I have given up on making new year resolutions. Most of them are dreams.
In 2023, I will concentrate on ATTITUDE CHANGE.
Am intending to take a searching look at my usual habits and gradually improve them, making radical changes if necessary.
I will commence by being curious about every challenge that faces me.
Before charging in to fix it, I will get CURIOUS and ask ‘why did this happen, can it be fixed by simple commonsense, is there a new way to fix it that has not been tried before, can it be done without generating anger and distrust while fostering goodwill and community spirit?’
I intend to base it on the thoughts expressed in a highly popular television series many decades ago by Professor Julius Sumner Miller. He called it WHY IS IT SO? His philosophy was to face every challenge by asking HOW DID THIS HAPPEN and WHAT IS THE BEST WAY TO SOLVE THIS. Do nothing without first becoming CURIOUS.
So it will be that with family, business, politics and religion I will get ultra CURIOUS in 2023.
But I will not just get live on curiosity. This will be useless unless I then act decisively to act, create and resolve. Results must be achieved otherwise I am wasting my life and doing nothing to lift the lives of others.
I need a base from which to start.
My 91 years of experience of life will help but I need to be across what is happening right now that can help me in becoming adequately curious.
You will note from the image below that I am reading a selection of essays on what we can learn from 2022 to prepare us for 2023. They are written by top quality academics from the Universities of Australia who write splendid articles for publication daily in a news service called CONVERSATIONS that you can discover on Google. Their writing will help us to get CURIOUS about how we can do much better in 2023. I recommend that you buy and enjoy the book. Its a good read.
I am also basing my venture into the realm of the curious on the inspiration given to us by extraordinary leaders whose lives, in life or death, impacted us in 2022.
My hero of the year is President Zelensky of Ukraine. A great leader of huge courage and ability.
Also Elizabeth11 – grace, dignity, calm, wisdom, longevity.
Mikhail Gorbachev – with huge courage he destroyed communism and paid a great personal price for doing so.
Sidney Poitier – magnificent talent as an actor who tried valiantly to close the racial divide.
Roger Federer – as graceful and talented a tennis player as ever graced a court and an inspirational person of huge generosity. In old fashioned terms, an absolute gentleman.
However, nothing will be possible without a core set of values on which I base my life and this means that any success I can achieve will be founded on my performance as a committed working partner of Jesus of Nazareth in constantly trying to have a creative role in achieving a better world.
So, a great year lies ahead in 2023.
It will be as good as we make it personally. It will be utterly pointless blaming politicians and everyone else for our problems. Our fate is entirely in our own hands.
But let us not forget that our first and correct and most positive challenge is to get CURIOUS.
Enjoy a happy, prosperous, satisfying year of achievement that you share with family and friends in creating a better society than we now have.
Shalom,
Everald
And don’t forget to get fired up for 2023 by reading my 3 books.
THE MAN ON THE TWENTY DOLLAR NOTES
DINNER WITH THE FOUNDING FATHERS
A BEAUTIFUL SUNSET.
And watch out for the publication of my new one that will hit the bookshops at Easter
CATCHING THE LINVILLE TRAIN – for a journey through history.
Go to my books website
