SUNSHINE AURA – self-esteem. self-love. self-actualization. 

Hi again, it’s me.

I took a bit of a break from writing, and I am excited to be back!

Toward the end of October, I visited one of my best friends in Delaware. Shortly after I returned home, I adopted a puppy, and the past few weeks I’ve been focused on helping him settle into his new life whilst growing and learning. I’m finally back in a good routine where I can prioritize writing and connecting with you.

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about December. More specifically, what me and you tend to do in December. It’s the month where I find myself sort of giving up. I don’t mean this to be rude, but I’m betting it’s the month where you sort of give up, too. It’s easier to think, “oh, I will just tackle that in the new year.” Or, “I should just indulge and focus on enjoying myself to the fullest right now,” rather than continuing to show up with the same focus and discipline you’ve striven to attain all year. These are not inherently bad thoughts. In fact, I think they are quite natural.

Human beings run on timelines. We also like them to be linear. We like going from point A to point B, onward to C, and then D, and all the way in a line through Z. We don’t like skipping around, taking different steps, going out of order, moving backward, side-to-side, and finally forward. We like one line, one direction, one destination.

This linear pattern is so not how life works. Think of patterns we see in nature. Oftentimes, they are circular, they zig-zag, they swirl in on themselves in a never-ending spiral. I find myself constantly comparing the human experience to nature around us. In my poetry, I am always thinking up imagery of how humans imitate nature and should just let ourselves flow.

I think this is why we can so easily let our dreams and goals go in December and tell ourselves they can wait till next year. We see December as representing an hourglass that is nearly out of sand. The end of a story. A door about to close. We think we have worked so hard all year (and we have!), so we deserve to just let all the discipline go and throw caution to the wind. We’ll start again next year, which is only a few weeks away in reality, yet feels like another dimension whose threshold we’ll cross in a very cosmic and mysterious way at the stroke of midnight on January 1. It’s the delusion of time that makes it easy to let go and, dare I say, give up.

And I am right there with you! After falling off the blogging train for a bit in November, I nearly convinced myself it was OK to just give up and let it go till next year. To let all the dreams and hopes go. But I decided to come back, because I realized the illusion of time is not as strong as my will to connect with others and to try and add some kind of value to the world. I decided in all areas of my life I have been working on to keep showing up.

The goals you and me have for ourselves are not running on a timeline. It’s great to have a date or general timeframe in mind when you would like to complete a goal, but it’s not necessary. It’ll get done when it gets done. And maybe it’s a goal that never really will be fully done. Perhaps it’s something you’ll need to work on every day for the rest of your life. Don’t fall into the trap that time is running out for you. Time is an illusion. It only has value because we say it does. You are on the right course. Don’t let December go just because a brand new year is nearly here. Finish out with a bang, and keep all your hard work going well into the new year.

Let’s do this.

With love,
Kayla