Thank goodness this year is almost over, amirite? I know that so many of us want to create as much distance as possible between this fall and ourselves, and having the mark of a different year on our calendars feels significant. But for deeper levels of change in myself and my community to occur, I know that I need to make bigger, yet sustainable steps into the future that I want to see than ritualistically burning my calendar (Kidding. It’s going into my recycling. . .after I tear it apart.)

For many of us in DC, we’re looking at a future that looks to be filled with roadblocks. But the magic of yoga practice is how it carves out spaces for light during dark times – how even on a rough day, it allows us to appreciate the expansion of our intercostal muscles in a side bend; how we can expel a sense of stuck-ness by flowing or holding utkatasana (chair) until we break into beads of sweat; how we can move with a childlike sense of playfulness on our mats. Let’s look to our practice for hope, for space, and as a way to spark our creative fires this year.

Not convinced? Does it feel selfish or fake or impossible to you to remain hopeful that change is possible? I hope that you will find these words from historian Howard Zinn elucidating:

“To be hopeful in bad times is not just foolishly romantic. It is based on the fact that human history is a history not only of cruelty but also of compassion, sacrifice, courage, kindness.

What we choose to emphasize in this complex history will determine our lives. If we see only the worst, it destroys our capacity to do something. If we remember those times and places—and there are so many—where people have behaved magnificently, this gives us the energy to act, and at least the possibility of sending this spinning top of a world in a different direction.

And if we do act, in however small a way, we don’t have to wait for some grand utopian future. The future is an infinite succession of presents, and to live now as we think human beings should live, in defiance of all that is bad around us, is itself a marvelous victory.”

So what changes shall we make in the new year, friends? What can we actually do?