Throughout this year celebrations have been dampened by regulations and by anxiety. I have been thinking about the value of celebrating. What exactly does it do in my life?

Celebrating puts a stake in the ground to show “This is where I am now. I have accomplished this specific achievement.” We celebrate big things milestones like passing an exam, finishing school, completing a degree. There is also value in celebrating smaller steps like developing a new habit. The feel-good experience of celebration helps us to hold on to the progress we have made, to keep the ground we have claimed.

We also celebrate the memory of past events. Such anniversaries give us a measuring marker to see how far we have come on our journey. We look back at the year that has passed between birthdays, Easters or Christmases and compare ourselves to the selves we were a year ago – physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually. What has changed? What has remained the same? Are we content with our current state?

Celebrating Christmas, Easter, cultural holidays or feasts also places me in a bigger story with a lasting meaning. I am not completely on my own in my individual narratives, but part of a bigger whole.

There is something about celebrating that simply needs community – a sharing together of the progress we want others to enjoy with us, a greater expression of thankfulness for what has been given to us. A wedding or round birthday celebrated in solitude is just not the same…

So, as we approach Christmas and New Year, I wish you wisdom in your choices of how to navigate the yearning for community celebration safely for yourself and others, that you can find yourself in a larger story with eternal meaning, that your evaluation of your journey this year leads you to fruitful applications of learning in the year to come, that you can see the progress you have made in small and big things.

Let us celebrate!