Another  year has set. Like the setting sun above {so wonderfully captured setting over the James River by my Beloved Wife MemoriaArts} the old year closes and a new one begins. We celebrate these times with new years resolutions, parties and new outlooks. I used to make new years resolutions like everyone else…and like most I failed miserably in my resolve.

Last year a trend started to pick a word or phrase for the year.I didn’t pick a word at all just submitted the year to God’s will and let what would be be. The last year was one of change…I moved away from the home area that I knew so well to a city I had never been to…I left a good fulfilling job for the uncertainty of a better paying new one…my children left the homeschool and entered into the public school 2 blocks from our new home. It was a year full of changes and trials good and bad.

This year I am picking a phrase…a Latin phrase….vivere consulto….Live deliberately. For so long I have hung back and let life happen. In part because that is what was easy in the slow country life. Partly because I had an absent father who when he was home was over bearing and controlling and was raised primary by my mother who rolled with the orders and directives. I learned from a young age to just go along with the world and adapt and move as needed. I never really planned for my life…never really watched my finances or planned my time and mainly existed. I realize now after a time of reflection that I never really knew who I was or what I liked.

That changed in college when I met my Beloved wife and had a reason to live and exist in this world. Problem was I wasn’t really sure how to do that and over the past 13 years have failed time and time again. Over those years I have learned a lot…grown in a lot of ways. This year I am making a concerted effort to live deliberately..to plan and set goals. To grow more and be the best Husband and Father I can be. Here is to a new year…a new book with many blank pages to fill.