A Passion for Celebration

Life is meant to be a celebration! It shouldn't be necessary to set aside special times to remind us of this fact. Wise is the person who finds a reason to make everyday a special one.

Traditionally the start of every new year is a time for letting go of the past, wiping the slate clean and renewing our hope in a future, both immediate and distant. We are of course most receptive to anything that strengthens our faith in tomorrow. After all, that's where we will spend the reminder of our lives. Our tradition of forward thinking also include a vision of a better life for generations yet to come.

So for the sake of continuity and posterity we invest the future with our best intentions. We try to remain hopeful for tomorrow's children and their children. But we are continually reminded from many sides of dark clouds on the horizon. Hope and apprehension for the future are for ever a running battle. We are told that the future will not be a very nice place in which to live; but a different impulse tells us that where there is life there is still hope.

I've often thought that we allow our past to speak too loudly in its implications for our future. Though very often accused of being too optimistic and even characterized  by irrepressible optimism and a tendency to find good in everything, I am always more willing to look for positive signs than for inexorable doom.

There's a lot of pessimism out there and I'm not buying in. In fact, I'm sick of it. It's hard for me to understand people who say things like, "I'm not bringing a child into this troubled world"; or, " Better we should end it and start all over again."


From my vantage point, the world still has just as much chance at Utopia as it does for Armageddon. Besides, like William Faulkner, if I must choose between a life of pain and suffering and no life at all, I'll take the pain and suffering anytime. No matter how miserable people tell me that existence is for us, I'll never be without hope. I haven't learned how to lose it yet.

When I so often say that we all have unlimited potential, I mean exactly that. I feel certain that the most stunning novel is yet to be written, the most awesome building has yet to be built, the greatest symphony is yet to be composed, the tastiest desert is yet to be dreamed of. There are planets and stars to be investigated and visited - a whole, as yet undiscovered, universe will continue to stagger the imaginations of a thousand more generations. There are breakthroughs still to be accomplished in virtually every field of human endeavor.

From my perspective, I plan to learn from the past and not suffer because of it. Like many before me, I see a renaissance just ahead and I want to be part of it. It's only natural that I wish to join those whose main purpose is to pass along to another generation the accumulated knowledge and inspiration of the past.

It's really not a lot to ask. We have witnessed so many fantastic things and we know with our hearts and our minds that miracles do happen. I ask only that we believe in the simple proposition that it is continued hope which sustains life. And hope arises from the knowledge that we are living in a time of abundant new beginnings. That's cause enough for celebration.

Happy and Prosperous New Year 2011 to all !