Turn the Page

I'm grateful that the flipping of the calendar coincides with being ready to get back to life.  My father-in-law's passing left us in considerable disarray, in our Christmas preparation, our finances and, most of all, our emotions. Once we'd given ourselves time to process the latter, we found ourselves in the midst of a crush of activity surrounding the holidays and having extra family in town.  It has been wonderful to have them here, but it's also important to recognize that it adds a level of chaos that we need to deal with appropriately.

Instead, I think we basically abandoned almost all of the progress we'd made in the latter portion of the year; I know this was true for me, and I'm pretty certain Teri would agree.  There were some ways in which that was probably no big deal, or even a valuable hiatus.  But now it's time to go back to work on growing in the ways that we've identified as being important enough to us to do something about.  I'm grateful for the opportunity that the new year brings us to re-prioritize and return our attention to the things that matter most.

And there is an additional lesson to be learned, too, that seems important to me.  If I'm serious about holding onto the gains I make, I need to not get complacent about them every time life throws us a new challenge.