Embracing 2016?

As 2015 fades in the rearview mirror I’ve been experiencing a general feeling of foreboding.  So like any educated modern day person with a problem I turned to Google and searched “unexplained sense of foreboding.”  According to the search results I either possess the power of Clairsentience (the ability to feel emotions or physical sensations in other people) or I’m depressed.  I’m really not feeling either of those explanations.

So after much reflection I’ve decided to blame it all on Facebook.  Because as the 2015 year-end wrap up of my friends and families lives flash on my iPhone, inevitably there are status updates like my personal favorite, “Dear 2015, don’t let the door hit you on the way out. I’m ready for a new and improved year!”  It is posts like this that are making me feel left out.  Like that’s always me!  I’m the girl who can’t wait for that year of struggle to be over!

Because part of me had always felt life is a struggle.  Maybe it’s because I went to Catholic school.  I can blame it on the nuns or Pope Paul VI who claimed, “All life demands struggle…The very striving and hard work that we so constantly try to avoid is the major building block in the person we are today.”  I might be a lapsed Catholic but there’s something about that sentiment that rings utterly and perfectly true for me.  If it’s hard it must be good for you, right?  Or if it’s too good to be true then it is?  Or no pain no gain?

For me 2015 was not painful.  In fact it was peaceful, happy, and productive.  Don’t get me wrong it wasn’t perfect – my kids still drove me crazy, my husband and I occasionally squabbled, my car broke down and my dishwasher died.  But none of these things felt disastrous.  In fact, there was nothing that felt disastrous in 2015.  Which is leaving me feeling like I’m due.  Due for something big bad and ugly to smack me upside my head in 2016.

Which started me thinking.  Maybe 2015 wasn’t as idyllic as I’m giving it credit for.  Maybe I’m just better at rolling with the punches.  Maybe the gift of 2015 is having over forty years of experience and perspective that helps me to not sweat the small stuff, to forgive easily and to eliminate poisonous and drama-filled relationships from my life.  The answer is to simply embrace what will be in 2016.  Because bad things will happen – and not just because I’d due, but because that is how this crazy life works – but now I can feel confident that I can handle them.  Thank you, 2015.

For laughter and inspiration read my blog NicoleCorning.com and my book The Working Mommy’s Manual, available on Amazon:

The Working Mommy’s Manual by Nicole W. Corning