New Beginnings

 New Beginnings

Here we are again starting out a new year.  Do you find yourself reflecting, as I do, on the past twelve months and contemplating the promise of the New Year?   This has always been a time for reflection for me along with the anticipation and the promise that the coming year will bring.  I believe that this will be the best year yet.  I know that the news of the economy may be telling us a different story with higher gas prices, high unemployment, foreclosures on the rise and the stock market being on a rollercoaster ride.  My wife and I also took a big hit like most everyone else did.  What are we going to do?  We can either throw up our hands and give in to the doom and gloom of the economical forecasts or we can set our own course and blaze a new trail.  I am not suggesting that we bury our heads in the sand and pretend that our financial system isn’t in a bit of a mess right now but we do not have to get caught up in its undertow.  We do not have to let this economy define our future and our families’ wellbeing.  When I sometimes feel that things are hopeless and heading south real fast I think of what my parents had to endure during the Great Depression.    They were not wealthy by anyone’s standards and both came from humble beginnings yet they managed to make it through one of the most difficult economical periods in our country’s history.  My parents worked when ever they could find it but at the same time they worked at becoming self-sufficient entrepreneurs by starting and operating their own businesses.  They found a need and carved out their very own niche.   They started out with nothing but a dream.  Their dream became a reality and they did very well for themselves.   The poet Carl Sandburg once wrote, “Nothing happens but first a dream.”  Sometimes in the wind of change we find new direction.  Perhaps this is the time to chart a new course for a new beginning.  All we need is a dream and the courage to try something new.  Keep in mind that courage does not always come on us like a roaring lion.  Often time’s courage is that gentle whisper in the evening saying we’ll try again tomorrow with a new day filled with all new opportunities.  The only things that stand in our way of what we want in our lives is the will and the courage to try something new along with the faith to believe in our dreams.   

Have a blessed year,

Terry