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What does a New Year mean? Is it a time for change, for optimism? Or
is it just a matter of tradition, of celebrations, much ado about
nothing?
Here is an interesting insight from the blog
entry of James Soriano, the author’s son and a senior high- school
student who leads his batch student government:
Is the New Year really a new lease on life?
Because if it isn’t, then it would be totally
meaningless to celebrate it, right? New Year is a time for new
beginnings! Let’s drive away the demons by making so much noise it
will make their ears bleed (although I’m not sure that makes them
‘go away’). That’s what we tell ourselves—and it’s good,
because it makes us happy.
Yet when you think about it, the New Year is
just another day. Another day that is the start of the same old
things, and the same old life, dealing with the same old problems. I
sound so disillusioned, but I don’t mean to; I mean, really—what
changes, tangibly? Mindset? Yeah, maybe that’s good, but then
again I know very few people who live up to their resolutions to
begin with. Soon enough, we’re all back into the same mold and the
same mindsets.
It’s not easy, after all, to really really
start over. Admittedly life’s more complicated now (which means I
must be getting older), and it’s not as easy as it was, when you
were a kid and you could just make dreams and decide to live them
out—no. We live in a world that constrains us to realities—like
love, family, and friends—and that means you have to make
sacrifices. Which is a pretty pessimistic way of putting the good
things in your life. Or what are supposed to be anyway.
So it’s funny, this whole ‘starting over’
thing. But that would mean that the reason for celebrating is
nothing but a big, romantic joke. In a sense, maybe it’s just
really like Kat put it: “the world pressuring you to pretend that
your life is worth fixing.”
Which is sad, if it were true. But if it were
true, and my life weren’t really worth fixing because it didn’t
mean anything to begin with- then I figure the best thing to do is
to use it for the good of other people. Whatever the hell that
means. But I know it doesn’t have to be something as
all-encompassing as living your life as Gandhi or Mother Teresa. But
hey, whatever suits your fancy.
Thankfully, I really don’t believe that. I do
believe that life has meaning. And in the end, everything, even the
sacrifices that I make, they make my life more meaningful. And while
good things—like love, family, and friends- aren’t good things
through and through, what matters is that you invest in them and
believe in them, because anything can really be a ‘good thing’.
I know I’m thankful for them, and no matter how sad you are right
now, I am of the opinion that you should be, too.
They say that part of celebrating the New Year
is starting it off with the right footing—and part of that is
being grounded on life’s complications and realities. To me, the
new year, taking it face value, seems to be nothing more than
another year of prolonged life-fixing. And the truth is, I will
never really know for certain whether it all means anything or not.
And well, it’s sort of useless to think about it, isn’t it?
But I do believe that it means something, if
nothing else but for my own happiness.
And even if it isn’t, then I would be happy if
I could make even one person’s life less of an inconvenience.
www.sorianoph.com
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