“I too am ferociously alive—and I lick my snout like a tiger who has just devoured a deer.”
Água Viva — Clarice Lispector.
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The other world is the Alive one. If only they would know!
Qur’an 29-64
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When it comes to the New Year, any "new" year, there's always a piece of January that's legitimately a continuation of December.
Think of it as the "old" refusing to make way for the "new", if you like. However we choose to consider it, though, all it is is a reminder, a reality check, that the "New" in New Year doesn't actually mean "reset" "restart" or "reboot" as much as we assume it does. As much as we'd wholeheartedly wish it does.
When it comes to the New Year, any "new" year, there's always a piece of January (and then the rest of the year) that's legitimately something unique.
Something completely unlike December or any of the months preceding it. Think of it as the "new" doing its thing. Trailblazing. Refreshing. Innovating. However we choose to consider it, though, it's only a piece, a part, a chapter of our personal and professional and social lives that sets sail like this. Not a complete rewrite. Not a reset, a restart, or even the much-coveted reboot. As much as we wish that would be.
When it comes to the New Year, any "new" year, there's always a piece of January that echoes something in the previous year.
There's always something of the old year that has echoes in the new year. Variations on a theme. Iterations on ideas, and experiences. Musical refrains. However we choose to consider it, though, this part of our year exists amidst and right alongside the old year that's imposing itself on the new... and the new year, relentlessly in motion, creating ever more distance between itself and the old.
It's all definitely an experiential balancing act of lessons we learned, lessons we're learning, and lessons we have yet to learn.
It's also a graduate-level experience in human focus. That is, with so much past, present, and future rushing all around and through us, there's infinite distraction in play every minute of every hour of every day.
And that can be a bit much.
In response to that reality, I’m reminded of a technique that’s used for behind-the-scenes videos, especially travel videos. Which is to point the camera, hit record, and ask the person in front of you —
“Where are we and what are we doing?”
It’s a fantastic technique, by the way, with which to stitch together a compelling behind-the-scenes presentation. It grounds the viewer even in the absence of further narration. Which is exactly what it does when you apply it to the stream of real-time life.
“Where are we and what are we doing?”
There has to be, you see, some way to ground ourselves in the stream. To maintain our course in the stormy present.
To keep our eyes on the ball.
Because it’s very very easy. To get lost in the New Year. And all the different things going on in it.
😕
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Oh, living is so uncomfortable. Everything presses in: the body demands, the spirit never ceases, living is like being weary but being unable to sleep – living is upsetting. You can’t walk around naked, either in body or in spirit.
Clarice Lispector, The Stream of Life
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