You Hold the Key

 a new year has begun, and we hope it is a better year than the past one.  at the start of each year, we have hopes for the year.  we plan to do certain things better than we did the previous year.  sometimes we make resolutions, promising ourselves that we will improve our lives, take on new projects, make changes in our lives.  if i have a resolution for the coming year, it is to find balance.  by that i mean, i hope to be aware of my tendency to go overboard with things i take on and to avoid such excess.  for instance, when i start a new plan of exercising, i usually go to an extreme, spending far too much time on my plan and taking it too seriously, often becoming angry with myself and others when something interferes with my exercise time.  this year i hope to temper my desire to adhere to my plans with the flexibility to accept that life doesn't always work out as we planned it.

i'm afraid that balance is a problem for many of us, both individually and collectively.  i suspect that many of the problems we face are owing to our insistence on pressing ahead with our own projects and purposes instead of accepting that life isn't about just ourselves.  we have to balance our desires with those of others and find ways to accommodate one another's wants and needs.  this is true in our individual and in our collective lives.  we are having difficulties existing as a "united" nation because there are too many shrill voices loudly insisting on one certain pathway for all of us.  we no longer listen to one another and to seek to understand each other's points-of-view.  we have lost the ability to find ways to work together, so we fight continually and nothing gets done as a country.

we insist on individual liberties at the expense of the well-being of the society as a whole and the national health.  instead of finding the middle way of balance between competing ideologies, we press ahead with our own narrow vision of what is best.  we must find ways of balancing our own path forward with the path others think best.  most often, we find that the middle path is the best one, taking us away from the edge of the abyss on one side while keeping us from the dangers on the other side.  instead of liberals versus conservatives, democrats versus republicans, whites versus non-whites, believers versus atheists, native-born versus immigrant, we must realize that we are all in this together, with more in common than we think.  we must find ways of being one people instead of a disparate collection of individual tribes.

balance is not giving up on our own dreams and aspirations.  it is realizing that our wants and hopes must not diminish the wants and hopes of others.  it is facing adversity with quiet calm and strength rather than railing at capricious fate.  it is refusing to allow passions, anger, and excess to rule us.  it is choosing to act with reason and consideration of the needs of others.  it is accepting our differences and respecting each other's right to be different, of withholding judgment of what we don't understand.

may we find balance in our lives, choosing the middle path that avoids extremes.  may we be conscious of one another's needs and accepting of one another, even when we don't agree.  may we choose tolerance over prejudice.  may an even-minded calm rule our lives and may we find ways to love one another despite our differences, indeed because of them.  shalom.