Ho-Ho-Hope
This will be the first post in my new series, the Business Technologist’s Journal. Unusual in that it's not on topic. However, perhaps the best way to launch the new is with a message of hope.
Whichever holiday you’re celebrating, the core message of that holiday is about hope. Even more, it’s about hope fulfilled! Those who were waiting for someone to come save them got their hopes fulfilled. Those who thought their fuel would run out found it lasted as long as they needed it to. So many wonderful stories of hope fulfilled.
Hopefully, some of your hopes were fulfilled during 2022, and even more will be fulfilled during the coming year 2023.
It’s important to remember, though, that not all hopes get fulfilled. Its part of the balance of life that we experience disappointment as well as fulfillment. Things sometimes go in a way other than we hoped. This year, my holiday message is about how we deal with that.
Deal With It
Several people near and dear to me have discovered difficult diseases or disorders in the past few years. All are fighting valiantly, and some are winning their fight. Others have not.
It occurs to me that this is going to continue to happen more and more as I myself get older. I recently discovered that many of the cousins I grew up with, and in some cases their children, have already passed. In fact, I’m among the last few of my generation still living.
Upon discovering this, my thoughts turned to my own parents and their siblings. At some point in the past, they experienced exactly what I’m experiencing now. They looked around as they aged and discovered that their generation was slowly departing.
Then my thoughts turned to my sons, and my grandsons. This led me to consider the many second cousins my generation birthed. They are now where I was a few decades back, thinking that nothing would ever change. That I would live in the comfort of my family and friends forever.
For me, that hope has gone. As it must. Just as it had for my parents, aunts, and uncles years before.
Those aunts and uncles never told me to lose that hope. Even though they had witnessed their parents experiencing the same, they never warned me.
In the end, the only way to deal with this disappointment is simply to deal with it. Take this holiday season to remember all the hopes you’ve had fulfilled in your life. Refocus and consider how much you endeavor to enjoy life as much as possible. Acknowledge there will be disappointments, and that the only way to diminish their impact on you is to remember the balance provided by hopes fulfilled.
Path to Your Future
Looking at my first grandson, I suddenly understood what others had told me about DNA connecting all of us to our past and our future. This resulted in an exploration of my own ancestry. One hundred fifty year old photographs of Barnett Cohen, my great-grandfather, and his family and realizing their DNA was very similar to my own. We shared that. We had that in common. I was simply a more recent incarnation of that DNA.
Looking at my grandsons, I realized they were the next incarnation, and they would hopefully lead to future incarnations. This is the only way I can be sure that my existence will continue beyond my own death. I hope there are others, but this much I know for sure.
Thinking Beyond Ourselves
These realizations put many things into a new context. Suddenly, the climate crisis was no longer an abstract eventuality that would occur long beyond me. When the worst comes, my grandsons and their children and grandchildren will be caught in the horror.
So, for this holiday season and the coming new year, my personal message to all my family, friends, readers, and others, is the think beyond yourself. Think about those who will carry your DNA into the future. Those who will continue you beyond yourself. Celebrate them during these holidays. Show them how you celebrate them as best you can.
Thinking beyond yourself, then think about the future, their future. Ask yourself what you can do today so they can celebrate for decades and centuries to come. We are each part of an ongoing chain, and it is to us to keep adding links to grow that chain forward.