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Description
Tradition and ceremony have been part of the human experience since around the time the first of us decided that standing on two legs instead of four might be a good idea. Our species has traditions surrounding some of the strangest things imaginable. Every religion generates a whole host of holy days (like Hannukah and Easter and Samhain); every nation has its own plethora of commemorative occasions and politically relevent holidays (President's Day, Thanksgiving, Independence Day). Sometimes world events become ceremonial, as in Bonfire Night, Bastille Day, or the anniversary of the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima. In this country especially, this phenomenon has become rampant. We have National Talk Like a Pirate Day, National Moldy Cheese Day, even, I kid you not, National Have a Bad Day Day. They're not federally recognized holidays, but they all have genuine celebrators around the United States (Talk Like a Pirate Day has in fact begun to enjoy international popularity, especially since a certain series of Johnny Depp movies that shall remain unnamed).

Now, forgive me as I veer wildly onto another topic for just a moment, and talk about a few of this month's words. First, albatross: the largest extant seabird (in fact possessing the largest wingspan of any bird in the world), used as a symbol of good luck by sailors, and a metaphor, ever since Samuel Taylor Coleridge wrote his famous poem, for a psychological burden or curse. Second, immolate: the act of killing or sacrificing something, especially by burning.

We have, in our history, had many, many holidays relating to the latter word. Burnt offering is probably one of the most common forms of ritual, and has worn many faces over the centuries. We burn all sorts of things: animal sacrifices, effigies, bedding, clothing, each-other -- even, in some Asian countries, all the chopsticks used that year. We burn things that are worn out, or contaminated. Some of these rituals are practical, some are spiritual, and some are simply amusing. What they tend to have in common is a feeling of officialdom; of formality, of a personal and social recognition that something has ended, and that something new can now begin.

So it occurs to me that it would be useful to immolate our albatrosses.

We have a tradition in most of the Western world centered around the forming of resolutions for the coming year. It's a nice idea, but as everyone knows, in practice it doesn't work very well. It's supposed to be a tradition of beginnings, but in reality it's a tradition of false starts and sheepish surrenders, and I think the reason for this is that it's always a beginning that doesn't have an ending in front of it. Every New Year's Resolution has the potential to be an albatross hung voluntarily around your own neck, and after a few years of this... well, you've got twenty albatrosses hanging off you, and that's just not comfortable.

What I mean is that we have traditions built around the taking on of new ideas, new aspects of our personalities, the process of becoming more like we want to be, but there's no flip-side to that coin. We know that ritual is as good for ending a thing as beginning it, but we haven't applied that knowledge to our own minds. So what I propose is an end-of-year holiday based on introspection and immolation, where we take a look at ourselves, examine the ideas we hold dear, the important ones that make us who we are, and decide: which ones don't work for us anymore? The mental and spiritual parts of the human animal are made entirely of ideas and beliefs, and all but the very best of these have shelf lives. We grow into them, we grow out of them, they live in us, and they die in us, but our minds can be like grease traps, and without a way to empty them, the rot of dead ideas can poison the growth of live ones.

This would be a holiday that recognizes our own fallibility, our own capacity for being wrong. It would be a letting go of, and a making space for. You can't have a fresh start if the detritus of last year is still hung around your neck, so take it off, and make of it a burnt offering to next year, so that you can look back and remember, "I don't believe that anymore," when a better idea comes along.

Plus, it would probably involve a big fire, and who doesn't love a big fire?

Description
Tradition and ceremony have been part of the human experience since around the time the first of us decided that standing on two legs instead of four might be a good idea. Our species has traditions surrounding some of the strangest things imaginable. Every religion generates a whole host of holy days (like Hannukah and Easter and Samhain); every nation has its own plethora of commemorative occasions and politically relevent holidays (President's Day, Thanksgiving, Independence Day). Sometimes world events become ceremonial, as in Bonfire Night, Bastille Day, or the anniversary of the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima. In this country especially, this phenomenon has become rampant. We have National Talk Like a Pirate Day, National Moldy Cheese Day, even, I kid you not, National Have a Bad Day Day. They're not federally recognized holidays, but they all have genuine celebrators around the United States (Talk Like a Pirate Day has in fact begun to enjoy international popularity, especially since a certain series of Johnny Depp movies that shall remain unnamed).

Now, forgive me as I veer wildly onto another topic for just a moment, and talk about a few of this month's words. First, albatross: the largest extant seabird (in fact possessing the largest wingspan of any bird in the world), used as a symbol of good luck by sailors, and a metaphor, ever since Samuel Taylor Coleridge wrote his famous poem, for a psychological burden or curse. Second, immolate: the act of killing or sacrificing something, especially by burning.

We have, in our history, had many, many holidays relating to the latter word. Burnt offering is probably one of the most common forms of ritual, and has worn many faces over the centuries. We burn all sorts of things: animal sacrifices, effigies, bedding, clothing, each-other -- even, in some Asian countries, all the chopsticks used that year. We burn things that are worn out, or contaminated. Some of these rituals are practical, some are spiritual, and some are simply amusing. What they tend to have in common is a feeling of officialdom; of formality, of a personal and social recognition that something has ended, and that something new can now begin.

So it occurs to me that it would be useful to immolate our albatrosses.

We have a tradition in most of the Western world centered around the forming of resolutions for the coming year. It's a nice idea, but as everyone knows, in practice it doesn't work very well. It's supposed to be a tradition of beginnings, but in reality it's a tradition of false starts and sheepish surrenders, and I think the reason for this is that it's always a beginning that doesn't have an ending in front of it. Every New Year's Resolution has the potential to be an albatross hung voluntarily around your own neck, and after a few years of this... well, you've got twenty albatrosses hanging off you, and that's just not comfortable.

What I mean is that we have traditions built around the taking on of new ideas, new aspects of our personalities, the process of becoming more like we want to be, but there's no flip-side to that coin. We know that ritual is as good for ending a thing as beginning it, but we haven't applied that knowledge to our own minds. So what I propose is an end-of-year holiday based on introspection and immolation, where we take a look at ourselves, examine the ideas we hold dear, the important ones that make us who we are, and decide: which ones don't work for us anymore? The mental and spiritual parts of the human animal are made entirely of ideas and beliefs, and all but the very best of these have shelf lives. We grow into them, we grow out of them, they live in us, and they die in us, but our minds can be like grease traps, and without a way to empty them, the rot of dead ideas can poison the growth of live ones.

This would be a holiday that recognizes our own fallibility, our own capacity for being wrong. It would be a letting go of, and a making space for. You can't have a fresh start if the detritus of last year is still hung around your neck, so take it off, and make of it a burnt offering to next year, so that you can look back and remember, "I don't believe that anymore," when a better idea comes along.

Plus, it would probably involve a big fire, and who doesn't love a big fire?