Prayer for a New Year: Finding the Uncommon Hour

2022 ends with a majestic stillness, 2023 welcomes in the abundance that comes when we live in awe

Sometimes the awe cannot be captured in a photo. Sometimes we just have to be present for it. That happened to me as I turned west toward home and the sky above the snow-capped peak of Mount Taylor presented a parade of cottony lavender clouds. I had just purchased oysters for a New Year’s Eve dinner with my special Irish guy and was brimming with gratitude for the love, music and writing that have filled my life this year.

I was driving, and no way could I capture a scene that majestic and immense on a mere smartphone, so I decided to dwell in the awe of the present moment and just be grateful I was alive and here to see this light. As Bono sings in U2’s “Song for Someone,” “there is a light, don’t let it go out.”

The light is here for us every day. To warm us, lift our eyes up, remind us that we can get through the dark times. The year 2022 was the manifestation for me of many years of learning to be at peace with the dark and to plant more light in my world.

Sometimes it’s as simple as the small moment when we are receptive to the uncommon grace of a day. I call this the “uncommon hour,” and it’s one of the practices I integrate into my Uncommon Hours class and community about designing and de-stressifying the writing life. The class is about more than corralling time so it sits just…