THE GIFT OF REMEMBERING — Fearfully & Wonderfully Jo

By now, I’m sure we’ve all heard the same old statements about 2020 being a “challenging and unprecedented year” so imma spare your ears from hearing it for the thousandth time. (Cuz I think we all get it by now).

Now that the holiday season is here, I’ve found that our yearning for the past has dramatically heightened. I’m sure we’re all reminiscing about the holidays pre-COVID, where we could have as many people in our houses around the dinner table as we wanted. Quite a stark contrast to this year, where, for example, my family spent Thanksgiving, just us, eating Stouffer’s pre-made Mac n Cheese that we only had to heat up in the oven. (I, personally, am not picky about food, so that meal was just as good as eating turkey to me tbh).

This simple celebration in itself was a huge blessing already, as there were countless others who had to spend this day alone in order to protect their loved ones. That’s another thing about this time- we’ve all learned something about being grateful for every little thing. As important as that is, that’s not the main point of this post, sooooo moving on!

I recently read a devotional about “remembering,” and it talked about how God desires that we remember everything we’ve learned about His goodness, so that we may find the courage to face the unknown. That got me thinking about the concept of “remembering” in general, and the purposes it serves. While it sux that we’re not able to hold our usual festivities this holiday season, we can choose to remember all the good times from the past and allow it to inspire a spirit of thankfulness and hope for the future.

I don’t know if anyone else has this habit, but I pretty frequently scroll through my camera roll to relive past moments- both happy and sad. The photos always automatically conjure up the emotions I felt in the moment and I always find myself smiling at the memories. I then think to myself: “Wow, I was so lucky to be able to experience that.” I think that can translate to our present moment- we can look back on past Thanksgivings, past Christmases, past New Years, and think to ourselves: “Wow, how lucky am I to have moments of joy I can look back on.”

Of course, one could take the opposite route and say that remembering can make you more wistful and depressed. And to that I say, you, my dear friend, need a perspective shift. Take a moment to think about a reality where we had no memories. Life would be quite bland, wouldn’t you say. I don’t think there would be as much smiling, that’s for sure. Think of all the times the phrase “Remember when…..?” was brought up in a convo, and then you and your chums would have a good laugh about it. Memories enable bonds to be formed and friendships to be grown, and they inspire joy even in the darkest of moments.

So this holiday season, if you’re feeling sad about the state of things right now, look into your personal archive of memories and pull some out to reflect and reminisce on. My hope is that it would give you reasons to be joyful as well as motivation to create new memories out of the seemingly smaller festivities this year!

Your attitude and perspective are choices only you can make. Choose wisely, my friends.

xx, jolene


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