I woke this morning to a mix of unrelated images and seemingly disparate thoughts.
On one side, the somber and desultory scenes from the Australian classic movie Walkabout wafting through my head, counterpointed against a myriad of New Year well wishes for the beginning of the year 5777 on the Jewish Calendar.
All this while on a few weeks of wandering around Europe, partially focused on work but mostly searching to find some moments of realization and reflection in the busyness of my daily life.
Some people choose the beach for this, I choose places rich in culture not my own for the same purpose. Haphazard experiences on the streets of Paris work better for me than sinking into the reflections of sun and surf.
Before first light today, I felt compelled to ask for the traditional apples and honey along with my double expresso and croissant in the all night café around the corner from the hotel in the 9th in Paris where I’m staying.
I’m very cognizant that for this totally secular Jew, the ceremonial embrace of a bit a sweetness on a tart apple as something to trigger thoughts of the year gone bye is a bit of a stretch.
But today, waking to have the New Year already past at home, I do feel an ache of loneliness for family, hopefulness for a good year and in need of emblems to lift my spirits and channel my energies.
I’m hardly comparing my jaunt through Europe at luxury hotels and the welcome of friends to the painful and eerily somber coming of age saga from Nicolas Roe. But somehow, my need for finding the moments in my life this year is triggering this confluence of seeming disconnected images.
And if I can use the amalgam of these thoughts as the kickoff to the year, I’ll take this reset in October rather than rethink and reevaluate what has occurred since January 1st.
It’s been a year of difficulty for many.
For me personally with my mother passing, with the viciousness of the political debate in the states and the rising unease of hate crimes that for the first time in my life since the single day of September 11th, I’m aware that indeed none of us are truly safe from the crazies out there.
All this in contrast to a world in many ways better, more ripe for change than every before.
Where technology has wired people together on a global basis giving rise to layers of community for every interest and place.
Where there is a growing popular understanding, I think, of caring for our bodies, our planet and even the recognition that we should be generally be more civil.
The contrast is palpable though.
So many avenues for communications and community. So little real conversations about the state of the world.
So much possibility as we look at the changes that an entrepreneurial approach towards work can offer, yet the fundamental anger that the election in the states is surfacing about the overt inequities of the distribution of wealth.
It didn’t just occur at this moment obviously, but I’m letting this reflective tradition of the Jewish new year take me for a bit of a ride. And without an iota of religiousness in me, the image of it all seems to be holding true.
If I’m really truthful about this moment, it is as much about me, as the world. My addressing what I need at this point in my life pushed to the surface by the events external to me throughout the year.
And I think that is what makes the tradition of the New Year and the after effect of great art and a haunting story have value.
The only way to impact change beyond ourselves is to make those changes in how we ourselves think and act.
We all need to stop doing shit that doesn’t matter. Stop rationalizing. Stop looking at ourselves in the mirror and seeing how we were rather than what we should be.
There’s an old saying that I often repeat—that the way to make each day better is to always look at yourself as being in the middle of life.
Think it is time to change that as it becomes less true daily.
Time to take more hold of the moments of our days. Lean more heavily on the strengths that we have learned from our experiences and use them better to be more open to the present, to create a new future.
Be smarter. Embrace nuances. Act with more intent. And generally be less content without being unhappy.
Time is certainly not on anyone’s side and that should excite and incent us, not slow us down.
Maybe I’ll change and start each year in October and embrace the variability of the lunar calendar and the emblematic nature of the Jewish new year as my new point of reset each year.
If I can actually have a second chance to make the year better and me along with it for every one moving forward, I’ll take it.
Maybe it’s a gift we should all latch onto.
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As a note, Paris is simply touching me at a new found place. I should find a way to revisit more often.
Pic below is me every morning before dawn, doing my morning words to capture something anew.
