New Year’s challenge: Be nice!
New Year’s Day has always seemed like an odd holiday. It’s not really a day of celebration or remembrance, like Christmas, Independence Day or Memorial Day. We simply get the day off because we change the calendar from December to January. Weird.
What’s so special about the New Year anyway?
The clue, of course, is found in the word “new.” The change from 2015 to 2016 is a time for new beginnings and new opportunities. It’s a time for optimism. Out with the old. In with the new and (hopefully) improved.
That’s why we make resolutions. This will be the year to finally drop a few pounds, to shed unhealthy habits, to exercise and eat right, to make positive changes. Do a quick online search for the most popular New Year’s resolutions and the usual chestnuts appear: Lose weight. Get more organized. Spend less and save more. Get fit. Quit smoking. Spend more time with family. Travel.
Naturally, the same lists appear on searches for the most frequently broken resolutions. At a gym in my former hometown some of us regulars would alternate between annoyance and amusement at the influx of newcomers each January. Annoyance because locker space was harder to come by, and amusement in knowing most of them would be gone within a month.
But let’s not dwell on that. This is a time for optimism! Hopefully, one week into 2016, everyone who made resolutions is sticking to them.
Even if we fail to keep our resolutions into next December — or even into February — the mindset behind making them is commendable. The quest to change for the better, for ourselves and those around us, is a noble one.
It has been a number of years since I’ve made any official resolutions, but I typically have a vague plan to get in better shape, physically and spiritually. And get more organized. That’s usually on there somewhere, despite the annual futility.
In 2016, I’d like to do something more concrete and impactful that has nothing to do with the number of miles run, days spent kayaking, books read, miles flown or deadlines met. It’s based on some very wise words, written about 2,000 years ago:
“Live in harmony with one another. Do not be haughty, but associate with the lowly. Never be wise in your own sight. Repay no one evil for evil, but give thought to do what is honorable in the sight of all. If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all.”
The resolution is something that could be summed up like this: be nice. And it’s something that perhaps needs to be issued as a challenge to American society in general.
It could just be the perspective of someone with a few gray hairs, looking back through the lens of nostalgia at a time that might not have really existed, but it seems that incivility is the norm these days.
Take politics. Please. Controversies abound: gun control, refugees, immigrants, illegal or otherwise, climate change, etc., etc. Reasonable people have always disagreed about issues; that’s why we have more than one party representing various points on the political philosophy spectrum. But it’s not enough to just disagree anymore. Nowadays no debate is complete without demonizing and marginalizing the opponent.
Being reasonable and civil will definitely be a challenge in 2016. This is a presidential election year, and passions are running high even before a single vote has been cast in a primary. Every candidate is being called an idiot, a liar, a racist, or a crook. Sometimes all of the above.
The suggestion here is not to gather around a campfire, sing “Kumbaya” and pretend that disagreements and divisions don’t exist. But maybe we can acknowledge those disagreements and divisions with more civility and less acrimony.
Whether or not the basis for my resolution is recognized as coming from the 12th chapter of Paul’s letter to the Romans in the Bible, the advice is sound and necessary. Live in harmony with one another. Repay no one evil for evil. If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all.
During a discussion on resolutions a few years ago my daughter said, don’t use the beginning of the year to say you’re going to be nicer to people. That’s something you should just be doing. She’s right. But if it’s not something we’re doing already, this time of year with the theme of new beginnings is a good time to start.
