Last Day of the Year, Jesus, and Waking the Dragon

It's the last day of the year 2008. I find myself living back in Austin again after several years away. I am staying with family in my childhood home by the lake. It's December and I've never seen more beautiful weather anywhere in the world (a crisp 62 and sunny). Occasionally I run into someone from high school at the grocery store and it feels like they remember someone else. I have hardly seen any friends since our arrival mid-October. I'm working a part time job that I have mixed feelings about, but that I know I'll have to leave when we move into town.

The thought of looking for work again makes me sick. The thought of finally going to school is terrifying but all the more appealing. I think of studying chemistry, history, art, psychology, interior design, and a million other subjects, and realize that I am no closer to choosing a career than I ever have been. I think about making a home, having a baby, traveling, visiting old friends, and I wonder which of these the new year holds for me.

I resolve to keep my brain and body more active- read more books, do more crosswords, walk, dance, do yoga- and I resolve to be a better person, to reconnect with myself and my spirituality, to reconnect with my family and extended family, and to stop letting fear influence my decisions. These are the same resolutions as last year and the year before, for many years and no doubt for many people. What we can hope for is to get just a little better each year at resolving these things, and to remember and practice our desire to resolve them on an ever increasing number of days out of the year.

It's last last day of the year and Christmas is still in the air and on my mind. This year I have had some realizations about the holiday and what I'd like to remember during future Christmastimes. No other season is more filled with family and traditions; no other holiday is more based on nostalgia. In our family it's about watching our Christmas movies and listening to our favorite Christmas music. The house is filled with the sounds of A Charlie Brown Christmas, The Grinch Who Stole Christmas, A Walt Disney Christmas, White Christmas, It's a Wonderful Life, and Christmas albums by the Beach Boys, the Carpenters, Bing Crosby, Stevie Wonder, and many, many more. Christmas just doesn't feel right without these familiar sounds. It's about the atmosphere and the time together as a family, about bounty and generosity.

But what message do I want to eventually give to my own children about the Christmas story? I want them to know why we still celebrate the birth of a savior so many lifetimes later and the importance of that birth. To me it represents a new beginning, a new chance for all mankind to reborn, each and every one as a new person. And we seem to heed that chance every new year with our lists of resolutions, though our willingness seems to fade as we grow further from the season that inspires us.

What is a savior? Someone who holds the power to save. A hero, a role model, someone for each person to emulate in life. It seems to me that we are at a crucial time as humans on earth. Something is changing and we can all feel it. We feel the need for a savior but we do not dare to search for those qualities within ourselves as Jesus taught. We are all God's children, and what that means to me is that we all have the power to be divine, to save. Jesus was an enlightened guy, a loving, generous, beautiful man with the divine living freely within him. What we must learn from him is that we must all live that way, find that light within us, trust our own power to save.

Youth has the enormous presence of a dragon in a cave, but as we age we are content to let the dragon sleep. I for one have no greater wish than to awaken the dragon that lives inside of me, to dare to be a better person, a more connected person, a more generous and selfless person, to live as if I am fearless, especially when fear seems unbeatable. I will open my eyes and my heart to the signs that the universe gives me and remember to give thanks to the earth and the animals that give their lives to feed me. Let this new year be for me the year of the dragon.