Starting the year with this wishing you post has become something of a tradition (2025, 2024, 2023*). I appreciate how it helps me reset, to start the year off somewhat focused and organized on a core value. I say somewhat cause, well, adulting is hard, and what age has taught me is that the best laid plans often go awry. So I’m just shooting for the bare medium! &
To do that bare medium (and maximum when it warrants), these wishing you posts with a key word or phrase have been a good exercise for me leading into the year and a good touchpoint during the year.
Even though I have spent over half of my life with a degenerative condition, it’s not really been visible nor did I ever feel like it was actually happening, the degeneration that is. But, that changed last year. At some point in the late spring, I felt frail. Like at any moment, a part of me may simply just snap. Not just physical, it was a whole body feeling. It was disconcerting, and well, weird feeling. I can’t explain it any better than that. So in the summer, I decided I had to do something about it. That something was really committing to regular exercise that was focused on improving strength and flexibility. I needed to not feel so damn frail. Up until my late 40s, I had stayed in pretty good shape. But as you can imagine, when you get out of the habit of exercising, it’s helluva hard to get back into it. And its double helluva hard when you’re of a certain age.
So since July, I have worked out pretty much every day. It has been a humbling and at times humiliating experience. Like who knew that standing on one leg and raising your arms could really be a challenge But, this work has paid off. I don’t feel nearly as frail as I did. I feel stronger physically, but that’s also paid dividends emotionally and mentally and even spiritually.
This commitment to exercise has made me re-think what strength means. And that thinking has led me to my wishing you for this year. For 2026, I wish you strength.
We often associate strength with needing to get through things. And it’s certainly an important part of dealing with hard or trying things (such as grief, an illness, or other emotional/physical upheavals). But it seems that too often we limit strength to just these things monumental things. Admittedly, it’s one of my go to prayers to ask for strength get through. I so often send a text, email, or card that wishes someone strength to get through a trying time.
There’s also the strength found in the everydayness of life. Like strength of character means standing up for what’s right and what you believe in even in the face of those who may disagree. Or strength of feeling when we get passionate about our favorite team or show (which is an examples everyday joy!) There;s also the strength of sitting in silence. I am always amazed at how few people are ok with silence. But, it takes strength to sit with yourself and the world. Silence is hard, but it’s also necessary to recenter and refocus ourselves. Relatedly, there is a strength needed to handle uncertainty and to be ok with just not knowing. The everyday strength I’ve been focusing on lately is to sit with hard questions. Too often we want a quick answer or an answer that validates what we already believe. When the true strength would be to sit with hard questions and consider different answers or approaches.
Here, though, strength seems to manifest a sense of resilience in important ways, and when the world still feels heavy and unsettled, embracing strength may be a way of getting through the big and little things, the local and global, the everyday and hopes for the future.
So as we are easing our way into 2026, I wish you strength for whatever your heart, mind, and body needs and desires.
And as always, I send along my best wishes for your health, peace, and joy.
*You can search on the blog and they’ll go back to 2018.
& Of course this is a play on words of the phrase bare minimum. My good friend Cathryn Molloy introduced me to the phrase bare medium, which I think is a great way to get through life sometimes.
# The irony is not lost on me that we need strength for strength and in the case of my starting to exercise it was all about doing to gain physical strength. Ha.