Affirmation for 2026: Living fully

Happy New Year? Like me, do you also hesitate with that wish?

Wishing happiness for a whole year can feel like asking

more of life than it can give,

and more of us than we should have to carry.

After all, life was never meant

to feel good, safe, or settled all the time.

So what if we wished for something else? Something truer. Something, perhaps, more realistic.

Here is my wish for all of us.

May we live fully.

Not chasing a performance.

Not chasing an achievement.

Not chasing anything comparative or superlative - 

becoming better, calmer, more healed, more certain.

None of that.

May we live life fully as we are, and as life is: uneven, alive, unfinished.

May we offer ourselves,

in the rare moments of quiet solitude

and in the presence of chosen family,

Just enough happiness,

Just enough joy,

Just enough grounding,

Just enough safety,

Just enough comfort,

Just enough ease,

Just enough spirituality - 

Enough to feel our feet on the earth.

Enough to soften without disappearing.

Enough to rest without numbing.

Enough to breathe without apologizing.

Enough to remember

that we belong to something wider than our fears.

Enough to carry us

into the moments out in the world - 

fully.

For constant grounding, safety, comfort, happiness, and ease

are flickers - promises life never made.

So what is living fully, after all?

Living fully is arriving with our tenderness intact. Meeting joy without clinging and grief without turning away.

Letting our edges be seen, our voices be imperfect, our presence be real rather than palatable.

Living fully is loving without guarantees. Acting without certainty. Staying when it would be easier to numb, distract, or disappear.

May we learn to offer ourselves enough care that we do not abandon our own lives.

Enough honesty that we stop negotiating ourselves down to fit.

Enough courage to participate even when the ground feels unstable beneath us.

May the grounding we cultivate in solitude and the safety we build with chosen family

be what enables us to show up for the rest of our lives - fully.

Fully enough to live

in an honest relationship with our lives.

Showing up bruised, curious, devoted, awake.

Showing up for life - 

as it is, fully.