Like most people, at this time of season I find myself looking back on the past year and doing a little accounting.  I, like many, crunch the numbers from the last 365 days and take a good hard look at the bottom line.  I suppose the logic is that, by taking stock of the last year, we can gain insights on what we should expect from the year ahead us.

And while there’s no way to know what the future holds, we can always hope.

I hope the best for you this year.

I hope you have a year of hard work.

I hope you have a year of chances taken.

I hope you have a year of failures and scrapes and bruises and lumps.

I hope you have a year of surprises and of time spent outside your comfort zone.

I hope you have a year of hardy struggles and sacrifice.

A year of new calluses and tested resolve.

I hope you have a year with moments when you don’t think you can make it.

Of moments of doubt that you can go on.

When the only thing you want to do is give up.

That’s the kind of year I want for you.

And when, at this time next year, we find ourselves, again, crunching the numbers of these next twelve months, I can only hope that you find your hard work to have be time well spent.

I hope you deem the chances you’ve taken well worth the risks.

I hope that every injury you suffer bears with it a valuable lesson, and that you can maintain the presences of mind to learn from it.

I hope that your failures are nothing more than successes deferred and that every abrasion, bruise, and contusion serves to make you a wiser person.

I hope your successes eclipse your struggles and each sacrifice brings a ten-fold return of investment.

I hope that your new calluses serve well to protect you like armor and shield.

I hope that when you look back on this next year, you look back, not having been triumphant in every struggle, but at least with sense of success in proving to yourself that you are resilient being.

That you can be persistent and patient.

I hope you look back with a new appreciation for your own power and with a heightened belief of what you can accomplish.

I hope this next year serves as proof that you are a force to be reckoned with in the universe, and that one person can change the world.

That’s the kind of year I hope for you.

Happy New Year.