Are You Being Realistic and Optimistic about 2021?

I’m a fairly optimistic person, but even I have felt bullied by 2020.

Remember when we thought if we could just make it to June, things would be oh-so-much better? We were kind of like the rabbit from the Trix Cereal commercials of the 1970s, naively dreaming that “this will be the moment” when we get just what we want!

Silly rabbit. Trix are for kids.

Now here we are, inching our way toward November, and 2021 is peaking over the horizon.

Memes sarcastically implying it has taken years to make it this far in 2020 seem to capture the sentiment. Maybe we are in the 500th month of 2020. Seems to feel that way.

So now we have an opportunity—and I don’t want to miss it—to be realistic about 2021 and, at the very same time, incredibly optimistic!

I’m channeling the Trix rabbit. Something in me believes 2021 will be a year of renewed hope and resolve, even as we sweep up the scattered shards of what has been decimating.

There is no denying that the toll has been tremendous for so many people this year. So much strain on mental health, physical health, relationships, finances, workplaces, schools, communities, first responders, health care providers, and more.  What a relentless bewildering scary year 2020 has been.

So now we have an opportunity…to be realistic and optimistic.

The realist in me has let go of this idea that there will be something magical about Jan. 1, 2021.  I don’t think it will be a panacea, whereby we will have flipped the calendar and all the fallout of 2020 will be in our rearview mirror. I think we will still be sorting through remnants of hard stuff and encountering new swaths of hard stuff.

The optimist in me is vying for time at the 2021 starting gate, though. And I think that optimist will hold her own. The optimist in me won’t be defeated by 2020—or by the unknowns and anxiety of 2021, for that matter.

What about you? Can you approach 2021 as a realist and an optimist? And if 2020 has been hard on your marriage, can you give voice to that while also proclaiming a renewed commitment to nurture your relationship in 2021?

We have an opportunity, my friends. We can be realistic about sloshing through the heavy muck created by 2020 and still optimistically tune our hearts and eyes with gratitude to what is good and joyful and empowering.

We have an opportunity. We should be thinking about it now, though, rather than waiting for Jan. 1.

For more reading, you can cruise through my list of past posts, as well as my page with a bunch of posts on orgasm.

Copyright 2020, Julie Sibert. Intimacy in Marriage Blog. Links may be monetized.

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