Happy New Year - Tabula Rasa

The first day of a new year is often a time of reflection for me. This year was no different in that sense. However, what is typically a very personal experience that speaks uniquely to my life feels bigger than me this year. So, here I am, the first day of a new year, sharing my first blog post. Notice, I said "sharing my first blog post" and not "writing my first blog post." The significance of that is likely lost on you, especially if you don't know me. I have several completed posts that I never shared because of a struggle I have with things needing to be "good enough," "just right," or even "perfect."

Just before the holidays, I was inspired by one of my clients who shares many of the same struggles of needing things to be "just right" before putting them out there for public consumption. As we talked, I was inspired to remove the cloak that therapists -- or at least this therapist -- often wear that prevents others from seeing the reality that we also struggle and are on a journey very similar to those with whom we journey in therapy. In that moment, I also committed to sharing my first blog post and not just writing it and stressing over whether or not you would find it helpful, interesting, or meaningful. This is inspiration spurring on hope.

This new year, hope was solidified in me by an experience Christmas morning. It was a quiet morning and I was alone sipping on coffee. I had already purposed to journal first thing Christmas before the distractions of the day set in. Interestingly, I awoke that morning with the words "hope," "newness," and "tabula rasa" in my mind. Tabula rasa?? To be honest, I hadn't given much thought to that since college and grad school. I know when random thoughts like this occur, there is something I need to explore further. So, I started to think about what I knew about tabula rasa. Without much effort, I remembered that the phrase means "blank slate" and that John Locke posited the theory that newborns are born with minds that are blank slates (tabula rasa) and that all knowledge comes from experience or perception. I let that land on me for a minute. I realized John Locke's use of the phrase was not why I was mindful of it this Christmas. So, I decided to look up the Latin meaning to see if that would give me any additional insight. Bingo! It all made sense!

The literal meaning of tabula rasa in latin is "scraped tablet." The overwhelming sense I had this Christmas was the hope of a scraped tablet. For me, that means there is hope that all things can be made new. Fresh starts are possible. It isn't a once and done concept that things can only be new once and that we have to remain stuck in our circumstances, grief, crisis, conflict, etc. For many of us, there is real tragedy, grief, and loss that we are walking through this first day of the new year and I don't want to diminish or minimize that in any way. What I would like to do is offer you the hope and inspiration of a scraped tablet, an intentionally wiped slate. May you be inspired this first day of the new year to consider how tabula rasa could result in a happy new year!

#hope #tabularasa #newyear #inspire #newbeginning