A prayer for the passing year
Earlier this month, I spent a couple weeks participating in an online course about making space for the new year. The first week was a beautiful unfolding of letting go of the current year that included forgiveness and reconciliation as well as affirming what we were grateful for. My favorite day, though, was when we were invited to consider how we would like to say farewell to 2019.
I chose to mark the passing of this year with an Allowing Prayer, something I created quite by accident earlier in the year and that evolved from a daily soul connection practice. Allowing Prayers are messages from my essential self that offer comfort and grounding by helping me accept what is and where I am in the moment.
When I sat with all that this year has been for me, the word that rose up was contentment. We are often quick to bid good riddance to the year that’s passing because we have a tendency to focus on the negative—the losses and the disappointments. There are plenty of those. However, there is also a lot of good that happens during the year if we allow ourselves the time to take note.
My year certainly had its share of hits and misses. On balance, though, it was a good year. I am content with what went well and what could-have-been-better, the progress I made and the distance I still have to travel. Being content with what was also seems like a good place from which to start the new year instead of burdening it with the pressure to make up for the year that’s passing.
Below is my blessing to 2019, which I will write out by hand on New Year’s Eve and then place in the fire, offering it up to the universe with gratitude for all I have received and creating space for what wants to be in the coming year.
Allow contentment
Allow me to be content with my accomplishments, knowing they are enough for this year.
Allow me to be content with what remains unfinished or not even begun, accepting that this year was not the year for those projects, ideas, or aspirations.
Allow me the contentment of recognizing that I have received much good this year and that I have also given much good.
Allow me to be content with the year's losses for it was time to let them go.
Allow me to be content with this year just as it is and with me for being just as I am.
The beauty of this ritual was that it indeed brought me a deep sense of peace and contentment about 2019. I could feel myself letting go as I wrote my Allowing Prayer, the ties to the year untethering, and in their place a sense of spaciousness.
Whether or not you choose to honor the passing of this year, I hope you can find contentment with the year you have had. And if 2019 has been particularly challenging for you, as I know it has been for many, may you find some contentment in the new year.
