I guess many people will spend today, this week, reflecting on the year that has gone by so incredibly fast. My heart broke this year because of the world around us. No one is listening and when they do listen; they listen to the wrong things. The world can change, we can change; we must change.
In a nutshell, that is what the year taught me.
Reflection; it has been a year of many changes in our family and they will continue. All very good things. As much as I live many things on my sleeve, much of the family day-to-day events stay within our family, where they should stay. But changes occurred and people moved on. Forward is always the best direction. We all hope the best things for our children and they all moved forward in leaps this year; dusted themselves off when needed, and overcame obstacles when the world said; “….you probably won’t achieve that…..” Well they did. And as I always say, they make me very proud.
Diabetes Community; I felt the diabetes community doubled in size this year. Many new voices and objectives wanting to make a difference and I surely hope that continues. New is good. As I have stated many times this year, and wrote about it as well, we are strong internally and among ourselves; if we want to educate the world, we must continue to venture into that world and move away from our community. Hold on to our community, stay with our community, lean on our community; but venture into the world as never before, a world that still has little clue about our world. We must look outward…..and if that scares us, great! Nothing done great is done comfortably……so fear is good; let’s look back at it at the end of next year and see what we did collectively.
Research; I still think the cure is coming and there are surely more devices, events, and projects like never before. I caution, still, that we stay away from living the online battle on who is better, who is worse, and bashing ideas based on opinions. We should not care who gets there first and one idea moving forward can always create a thought in someone else’s mind. I would still love to see all these great minds in one room to create a ‘white paper’ on how to get this job done. That goes for management tools as well. And again I say, no one can ‘fix’ anything from the outside. If you are not active in something, and you think it needs to be fixed, or should work better; you just cannot do it from the outside. It’s too easy to give an opinion and everyone has one; if you want change…..roll up your sleeves and get in there and do the work to make it better. ‘Work’ can mean whatever you want but just “don’t do nothing”.
For you; I want this day-to-day ‘diabetes thing’ not to own you. I want you to live life to the fullest potential in all aspects. If you are stressed, seek peace. If you are lonely; seek companionship. If you feel uneducated; learn. If you feel inactive; move forward. If you only ‘talk’ of doing; create an action step. I hope YOU gets taken care of this year.
The bottom line is that we have one shot at THIS life. Whatever you are going through, take it and make it whatever you need to make it. It’s a great, big, wonderful world out here……..may 2015 allow you the opportunity to find that out as never before.
God Bless and Happy New Year!
I am a diabetes dad.
Please visit my Diabetes Dad FB Page and hit ‘like’.
PS……for those who always liked my annual ‘good-bye’ column to the year passed; you can read it here.