Writing the Next Chapter of Life

Happy New Year 2018!

Everyone desires that a new year will be better than the last--that wishes will come true, dreams will be achieved, and hopes will become a reality. And why shouldn't we feel that way about the year ahead of us? A fresh start as the old year closes and the new year begins gives us a reason to try. It's good to have goals because if we aren't shooting for anything, our life will be rather stagnant.

Where do we see ourselves at the end of 2018? Did we miss a lot of opportunities during the course of 2017? What can we do to make the most of every moment of each day that God gives us? These are some questions that make food for thought. Instead of wasting the night away with late parties, we should be grateful for the blessings of the previous year and think about what we want to do with the prospects of the new year.

I'm a writer so the way I look at New Year's is a whole year unwritten with lots and lots of blank pages. Each day is a page in the next chapter of our life, and God is the author of our story. Don't be a pen that runs out of ink! Be a pen that writes your life perseveringly, honestly, happily--filling the pages with triumphs in difficulties, endurance in suffering, charity toward all, and joy in family and friends. "Life is what you make it" is not such an untruth. God is in control, but He asks for our cooperation in His plan for our life as fulfilling His will is all that matters. 

St. Teresa of Avila says: "Remember that you have only one soul; that you have only one death to die; that you have only one life, which is short and has to be lived by you alone; and there is only one Glory, which is eternal. If you do this, there will be many things about which you care nothing."