New Year with New Meaning

Our bodies have a funny way of teaching us what we need. As I sat down to begin 2023, after a hysterectomy at the end of December, there was only one word on my mind: 

Peace. 

There’s something about going through several surgeries in one year, unprecedented pain and blood loss, and an uphill immune battle that will make you appreciate un-eventfulness. 

I like speed. 

Ah, velocity has always been the name of the game for me. 

Go as fast as you can as far as you can until you can’t. 

Just take a peek at the track record behind me. 

And maybe that’s why we are where we are, or maybe they’re disconnected and environment and genes have played a hand on me. 

Either way, there’s one thing that 2023 is ready to teach me: peace. 

I talked about it with Javi on a Wednesday, I wrote about in my journal on a Thursday, I studied it in Scripture on a Friday, and I begged for it on a Saturday. What a week. 

It was my carved-in-stone intention before the clock ever struck midnight. 

Peace, baby, 2023, the year of peace. 

—— 

I wanted a clean slate, though. That’s what we want from New Years, right? That’s what we’re sold by fitness programs and coaching programs and notebook vendors and all the things. We’re sold the ambition of New Year as a blank canvas and a fresh start. 

And sure, there’s some truth to that - after all, in the Kingdom, every day is a new day filled with new mercy and compassion (Lamentations 3:22-23)… but as the years of big New Year declarations and attempts go by with frustration, I’m learning that the New Year is less about upheaval and more about patience. 

I started Monday with all the new peace-in-mind goals. 

And I’m not inhuman - 

So, of course, those included: 

Christmas decorations down, 

House re-set and polished, 

Meal prep for kids lunches for the month ahead, 

A new nutrition and fitness program, 

And bold business goals. 

[DO YOU SEE WHY PEACE IS MY AMBITION?! My enneagram 3-ness cannot be left to its own devices]. 

Mind you, my friends, I am just 3 weeks post major surgery. 

So let’s be real: 

Christmas isn’t fully put away. 

The house is a bigger mess now than it was before New Years. 

I managed to do just one-day of kids lunch meal prep.

I’ve gotten a mere 5-working hours in since Monday on those new business goals, 

And a mile and a half on the treadmill yesterday put me in bed until noon today. 

The body keeps score. 

——

So I woke up this afternoon (yes, you’re seeing that right), my heart and mind all in a knot about all the things un-done, and in my devotional time wrote something that I hope will serve you (as the catharsis of writing it has served me): 

“Change is hard. Going uphill is hard. 

I want to already be at the top of the mountain, 

to already be experiencing the high of the summit. 

After all, in my mind I’ve already done the hard work of preparations and charting the way. 

But, alas, time. 

I cannot exclude time from the equation. 

It holds its own and demands incremental resistance. 

How annoying this is- to be held back in speed by time. 

My energy, my vision, my strategy, my charisma…

They, too, must submit to the ticking of time. 

So, if I cannot work against it, Lord, 

help me move with it. 

Make my kryptonite my power. 

Tether me to time. 

Give me mental fortitude, resilience. 

Help me fit the daily ticking within the long view. 

And God, not last + not least, give me patience with me. 

— that I won’t forget that this flesh 

has been constrained to time for its glory. 

Let me not rush me, or be unkind to my body. 

The God of everything makes time for the little things, 

and the little things, 

for our curiosity and delight and wonder. 

I submit, 

— to time, 

— to my body, 

— and to the little things. 

—— 

No sooner had I penned my prayer wrestle and put my notebook down, when conviction nestled in my heart: 

This is part of the mystery to peace, isn’t it? 

Patience with the process. 

——

What if the New Year brings better news than upheaval and new everything? 

Maybe subtle, renewed patience is all we actually need. 

She’s less glamorous, but patience might be the key we need to living peace in 2023. 

Be patient with you, my friend. 

Be patient with the process, sister and brother. 

Be patient with the slow ticking of cronos time — 

Your Kairos, your breakthrough, your summit … they’re incrementally on their way. 

~