What Will the New Year Bring?

This year might bring a real awakening of our search for values. With all of the upheavals in the markets and financial losses people have suffered they may finally look at things in a way that is heart focused. Sometimes we have to lose some things in order to appreciate life more fully.

Just ask someone who has faced a serious illness like cancer or heart attack and survived. Once you have faced the possibility of dying, priorities change. Suddenly there is time for the things you have been putting off, or the changes you hesitated to make.

If you thought you had a pretty good nest egg, but saw it shrink, then you have to reconsider what you want to spend that nest egg on. So maybe this is the year when you add another tool to your set, whether it is learning tarot or the runes, or tai chi or yoga, or write a memoir or maybe try your hand at fiction, or pottery, drawing or painting.

What will happen out there? Perhaps these scandals have taught us to look at more solid investments and more solid things we should be creating as a society, such as an energy grid powered more by renewable energy sources than not. Or more energy efficient homes.

Will there be peace in the countries where we now see war? Hopefully. Of course, in each place where there is war, there has to be a way to really reduce the source of inflammation. We need leaders who will not pander to racial or ethnic animosities. We need more changes in a real way, so that the trouble spots do not keep flaring up. Is it possible? Yes. Each place where there is war will require a different sort of breakthrough. It is possible to change the big picture. We have to look for the key to change and then encourage those who can to implement it.