Let me be the first to wish you and your loved ones a very happy and healthy 2013. We know it will be here in 362 days. 2012 will blow past us just as fast as 2011 did, and we won’t get a chance to do it over again.
People rightfully talk about the value of hindsight. True, nothing like the rearview mirror of hindsight unearths the woulda, coulda, shouldas of life’s missed opportunities. So let’s jump ahead to the end of 2012 for a moment and use a little “pre-hindsight” to look backwards into the coming year.
The first thing I see is that the rewards of 2012 went to those who worked, not wished for what they wanted. Hard work perennially favors those who relish most deeply the opportunity of America, and 2012 was no exception. Once again history repeated itself, revealing that America’s enviable strength continues to be nurtured by those who maintain the sobriety of self-reliance amidst the stagnation of entitlement.
Technology accelerated her tenacious penetration into every crevice of modern life. From medicinal nano-robotics to deep space exploration, 2012 provided the largest window ever into how much we know about how little we know. Just as Edison and Einstein hewed a path for Jobs, Branson, Kamen and Gates, so did 2012 Sherpa the way for our next generation of technology’s trailblazers.
Of course our evolutionary journey can not be disgorged from its past, and 2012 was no exception in our painfully slow march to the brighter edges of humanity. For those hoping differently, I regret to inform you that our many accomplishments over the next 12 moons were not divorced from the crime, war, neglect, intolerance and disregard which accounts for such bulk in our behavioral forensics. But undaunted, we forged ahead nonetheless.
It is not by accident, but through perseverance, that we made it to the end of 2012. And it is not through indifference that we will make it much farther. The best news of all in our pre-hindsight review of 2012 is that in the ongoing battle between indifference and perseverance, perseverance won once again. For every instance of self-destruction both around us and within us, so too did arise the opportunity to remain fearless, unrelenting and undeterred in our appreciation of the gift life. I did not give up. And you did not give up. And that is ALL that will matter, in hindsight, some 362 days from now.
So as it must be, the year 2012 will be like none before it, a bittersweet experiment from the almanac of time. And as it can be, if we choose, the greatest days of our lives.
