Oh Betsy, Betsy, Betsy... You do have a way of simplifying complex things so easily, and with a healthy splash of humility and wry humor. Or at least we folk make these things complex. I rather presume that the things themselves simply ARE (a version of your "Be" as it happens) and that as with electricity and the dark, it is how we use it and how we interpret it that gives us a value judgment of the simple neutral fact of a thing's existence.
(The OED has smacked me upside the head a time or five or more in my life as well.)
Thank you for reminding me of the word choice approach to the New Year. I long ago determined that if something was important enough for me to consider in the running for a resolution, it was too important to wait until an arbitrary day on a human-made calendar. Carpe diem!
I will make a determination as to a goal - not a resolution, that word always triggered thoughts of "resigned" which seems too much of a downer for a consciously-decided life change - and then wait a minimum of three days but no longer than a week to begin it. My word is my bond; I will not commit it unless I am certain and I feel prepared. Those three days are to give me breathing space to reflect on the goal and my resources and ability to follow through. Then I re-commit and take action.
My birthday is a more ritualistic affair. It is, I suppose, closest to a New Year than any other day for me. Because there is no breathless consumer build-up to this otherwise ordinary day, I use the day, the first day on my own personal New Year, for gratitude and reflection. I thank my mother and father, reminding them that while I knew being in the delivery room at that time so many years ago wasn't necessarily what they had planned for those days, I was and remain grateful that they both rolled with it so gracefully. I have also been known to send a Thank You card to my mother-in-law on my husband's birthday back when we were not a under the same roof - thanking her for giving him life and raising him into the fine man he became and that I married. I think moms should get more recognition on their kids' birthdays - they did the majority of the hard work that day, after all!
Then I take some time for reflection on my past year - and update my resume. It's something I have done since my first job, and it's actually a two-part affair. The first document is a running document which contains all the information one would ever need on a job application - jobs, addresses, titles, supervisors, dates of employment, phone numbers, reason for leaving, pay at hire and upon departure, any promotions, and as comprehensive a list of duties and accomplishments as I can muster up. My first "official" jobs were in college but I started volunteering in the Career Center in high school, so I knew how valuable this information could be (and has been) in the future. I include volunteer work as well, in chronological order. It's all life experience, after all. When employed in a job for multiple years, I simply make a notation of the date and follow that with any new tasks, duties, achievements, awards, etc. It's a lovely brief partial life review of where I started and how I have grown, side side trips down Memory Lane as I look over the words that describe my past lived experiences in one part of my life. A nice way to pass some time on the day that saw me enter this world.
Being a digital document also makes it easy to cut and paste items into resumes I may develop for future work. All the pertinent information is there, and it is a birthday gift to myself to see either growth in a position or the stability of a current job going well. Practical and sentimental at once. My motto of "practical whimsy" in full force. π
On a few occasions, I have adopted the "Word of the Year" approach that seems fairly similar to what you describe. I even chose the same word that you did one year - "Be." π
A few days ago, I decided to select a word. It had come to me in a meditation session and really hooked into me. Couldn't shake it off. So I turned and embraced it. Leaned into it, if you will. Though I see it more as fusing the word and meaning to my very being and striving to live this next year through the eyes and lens of this word.
I had thought during that session that "growth" or "change" would be the word. I should know better than to make presumptive guesses. My word, while similar in many ways, turned out to be "transition."
It fits. So well.
There is change afoot in my life. Change a-plenty. People lost due to the pandemic. (I have a staggered visitation to attend this afternoon, in fact, for a dear co-worker's wife, then another one for a lovely co-worker himself and his wife - double service since they died less than 24 hours apart - next week, where we will continue to attempt to convey our condolences to two of their children who also work for us. A close co-worker is recovering at home right now from a very symptomatic fight with COVID herself. A family member of mine has had it and mostly recovered. At any moment, I may learn that one of our dogs has chosen it was her time and passed away, although I believe my mother-in-law is going to be contacting the vet to schedule an in-home farewell if the end has not come in the next day or two. One of my staff retired in December, dropping my department down even more and increasing the workload on the last three of us just as I am physically facing increasing challenges that are making me question what is truly necessary to maintain in my life and what I can release to maintain my sanity and joy and health.
Amidst this all, my beautiful, strong, amazing child has fully emerged as the male he has always felt himself to be, and I love and support him with every fiber of my being. Not everyone in the family is at that place yet, and some may never be, so I find myself in a "new mom" role again in a way, advocating for my child, providing a shoulder to lean on, while wondering in true parental fashion how I can most effectively sneak away briefly so I can wrap his 20th birthday presents before next weekend.
I myself am growing and changing too, becoming more focused on what it is I want to do with my life experiences thus far. This morning, just an hour after access was finally granted for the quarter ahead, I posted a response to my professor's welcome video as I finally began my PhD program coursework. "Transition" whispered through my mind as if on repeat, as I listened to him say how this program will change us as we move through the doctoral process, and we TRANSITION into scholar-practictioners. And I noted with more than a dash of amused irony that he lives in the same town we lived in when our child was born, and, like us, was active duty Army, and was stationed at the local military post there as my husband was, even working at the very hospital where I delivered our child.
Transition. Not so far off from "impermanence." I have worked with that concept in great depth these last few years as I have moved through quick succession of family losses and my own surgeries and so on. Nothing stays the same. Everything changes. One cannot step into the same river twice. Transition.
