Happy New Year!

How was this holiday season for you?

This New Year in particular was very unique for me. It felt different from all the others. Since I spent the week recovering from my final round of chemotherapy, the actual New Year was far from my mind. I remained isolated from most human contact throughout the whole week. My only source of human interaction was social media (which I don’t recommend, by the way.) As I saw all the posts of my network’s reflections, recaps, and resolutions, I felt even more disconnected from the hype.

I watched the New Year happen all around me, but I wasn’t part of it.

The New Year is always a great time for reflection. I like that concept. It’s good to check in with yourself every once in a while. We all love to feel inspired, and it’s important to get intentional with our lives. We can spend so much of our time on autopilot, feeling like we’re merely surviving, that it’s nice to create our own annual check-up.

We could all use an excuse to re-charge and get inspired and excited.

Since I spent this New Year as an observer looking in from the outside, I actually missed out on creating my own inspiration and excitement. No, it wasn’t a fun time for me, but the missing out part itself wasn’t so bad. It offered me the chance to gain a new perspective.

Of all that I observed through the screen, what stood out the most is how we love to label the year. The labels are rampant. Either 2018 was the best year yet! Or it was the worst year ever! And 2019 was going to be even better– an even more impressive best year yet! I love the optimism this time of year brings. It helps us in so many ways.

But can we really define an entire 365-day span in such black and white terms?

I’m not so sure.

Life is more complex than that. For me 2018 was a great year. It was full of fun, hope, and big plans. Life felt like it was on track exactly how I wanted it to be. For that I’m grateful. But it also brought me intense personal hardship. One moment in time turned all the fun to pain, all the hope to despair, and it led to many canceled “big plans.”

In an instant, what seemed like the best year ever turned into the worst year ever. And everything I counted on to define my year vanished.

So which is it? The best or the worst?

Ever since I was first diagnosed with cancer back in August, people said to me, “Screw 2018! 2019 is going to be so much better!”

That’s when I started re-thinking how we define our time. If we wrap it up in neat, tidy boxes, maybe we can feel more in control. Even after experiencing the greatest anguish of my life, 2018 still had many wonderful moments. My personal tragedy can’t erase the good that occurred. I can’t let it define my year.

It would be unfair to give it that power.

If you find yourself defining time this way, I’m curious to know what it creates for you. For me it creates that sense of control. There’s a security in believing we can control the things that happen to us. I either feel excited knowing that I can manifest more and more of the good stuff; or I feel comforted that because the year is over, the bad stuff will disappear with the old year.

But life doesn’t work that way. We really have no control over what will happen in our time.

I used to think that if life was going well for a long time, then something bad was bound to happen. It was like the time Jerry Seinfeld was Even Steven. No matter what happened to him, something else would happen to even it out. It seems a lot of us think similarly. When things are going “too well,” we are often waiting for the other shoe to drop.

A few years ago, I decided to stop thinking that way. I decided that it wasn’t helpful for me to expect something bad to happen in my life because things were going so well for so long. There really is no cosmic connection that makes bad things happen to us when things are going well. I believe that mindset sets us up for more negativity in our lives.

Now I’m glad I changed my mindset.

Though I’d love to find a reason to have something to blame for cancer, I don’t want it to be because I’ve been too happy the past few years.

We can accept what happens to us without letting it define our time.

As I say goodbye to 2018 and welcome in 2019, I no longer feel the need to depend on the safety of believing 2019 be my best year yet.

Sure, it would feel exciting and comforting right now to think it will be, but I actually don’t know if it’s true.

And that’s okay. Today I can say we don’t always need guarantees for things to turn out okay. It’s a powerful and scary belief to take on. I even worry whether I’ll believe it tomorrow, or not. I’ll probably need to learn it again and again in my lifetime.

But I’m hoping it brings me a true sense of freedom, away from entitlements and expectations.

Why would we want to be free of entitlements and expectations?

Whenever we feel entitled, we miss out on gratitude. Over and over the Positive Psychology experts credit gratitude for creating more positivity in our lives. It makes sense. When we think we deserve something, it’s hard to find a deep appreciation for it.

When we think we are entitled to be healthy, we forget to appreciate how good healthy feels. When we expect our businesses to be successful, we focus on how stressed work makes us. No matter what it is, if we forget that health, wealth, and love are gifts that we don’t automatically receive, we forget to see the beauty in what we have.

As 2019 chugs along, I hope it is your best year yet. Actually, I hope it is OUR best year yet. But even more than that, I hope that the twists and turns that come into our paths remain just that, and we can appreciate our time without letting these things define it.