What's Saving My Life? A Hodgepodge

a world's okayest end-of-year list

Hello, dear friends. Today is our last dispatch before the holidays–the Blue Room will be closed until the first Friday of 2023.

Best-of lists and end-of-year summaries are everywhere this time of year. I like a good retrospective as much as anyone, and there were certainly blessed highlights in 2022, including a sabbatical, a book release, and a renewed call. But it was also A Lot. 

So today I’m sharing a few hodgepodge answers to the question popularized by Barbara Brown Taylor, “What’s saving your life lately?” Some of these may seem frivolous and not worthy of such a lofty question. Pish posh. Yes, the grand virtues like beauty, love, hope, and kindness help sustain us. But we experience these grandiosities through concrete things: a hand on the shoulder, the expansiveness in the lungs after a good workout, the soft clothes we change into at the end of a hard day. 

So with no apologies and off the top of my head, here’s a random list of what saved my life in 2022, with some recency bias because the early part of the year is hazy. I hope you’ll compile and share your own list.

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I bought this teapot from Goodwill for $4 while shopping for the college kid’s apartment, and it cheers me every time I use it, which is almost daily.

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Music League with my extended family. 

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During an exceedingly difficult week this fall, a loved one sent an amaryllis bulb wrapped in red wax, with the instruction to put it in a window and do nothing else to it. Sure enough, it has bloomed through no effort on my part. It’s been a living metaphor for life’s unfolding, whether through our efforts or in spite of them.

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The Dear Hank and John podcast.

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The book More Language of Letting Go by Melody Beattie, author of that self-help stalwart Codependent No More. I have some baggage around the word “boundaries”--it was weaponized against me at a vulnerable time in my life–but I’m realizing more and more how healthy relationships depend on healthy boundaries. Prentiss Hemphill defines boundaries as “ the distance at which I can love you and me simultaneously,” and this book of daily readings has been a great guide as I do that work. 

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Candles candles candles. I burn them almost nonstop from mid-October through spring. Hurricane lamps, lightly scented candles in tins from Trader Joes, and this month, the Advent wreath. “Christ” candle courtesy of my friend Joe:

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My weekly coaching/checkin with my friend LeAnn. In addition to helping one another set intent and stay accountable, we support one another through silly gifs and memes:

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Juno my compost bin, and what she teaches me about patience.

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Favorite TV shows from this year: Andor, Station Eleven, and Somebody Somewhere. Honorable mention: Ted Lasso, which came out in 2020/2021, but I rewatched it this year for my own pleasure and for the leadership cohort I co-led.

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A renewed love of Celtic spirituality in general and Celtic Christianity in particular. Am currently reading every John Phillip Newell book I can get my hands on. Christ of the Celts has been my favorite so far. If we can put imperialist colonialist Christianity decisively behind us–here’s hoping–this could be part of the grand experiment that comes next. Everything old is new again. (Would you be interested in more posts/conversation on this topic? Let me know.)

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Speaking of writing, the move to Substack has provided so much ease. The platform is simpler and cleaner than MailChimp, so much so that it makes me want to write more! I’ve got some plans and dreams in the works for next year. The weekly Blue Room newsletter will continue and will always be free, but I’ll be sharing additional musings with paid subscribers in the new year. To welcome folks into this experiment, a yearly subscription is 10% off through the end of the year. 

However you show up here, thank you, one and all, for your support and companionship. They are tremendous gifts.

Season’s Greetings!