Listen to thisLike countless others, I make New Year’s resolutions
every year. I’ve been doing so since I was seven or eight. Most years I
write them down. Some years I make a long list, and when I look back on
these lists, I can identify a couple of common themes that unite them.
Two years ago I just made one. Some research indicates that making only
one resolution can improve one's success rate. Funnily, though, in
trying to meet that one, I ended up focusing on and improving two others
instead – ones that I had considered adding to the list but didn’t. I
guess I was rebelling against myself.
Statistics such as “99% of all people do not keep their resolutions" get
thrown around at this time of year, and the more cynical among us
consider New Year’s resolutions a complete waste of time. For me,
however, it has become less about success or failure and more about
looking back and looking forward. Interestingly, the tradition of making
New Year’s resolutions started over 2,000 years ago when Janus, a
mythical Roman god, was placed at the start of the calendar. He had two
faces, symbolising the ability simultaneously to look backward and
forward; January is named after him. I’ve included a more feminine
version above.
Rituals are also an important element of good Child and Youth Care
practice . They they are worth attending to in other realms as well, and
this ritual that integrates looking back and taking stock with looking
forward and making goals has stood the test of time. So, for 2009 I have
resolved to write a monthly contribution for Child and Youth Care Online. Thank you Thom,
for this opportunity and challenge.
This resolution to write a column actually serves the broader themes I
referred to above. One relates to attending to my own personal and
professional development, and the other to making a positive
contribution to others. Writing is an anxious affair and I have all
sorts of diverting behaviours that get in the way of doing it. It’s something I need to develop, though. Writing is also a core requirement
of my work, and more importantly, I think it is central to the
contribution I want to make to our profession. More concretely, I
want to better support
CYC-Net, and delivering this monthly column is one way of doing so. I
know that writing is vital in the development of clearer thinking, and
that writing regularly is necessary to find one’s voice. Voice is
something I’d like to understand better and write about. Clearer
thinking and voice can be important ingredients in empowering others
(and in understanding how to do this better).
This is a nice illustration, actually, of the complex interplay of self
and other within the context of service. In developing myself, I am
better able to serve others and in serving others, I develop. This is
also something I want to develop a deeper understanding of and write
about.
I think there is another, perhaps even more important aspect of making
resolutions (whether at New Year or other times of the year). The act of
looking forward with aspiration requires a degree of hope, but it also
stimulates and cultivates hope. Barak Obama’s recent presidential
campaign clearly tapped into a healthy collective hunger for hope rather
than fear to shape our political future. Above, I have included an
image, designed by Shepard Fairey, which played a part in Obama’s election. Fairey – and Yosi Sargent, a dedicated Obama
supporter – disseminated posters of this image so that it was plastered
across democratic primary battle grounds around the country. These two
individuals chose to believe that they could make a difference, in their
own unique way, and they acted on that belief . The impact of
this–surely now iconic–image cannot be measured, but if one is to go by
the price of winning bids on eBay for rip off posters, then it continues
to have an effect.
Hope isn’t something that I remember speaking about that much when I was
in practice, and certainly not in terms of its importance for good
practice. Yet I am becoming increasingly convinced of the fundamental
need for hope, and the importance of holding and conveying hope to our
staff and young people. I am also developing a better understanding of
the destructive impact our lack of attention to hope has had on our
young people, their families and ourselves. I will definitely be working
to understand better the place of hope in practice, and will be sharing
my thoughts about this in future.
So here’s to 2009. May we find the hope necessary to invest in our own
development and to make our unique contributions to the lives of
children, young people and their families. Happy New Year!
