2025 : A Year of Compassion
I initially wanted 2025 to be A Year of Focus. 2024 got away from me; it felt like the bad news piled on, and I lost myself just trying to do my best day to day. My instinct is to try to work harder, but as I’ve come to learn, that’s been a contributor to the problems at times. If ‘work harder’ was the solution to everything, our world would look drastically different. I know in my heart if I could be doing something, I would be doing it already, so having a Year of Focus wasn’t the correct answer. My second instinct is to ask, ‘Why?’ Why can I not accomplish what I’m attempting to at the time I’m attempting it? Such a self-analysis led me to realize I’ve been treating myself poorly, and before I can focus the way I want to, I must learn to be compassionate with myself.
What is Compassion? At the level most of us have right now, compassion is some form of caring about something that doesn’t impact us or forgiving something that does. However, compassion at a deeper level does not have to forgive at all as we never made a judgment to begin with – and being most of us sit with regrets about our past, we haven’t reached this level yet. Compassion requires detachment, but westerners don’t understand detachment either. Westerners think detachment is apathy, something elections show they’re good at. Detachment only means we remain stable in a changing world or put similarly – something else can change, but that change doesn’t automatically force us to respond.
My instinct to work harder stems from a powerful imposter syndrome, one that is going to take a lot of hard work to quell. As I sit here and meditate on it, I become saddened as I get a better sense of just how far-reaching it is, from my past to my work to my relationships. It is deep-seated and influential. I know one of the consequences of it is I refuse to allow to see myself as others do. Others compliment me, and while I generally do not doubt their authenticity, I refuse to allow myself to view myself in the same light.
I’m not where I want to be with my health, my house, my ability to be creative, or my ability to rest. I have stripped my ability to enjoy life in multiple instances and have mainly become either anxious or exhausted. I address this by trying to ‘soldier through’ it and, get things done in spite of anything, and manage life waiting for the next bit of bad news. I’m glad that through all of this my ability to be kind and thoughtful to others has remained a strongsuit, as such I know I’m capable of doing it, I merely need to learn to apply it to myself.
I harbor a deep inward anger and an equally deep outward hope. Yes, there are a select few others I am angry with, but those are the war profiteers and the exploiters making lives worse for us all – the everyperson trying to get by is generally good, even if they have trouble showing it through the scars of the system. I know I’m a typically good person, too, but I’m very aware my outward expressions have been more painful than I’d like for far too long. Before I can (A Year of) Focus on it, I need to be compassionate with myself. Only endlessly working harder isn’t the answer, even if my heart is in the right place. I know I have positive things to offer, and I’d like that to be the core of how I see myself as opposed to accidental successes. I’d like to believe in myself, and that will take time and practice.