My grandmother would have been 100 today. She died in 2022 at the age of 96 and lived a very full life. I miss her.
She and I used to chat on the phone. She was a woman who spoke her mind – telling me that she still clung to certain “Victorian” values. Although she never unpacked what that meant I suspect duty and determination were high up there, especially given her strong military heritage going back generations, and her no-nonsense approach to life. This dovetailed with a keen sense of deep fun; she loved to laugh. She was also incredibly perceptive. She knew, though, that some of these values wouldn’t necessarily be the values that the next generation would keep in the same way that she did. Remembering her has shifted my perspective this year, to consider more how to be grounded and refine what’s already there rather than grasp for the latest “quick fix” for my life.
I’ve been reflecting this New Year on what I want to take with me forward into 2026. The phrase “new year, new you?” has been swirling around my mind and I think, the answer for me is perhaps not. Because, for me, I am looking for a sense of renewal and not necessarily reinvention.
That thought has drawn me back to Tolkien – a quote that has stayed with me for years (in fact, I have it in a frame sat next to me on the window sill as I write!). It comes from his essay “On fairy-stories”. He talks about how the dullness of time can stop us from seeing what’s in front of our faces. They become familiar, we get used to them and we stop seeing them as we once did. He says
They have become things which once attracted us by their glitter or their colour, or their shape, and we laid hands on them, and then locked them in our
hoard, acquired them, and acquiring ceased to look at them.”
We live in a fast society, bombarded what’s next. Add an ADHD brain into the mix and it can be overwhelming. My mind will quite happily flit from one glittery thing to the next and looking for a new me is the last thing I need. The “new year, new you” mantra feels to me like a bit of a trap. No, I need some serious grounding and to slow down in order to actually see what came before, what once was “new” and what I intentionally bring with me and look at again with fresh attention.
That’s not to say things won’t change. The old can become the new when we set it in front of us in an active act of defiance against the throw away culture that influences our attitudes and emotions if we let it. Several years back I wrote a blog post I called Inspirations Furnace with a focus on nursing history and past; the idea that a furnace burns the rubbish but it leaves the precious metals, even though it may melt them. That we can consider which qualities from our rich nursing history should be preserved, transformed or reimagined as we move forward.
When we look at the past… I am drawn to wonder what is set to last. If we put [our history] into “inspiration’s furnace” what will come out and, more to the point, in what form? For a furnace doesn’t just purify and melt… what comes out takes on a new form. A form that is designed for a future use.
This new year, I’ve been mulling over what this could mean for me and my values, attitudes and behaviours I want to move forward with. Instead of looking for the new, I am drawn to look to what precious metals I am to keep from the years gone by. What nuggets of gold will I take with me into the next year? That’s for me to ponder and determine but I know they are there. For the furnace certainly did come in many ways last year and what it has left behind is precious.
I wish you all a very happy new year and whether you look for the new, or the renewed, or even to just stay as you are that you will find contentment, growth and an opportunity to thrive in what you do and who you are. Blwyddyn newydd dda pawb!
Receiving Consent 