It’s 2013, your year! 

Hooroo!  Christmas and the New Year are behind you!  Now you can turn your attention to making 2013 your year.

Like everyone else, you come to the New Year with your fears, anxieties, problems, and possibilities.  Inside your own head, what’s making more noise, your fears-anxieties-problems?  Or your possibilities? 

Does it sound like a silly question? 

Ok, let’s visualize it for a moment: 

In the Black Corner, you have all the fears, anxieties, and problems you know so well.  They’re an ugly bunch, aren’t they?  Do they look like the Orcs from Lord of the Rings, with bad, bad teeth, and awful person hygiene?  (Or is that just my fantasy?)   How do they look to you?  Are they big or small?  Attractive or butt ugly?  Do they look ferocious, or child-friendly?  

Don’t list them, or – worse – listen to them.  Just LOOK at them, and really see what they look like. 

Yuk! 

That’s enough. 

Now take your eyes over to the Yellow Corner.  In the Yellow Corner we have your possibilities.   Not your Dire Predictions, and Prognostications – they live in the Black Corner.  Can you see how The Dire P & Ps are blinking in the unaccustomed golden light?  If they spend too long in the Yellow Corner, they’ll start to get pale and sickly.  So, as a gesture of kindness, send them swiftly back to the Black Corner where they belong. 

Now, you can focus on your possibilities in the Yellow Corner.  Do they look small and thin on the ground to you?  Then you need to move in closer, and focus on them.  Really see them, and open your heart to them for a change.  

Did you know they thrive on attention?  Just like your fears-anxieties-problems do. 

I don’t know how you see Life.  I see it as a tightrope.  To get anywhere at all, you have to walk that tightrope.  Everybody does.  Tightrope walking has just one simple rule: do NOT look   down.  Down is where all the world’s fears-anxieties-problems lurk. And they are U-G-L-Y.  They’re sloppy, messy, and completely lacking in ALL the social graces.  You really do not want to look that way. 

 

Keep your eyes on your destination.  It doesn’t matter whether you are 6 inches above the ground, or 60 feet.  It doesn’t matter how you balance – you can use an umbrella, a 6 foot pole, or just hold your arms out. It doesn’t matter if you walk or dance forward.  Just keep your destination in your sights and keep edging forward. 

The art is, always, to focus on where you’re going, without looking down.  

Of course, you can tell yourself it’s too hard to do.  

The truth is nothing is ever going to be harder than dragging yourself through each day under the influence of your fears-anxieties-problems. Nothing is worth being in that pit with those ugly, noisy, bossy monsters.  Sure, you may fall off the tightrope from time to time.  When that happens, instead of fraternizing with the Uglies, you just pick yourself up, focus on where you’re going, and get back on the tightrope. 

Think about it.  Walking a tightrope isn’t new to you.  

Until now, you’ve spent your life walking the tightrope of service to other people. Especially an abusive partner. 

That tightrope is never going to take you where you want to go, where you deserve to go. 

You’ve shown huge courage, endurance – and self-sacrifice – in just getting through the days, doing your best for other people.  

You just – mistakenly – thought that your Life was all about doing everything you possibly could for other people. 

It isn’t. 

You matter, too.  You’re worth your own effort.  You’re worth committing to. 

You can make 2013 your best year yet.  Stack the odds in your favor.  Get some help and support, if you need it, from a tightrope-walking trainer.  And keep your eyes focused on your destination, not the pit. 

You’ve had enough unhappiness for one lifetime.  It’s time, now, for you to be happy.  Give yourself permission, wholeheartedly, and get walking towards your happiness.