MORE!

While I’ve never really been one for buzzwords and such, I’ve found myself focused since the start of the new year on one word in particular…MORE.  Its presence on my mind and heart has admittedly been a bit strange because, when I think of it, my focus is not at all upon what one might think of in the context of our materialistic American culture that has commodified most everything including people, relationships, and even time. 

When I think of my hopes for 2024 and think of MORE, my intention is less on gathering up, saving, earning, or possessing and much more upon a deeper awareness of my daily experience in terms of gratitude and depth.  Yes, there is much in our world and our daily experience of life that we rightly lament and at times actively oppose.  Life can be, and often is, brutal and unjust.  At the same time while acknowledging what is wrong around us, seeking change, and finding ways to be actively involved, there is also so much that is simultaneously beautiful, incredible, dare I say transcendent (?).  Brutality AND beauty.  Life as I often say, truly is “both and.”  Every day is a dance between both of these realities for us as human beings.  How we choose to navigate this daily “dance” means everything as I see it.

I’d like to think that my awareness of the goodness and many gifts life brings is already keen and significant at middle age.  But my heart, for whatever reason this year, yearns for MORE.  The look and touch of a grandchild, the glistening of falling snow, the warm sun shining brightly on an unusually warm midwinter’s day, a long walk in the neighborhood, a pet’s laying on our lap as we work, read, or just relax, poignant connections with families in my work…these are moments I want to experience and appreciate more fully and gratefully this year.  I want to savor times like these with a deeper sense of the moment, being more fully present.  Doing so will, I hope, help me be more aware of how my one life, lived alongside billions of others, has its place in our larger, connected web of being.  These experiences are not just isolated events, just mine to behold or just about me, but part of a much larger mosaic of human experience.  Every moment of every day there are such moments all over our world.

So, I want MORE this year.  That could mean making, saving, or giving more money, spending more time with family and loved ones, or having unique new experiences I’ve not even thought of yet.  I hope so.  With these will also come the more numerous routine, more mundane experiences that can often be overlooked.  Part of the challenge for MORE this year for me is to stop, at least for a few moments, in the midst of my drive to produce, to achieve, to plan, and to overcome and just “BE” in such a way as to give gratitude for the many gifts life brings…every single day.  A tall order for sure, but worth the effort! 

God of life, love, and beginnings and endings, open us to see, hear, feel, and touch the beauty life brings to us each and every day and take the time to savor these gifts!  Amen.

Brian remains as always a passionate traveling Dad and Pops oft traversing the highways and airways between KC and Texas, a dedicated gym rat, and a perpetual novice at following Jesus.