Welcome to the last day of 2021, or maybe the first day of 2022 depending upon when you get this. We hoped 2021 would be an improvement over 2020 when we had the shock of the first major pandemic perhaps since the Spanish Flu of 1918. It has caused immense changes in how we live and interact.
Still, a year end is an ideal time for reflection and gathering ideas for change in our lives–and maybe our thinking. We, the people, seem to be woefully short on reflection. Since most people have a few days left of holiday, use yours to set aside a few hours to just sit and think. That is called reflection.
What good did you do last year?
Where could you have done something and didn’t? No guilt. No excuses. Just a short list.
Who did you lose track of, perhaps due to Covid or not?
Where did you grow last year?
Then we can project into the new year.
What one thing can do in 2022 to grow intellectually, spiritually, or in relationship? What trigger can I set up to encourage it? For example, setting out workout clothes at night so that in the morning they are right there to be put on getting you in the mood of exercise.
What good can I do in 2022?
I stopped doing New Year’s Resolutions many years ago. I think of what kind of person I’d like to be and what changes I can make in my daily life to assimilate it.
I started this blog in 2008 as a service to my local church with another person. She left to go to seminary. The pastor was transferred to another place. I changed it in 2009 and then took it seriously a year later. Eleven years and 2,600+ posts later, it’s a part of my daily discipline. The blog never caught on to the tune of hundreds of thousands of readers. But I only promote it on Twitter. I seldom try to hit a “click bait” issue to trick people into clicking. And still there are a few thousand readers. If you care to pass it on, I’d appreciate it. I have no income from this. It’s as much for me to organize some thinking as anything.
Gary Mintchell
Faith Venture 