It’s time to mark off another year. It’s time to
put three-hundred-sixty-five days behind us and reach for the next set of
sunrises and sunsets given to us.
Some say to not look back. Some won’t. Some will
just want to look forward. Some though just have to glance back one more time.
Sometimes, they surmise, it helps to look where you were so you know where you
are going and maybe to appreciate the journey. Either way, it can be easy to
look past here and now to the future or to the past.
Still, we mark this time as an ending and wait for
the new.
Nowadays, with social media, the voices seem to
never cease. Somebody’s always talking. And most of the talk seems about, well,
not much, but our own little lives, or more appropriately, our own little
minds, or more to the point, what really lives in our hearts. And, often, that
seems ugly, and petty, and small, and of really very little value.
Politics, TV shows, the sordid life of a movie
star, sports, controversy, shock, glamour, apathy, dismay, agitation, greed,
disrespect, laziness, entitlement, pride, envy, discontentment, hate.
No matter what is highlighted, it is only a moment
before the topic is turned into something political or something personal. And
in the here and now, disagreements are no longer civil. If someone disagrees
with you then they label you as stupid or they toss out other labels without
thought or understanding how those labels can cut and even destroy. End of
argument. Said and done. No mercy. No grace. It must really be such a burden to
always be right and for so many others, or maybe, everyone, to be so wrong.
‘Nuff said.
The talk abounds and has for a long time. Still,
in spite of all the talk and its bravado, so many of the same problems exist.
And whether we realize it or not, all we seem to do is continue to talk about
these same problems or maybe, more appropriately we keep talking around them.
So another year ends, a new one starts. Many take
the new start as a time to change habits, try new things, to work on making
things better.
Call me foolish, but, wouldn’t it be nice, in this
day and age of non-stop talk, constant chatter and endless vocal diarrhea, if
the voices stilled for a time? Wouldn’t it be nice if people were respectful
enough to hear the voices of others and not just hear the words that were spoken
but really listened to those voices, to those words, to those hearts? And then
after they heard and listened to those voices, wouldn’t it be nice if we all
kept our mouths shut for a little bit longer before reacting without any
consideration?
It’s time for a new year. A do-over. A new start.
A fresh beginning. Make of it what you will. Then, listen for the change.
James 1:19: let every person be quick to hear,
slow to speak, slow to anger
Proverbs 18:2: A fool takes no pleasure in
understanding, but only in expressing his opinion
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