Wishes and hopes for 2024

“Hope is being able to see that there is light despite all of the darkness.” - Desmond Tutu

As we head into 2024, there is much we cannot know about what lies ahead. Uncertainty is an integral part of human life. We can be sure, though, that the new year will bring for us - individually and collectively - a potent mix of dark and light: challenge and opportunity, problem and possibility, sickness and health, joy and pain, hate and love.

Wishing one another a good year ahead is really a wish for light to prevail over dark. And even as we do so, we know deep down that we will have to also confront the dark.

How we choose to do that matters a great deal. We have the ability to choose how we want to move through the year, regardless of what it might bring. That choice has power, especially if it is a collective choice that harnesses the energy of community.

Maybe the first fundamental choice that could shape our response to what 2024 might bring is adopt an attitude of hope. Hope not as a passive wishing that "things will work out well". Rather, hope as an active, intentional seeking out the light that is always there, in the midst of the dark. Hope as a courageous and action-oriented response to the light we do find, a response that leads us to work together to amplify that light and spread it as a counter to the dark.

My wish for you is that you, in all the significant domains of your life, you will be able to cultivate this kind of hope. And that you will have the support of others alongside you to strengthen this hope, and to turn it into courageous, compassionate and creative action to amplify the light in 2024.

About the image at the top of the article: Traces of light and dark | Acrylic on canvas | 11 by 14

© Melinda Sinclair 2024