The End of One Year, The Start of the Next

Five years ago this week I was at the beginning of a 3 weeks hospital stay and this is a summary of the conversation someone from pastoral care and I had right before New Years about the start of a fresh year. It’s a condensed form because the person was there for half and hour then came back and was there for hours later as we discussed this topic. It’s how I try to look at my life at the end of one year and the beginning of the next...

---

The end of one year and the start of another is like moving into a new room in the house of your life. It’s already freshly painted and ready to go on January 1st.

There are many things that will automatically be moved for you that are a part of who you are and will come with you...medical issues, life responsibilities, relationships. With a snap of a finger, those all appear in the next year’s room.

But there are also things you get to chose to take with you. You decide to pack those up in a bag or a box or in some cases multiple large moving boxes. Arguments and disputes that you really could let go of because there’s nothing left to say. Anger and hurt while you wait for an I’m sorry you know you won’t get.

Sure some of those things feel great in the moment or days to hold onto or hold over someone but are they worth walking into a new year with? Are they worth weighing you down for another year? It may be in some situations but that is the question as you pack everything up to take it with you for the next year, is the weight it carries on your soul worth it? If so, pack it up and bring it along for another year. You may be ready to clear it out in another year or 10 or maybe never. It may go room to room with you.

But if it’s not worth it. Clear it out of you. Leave it in the 2018 room. And really leave it there. It doesn’t mean forget whatever happened or be besties if someone wronged you. It’s just clearing that from you so that you can enter the new year and start the new room with only things that you really need to keep. Then you have room for amazing new things and people to come into your life.

None of that is easy. It’s way easier to hold onto anger and the wrong that someone has done to you. That doesn’t hurt them in the least many times but even worse sometimes it does. Do you really want to hurt people? If you don’t want people to hurt you, why would you set out to intentionally hurt someone else?

I clean my moving pile each year before I switched rooms. I’m human. I definitely sometimes take grudges and things I should leave behind but I wasn’t ready to let them go. Then when they weigh me down later in the year, I realize I should have left them behind.

Not everything can be simply let go. Not everything is that easy. But it is that easy to ask the question of is it worth the weight to carry it into next year to everything? Only you know the correct answer for you.

---

The Death Of The Old Year

Alfred, Lord Tennyson

Full knee-deep lies the winter snow,

And the winter winds are wearily sighing:

Toll ye the church bell sad and slow,

And tread softly and speak low,

For the old year lies a-dying.

Old year you must not die;

You came to us so readily,

You lived with us so steadily,

Old year you shall not die.

He lieth still: he doth not move:

He will not see the dawn of day.

He hath no other life above.

He gave me a friend and a true truelove

And the New-year will take 'em away.

Old year you must not go;

So long you have been with us,

Such joy as you have seen with us,

Old year, you shall not go.

He froth'd his bumpers to the brim;

A jollier year we shall not see.

But tho' his eyes are waxing dim,

And tho' his foes speak ill of him,

He was a friend to me.

Old year, you shall not die;

We did so laugh and cry with you,

I've half a mind to die with you,

Old year, if you must die.

He was full of joke and jest,

But all his merry quips are o'er.

To see him die across the waste

His son and heir doth ride post-haste,

But he'll be dead before.

Every one for his own.

The night is starry and cold, my friend,

And the New-year blithe and bold, my friend,

Comes up to take his own.

How hard he breathes! over the snow

I heard just now the crowing cock.

The shadows flicker to and fro:

The cricket chirps: the light burns low:

'Tis nearly twelve o'clock.

Shake hands, before you die.

Old year, we'll dearly rue for you:

What is it we can do for you?

Speak out before you die.

His face is growing sharp and thin.

Alack! our friend is gone,

Close up his eyes: tie up his chin:

Step from the corpse, and let him in

That standeth there alone,

And waiteth at the door.

There's a new foot on the floor, my friend,

And a new face at the door, my friend,

A new face at the door.

#newyear