There are great changes on the horizon. I make it a policy not to check the news before I meditate each morning. Given the tragic events at the U.S. Capitol building yesterday - a definite transition from the heretofore almost exclusively peaceful history that typically ceremonial process has enjoyed - and the coverage I saw before shutting down for the evening to clear my mind and meditate with peace before bed, I wonder what I will find when I do open a newsfeed today. I might not do it at all for a while, testing my curiosity's limits, balancing that with my belief that a citizen should be conversant with at minimum the top level major events going on in the country...as I receive a delivery notification that my inauguration commerative pin and magnet have shipped and should arrive soon. (Which pleases me greatly.)
Transition.
In many ways, in many aspects. Even to simply "be" is a transition. A transition from activity to settling in and being still. Being oneself rather than who the world demands us to be - or who we choose to believe the world is asking us to be when in reality it asks us to be nothing other than our inherent stardust-born, glorious, wildly unique selves. No assembly required. Simply be. Transition into that be-ing. And strive to maintain that be-ing against all external forces and internal forces that would impose society or cultural expectations upon us that were embedded into our selves before we knew we could refuse - or have the strength or courage to do so.
Transition.
A movement from one state of being to another. An ongoing and simultaneously unique single event. Each moment in time is a single event, and each moment brings a small change which makes the next moment unique from its predecessor.
I observe the changes of the seasons. As a broadly classified Pagan, this is a default setting for me. I note that even on Yule, the Winter Solstice, where I know from my courses in astronomy and astrophysics that yes indeed from an empirical standpoint the day and night are of equal length at that time, the reality is that it doesn't appear that way to the casual observer. Perhaps due to Daylight Savings Time, perhaps other factors too, the days seem to be shortening faster AFTER the solstice here where I live. The weather grows colder. The chance for snow (π€π»β€ββοΈβ₯οΈπ€π») increases. All is clearly not as it seems. It changes. It transitions. And I observe with wonderment and curiosity to see what will come next, even as I am aware that my very presence makes me a part of this glorious dynamic ecosystem. I have my part to play in the passing of the seasons, as odd as it may sound. As does each being on this globe.
Transition.
As small an action as me mindfully standing up from practice to prepare for the work day, or as large an action as embarking upon a journey that will forever change my perspective on the world and my life. I have already done both within the first eight hours of this day. I look forward to finding out what new choices and opportunities will present themselves to me, via whatever means they reach me - my own past or present actions, happenstance, direction from the Universe in the spirit of "when the student is ready, the teacher will appear," or something as yet unrevealed and unimagined.
Transition.
A constant action at the subatomic level. Amazing how something that can have such profound consequences may be taking place beneath an outwardly placid surface. The formation of ice on a lake. Break up in the spring. The growth of a child in the womb. The return of a physical body no longer needed into the organic components of soil which will nurture new life in the days and weeks and months and years to come as a nurse log in an old forest might do.
Transition. A form of active "be-ing."
It is, I sense, a good thing for me to lean into and embrace this year, more so perhaps now than in any other in recent times. I will allow, observe, and actively participate with a living, open heart, my transition throughout this year and indeed my life as a whole. Perhaps I will have a different word at some time in the next 12 months. I will not cap my spirit's whispering by the presence of printed grids with numbers in the squares that hang on a wall and tell me when I am supposed to work and when to play. Calendars have useful functions but are meaningless in the development of self, beyond personal desire to commerate a particularly meaningful event or idea.
May you find that your "be-ing" is the precise thing your spirit requires and calls for in your personal New Year, Betsy. You know I adore your work. It just sends me into such philosophical musings that I cannot listen to them all immediately as they are released due only to time constraints I have on myself. I value your work and my processing of your work too dearly to do either one disservice by rushing the journey.
On a more mundane and separate instance where my word "transition" is already being actively worked with in my life - I saw the e-newsletter that recently came from our mutual alma mater, and the actual costume-wearing mascot is to my eyes, rather disconcerting. I say this as having been co-captain of my high school mascot squad, wearing our own costume for local and state events. I was a bit in facepalm mode when a name was given and a character developed for the mascot, a groan was added when the small sidekick was added, an eyeroll with the "fight slogan" if you will, but these photos in the newsletter baffle and disturb me. Can't decide if the expression is fierce or happy. The eyes say one thing. The mouth another. Clearly the kids posing for photos seem equally conflicted, from the looks on THEIR youthful faces. But this, as with campus itself, is a transition as well. At least our Power Rings of Cobber Identification amongst the masses remain the same. A foothold (or fingerhold?) in the swirling eddies of time. π
Just waiting for the next transition, I guess. So I will let it "be" for now. π
I see you and the light within you, Betsy. Be well and be safe, as always. π€²π»β€π€²π»
EDIT TO ADD:
You may need to sign up for the newsletter. I don't recall doing it, but my parents are part of the C-400 club so they may have provided the info.
Meanwhile, for a single still image of the face of the new ear on the street, go to the school website. Upper right corner, click the drop down hamburger menu and select "About." I believe it's the last entry before the address and such - click on "Traditions" (or "Top Traditions"). Scroll on down and you'll find amongst the other items, a head and shoulders photo of a student with the large head of the "Kernel" and a paragraph of punny-stuff which includes the fight slogan and the names of the two characters we get to look at now at events. (Somewhere on the page, I think under that link, there's even a mascot appearance request form. *facepalm*)
The photo does a nice job showing the odd facial expression on the mascot, though the student seems happy enough. (Would they really publish anything less?)
For more photos and the history of it, click the "In This Section" submenu on that same "Traditions" page. There's only one item to choose, and it's the one you want to see more photos of everything involved. π½π€ͺπ
He apparently also has his own Twitter account and in 2016 was named the NCAA's "Top Meatless Mascot." π³
Have a glorious day ahead of "be-ing," Betsy. π€²π»β₯οΈπ€²π»
