“If you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change.” ~Wayne Dyer

Dear Universe,

I can’t believe this year is finally, finally, almost over. (Can I get a hallelujah?)

The other day my husband mentioned how my birthday is coming up (a couple of weeks from now). I commented how in some ways it feels like it was just my birthday and we were celebrating it in Florida—and then it feels like all the other months collapsed into some weird void and all of a sudden it’s January again.

How?

On the flip side, this simultaneously feels like the longest, slowest, walking through quicksand type of year.

It’s hard to wrap my head around what this year has been, how strange and surreal and hard and challenging it’s felt, while still remembering how blessed I am through all this.

A couple of days ago, I remembered something someone once told me—about a lifetime ago now—that’s always stayed with me.

At the time, I was dating someone and we were visiting his grandparents. A tiny spat happened between my boyfriend and me—one that was pretty imperceptible, except his grandfather picked up on it.

His grandfather was one of those grandfathers you immediately fall in love with. You’re taken with his beaming smile, charming personality, unbeatable sense of humor and you hang onto his every word and story.

And so when he sat us down to give us some life advice, I was all ears.

He told us to imagine our life like a bucket filled with water. He then told us to picture every moment, memory, mishap, misadventure, and milestone as just one single drop of water. And that all the drops come together to fill up the bucket.

He asked us not to spend too much time focusing on one little drop, but instead to let it fall in the bucket and join all the other water we had collected.

In other words, he wanted us to let go of the fight and make up already. He didn’t want us to get so caught up in this one drop and have it define the whole of what we were or what we could be.

Through the years, I’ve thought about this analogy often. (In fact, I’m pretty sure I’ve written about this before somewhere here on the blog.) When I’m having a rough day, going through something difficult or simply can’t see the purpose behind something, I pause and remind myself, “It’s just a drop in the bucket.”

I try to believe the drop is simply a small part of the whole, and when I take a step back and look at the bucket I can see the big picture. I see abundance and flow. I see stillness and serenity.

I see my own reflection staring back at me, reassuring me that this too shall pass.

I guess the point is not to hang onto anything too tightly or longer than we should. Recognize something doesn’t have to be everything; it can just be one thing—one drop. Release and let it fall away when the time is right.

Don’t be afraid to let go. Sometimes letting go doesn’t mean losing or subtracting. Sometimes letting go means adding to the wholeness of your life.

His words came to me again in thinking about this year. Maybe 2020 is just a drop in the bucket. Maybe it’s best to let this year fall into the bucket of our lives, to let it dissolve and blend with all the rest of our days.

Maybe 2021 can be a fresh new drop. Maybe it can be filled with thousands of new drops—ones of possibilities, happy surprises and miracles—waiting for us to experience and collect.

I’m hopeful.

And that’s my wish for all of you too.

With Gratitude,