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Relishing the new

Mark Berry helps us reflect on the challenges and the joys of embracing new possibilities.

As a lover of football, the most nervy time is not the end of the season. More often than not you have a pretty good idea of where your team will finish a good time before the kick off of the final game, though for some, each season there is always the tense minutes of a survival fight or a play off campaign.

But for most fans, by the last month of the season, thoughts are already turning to August - which players will go, who will come in, what are the hopes and targets for the season to come?  No, the most difficult time for the football fan is the preseason, as players (and sometimes managers) come and go and hours are spent pouring over stats and forecasts.

No matter how good things may begin to look on paper, no one knows what is going to happen when the first whistle blows in September. There is no certainty in sport, that’s kind of the point! We love the thrill of the unknown, we love the feeling of hope and the buzz of nervous energy! Despite the old idiom, “it’s the hope that kills you!”, we can’t resist the excitement of what might be.

Thomas Merton wrote, “You do not need to know precisely what is happening or exactly where it is going. What you need is to recognise the possibilities and challenges offered by the present moment, and to embrace them with courage, faith and hope.” From Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander (1968).

In times of change we can choose to focus on what has been, either to rip it apart or to look back with nostalgia, maybe even attempt to climb on to it!  Or, perhaps we leap too far ahead and spend the time trying to predict what will be, either with hope or fear. Merton challenges us to be present in the moment, to relish the new and the unknown and the possibilities that it brings. 

Eckhart Tolle once said, “People don’t realise that now is all there ever is; there is no past or future except as memory or anticipation in your mind”, but I think there’s more to it than that.

There is real treasure in learning to notice the present in a deep way, not directing our attention beyond it to the point that it never comes into focus and we find ourselves missing so much. 

However, the past is always part of where we are - we could not be where we are without it. We need to value it and the lessons it taught us whilst resisting the temptation to cling to it, or attempting to dwell in it.  And the future is in part what gives the present its dynamic - call it anticipation, call it hope - the unknown is full of a very real energy. 

The truth is we hold the three in tension, the present is itself a cat’s cradle where the wisdom gained in the past can be woven into the possibilities of the future in hope. 

 

Mark is known for his poetry as well as being a pioneer and teacher. Read his poem 'Hope' for further reflection on the theme of relishing the new.

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