Day 26: Relaxing into Hope
Sometimes we just have to breathe and let hope come to us.
I hope you’re having a wonderful holiday season. Whether you celebrate Winter Solstice, Christmas (and the subsequent Twelve Days of Christmas up to Epiphany), Hannukah, Kwanzaa, all of these, or none of these, I hope you’re feeling the embrace of community and love. I certainly am.
As we’re nearing the end of the “Thirty Days of Hope” and the end of 2024, I’m beginning to reflect on how my hopes for 2024 played out and what I’m hoping for in 2025. As I do that, I’m continuing to enjoy the solitude of a relaxed pace and time at home with my wife. I’m encouraging you to do the same, if you can. Just let yourself breathe and see what comes to you. No pressure. No task list. Just take time to be. That’s what I’m doing today.
If you have to work, prepare for company, watch children, or aren’t able to relax for some other reason, I encourage you to take five minutes to sit in quiet and solitude. Set a timer and watch a bird at a feeder, sip on a cup of tea, or let a piece of holiday chocolate melt in your mouth. Five minutes will revive your spirit and allow hope to creep back in.
In honor of the beginning of Kwanzaa today, I’m reflecting on the words of Howard Thurman,
A dream is the bearer of a new possibility, the enlarged horizon, the great hope.
Today’s Reflection
Allow yourself to dream a little today. Give yourself permission to do a jig-saw puzzle, watch a fun movie, sit quietly and watch the birds, read a print book, look up at the night sky, take a bubble bath—do whatever you can to just let yourself relax. Enjoy yourself.
With hope in my heart,
Annette
