I wanted to take the pessimist’s way out and renounce the idea of a fresh start in general. Because obviously resolutions are stupid if I can’t manage to them figure them out when everyone says I’m supposed to.

And then I remembered my last post of 2022 and tried to take my own advice.

(Which I am not very good at taking, mind you. In case you have ever read this blog and thought, even for a second, that I’m running a tight ship here.)

Instead of succumbing to the tempting pull of defeatism, I chose to spend my January sitting and thinking about what I wanted for this year.

(Could I have just done that last year? Possibly. But sitting and musing in the middle of the Christmas commotion and general end-of-year shenanigans? Yeah. Exactly.)

Anyway, it worked? I figured out what I wanted?

I ultimately decided it would be good for me to have a motif for the year, something to set the tone, something that I can live my life by for this year and beyond.

So, I chose three watchwords for 2023.

(I’m sure you can already guess what those words are.)

My first watchword is faith.

I know it’s a tired line of conversation, but things have been so chaotic for the last few years. I feel like we are collectively existing in a state of having the rug pulled out from under us constantly. There is literally always something going wrong these days.

And, in the midst of all of that, we have to carry on with our lives. We have to keep moving forward.

I don’t know about y’all but the only way I have been able to do that and stay sane is by finding stability by rooting myself in something solid and unchanging. For me, that’s my faith and my relationship with God.

This year, I’m being very intentional about building that up through prayer.

If there’s anything getting me through 2023, it’s faith. And I’m holding onto that with both hands.

My second word is hope.

It can feel a little delusional to hope for anything these days, but what’s the alternative?

To me, there is very little as devastating as true hopelessness. I don’t think we are meant to live without hope. When we feel like we’re just trudging along, with no way to see the light at the end of the tunnel, that’s when it really starts to seem like everything is crumbling around us.

I don’t even think we necessarily need the big hope for big things. Sometimes, it’s enough to just hope that tomorrow will be better.

I choose to hope that my tomorrow will always be better, even in the moments when I can’t see how.

And last, but not least, love.

Being exposed to as much tragedy as we are daily, it’s easy to feel like we exist in a void and there’s nothing we can do to help anyone. And we forget how much of an impact we can have in the lives of those around us.

In 2023, I want to love those around me. Love, as the doing word. I want to be kinder, more patient, and more forgiving. I want to keep showing up for my family and friends in the big ways and the small.

I want to donate where I can, offer my time to those who need it, carry others in my heart and in my prayers.

I want to give as much love as I can without getting caught up in what I receive in return.

Those are my watchwords for this year.

They’re pretty simple but they have a lot of meaning to me. They are things I can ground myself with as I walk through the year. And, to be honest, that’s really all I need.

So, if you haven’t gotten around to setting your intentions for the year, there’s still time to figure it out. You can still decide what this year will look like for you.

As long as we’re still in 2023, there will be time to decide.

Until next time,

Siobhan 🖊