Start again

We need beginnings to make sense of endings.

Good storytellers understand this, and so they find ways to hide the beginning of their stories from their audience. No book, movie, or story really ever starts at the beginning. There’s always some context or history missing from the first pages and scenes.

And it has to be this way because human beings are wired to be curious about the beginning of a thing. Anything.

We always want to know how things started, and it bugs us when we don’t. As far as we know, everything that exists has to have an origin story, including us.

We know how life ends, but many still have questions about how it began. We hold on to origin stories from Holy Books or tales from sages and elders because we want to make sense of our existence and have a better understanding of where we’re headed.

Considering how much beginnings matter to us, it is important to not let our knowledge of beginnings completely affect the way we think of where we are right now.

Particularly, if the first month of your year hasn’t started the way you hoped, be careful not to judge the rest of your year right away. Instead, give yourself grace and take new steps that will help you get closer to where you want to be.

Beginnings are important but they aren’t the entire story. Much more than your beginning, what you do today is a greater indication of how your story ends. For every new day, you get to live, you have an opportunity to start again.

So, start again.

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