As this year comes to an end, I’m not thinking much about resolutions.
What I’m noticing, instead, is that life feels more precious than it once did. I care less and less about material things and more and more about lasting relationships. The kind that remain steady over time, even as circumstances change.
For example, I often find myself thinking a lot about the elderly in my life. Many of them are widowed now. They have children, families who care about them, and people who check in on them. And yet, at the end of the day, they are often alone. There is a particular loneliness that comes with losing a life partner, someone who shared the daily rhythm of your life, the small conversations, their simple presence. It’s something you don’t fully understand until you see it up close.
Observing this has changed me. It has made me more attentive to what truly matters over time. Careers end. Roles change. Health shifts. But the need for connection, companionship, and relationships endures.
I realize that what I understand now hasn’t come from textbooks or professional training.
It’s come from listening, from watching people navigate marriage, parenting, aging, illness, faith, doubt, and loss. And from living long enough to see that information alone doesn’t carry people through life. Relationships do. Faith does. Purpose does.
Over the past year, my own faith has deepened. Not because God sent down a lightning bolt, but because I’m learning to trust more and control less. I’m less focused on outcomes and more grounded in the belief that I’m not meant to carry everything on my own. That feeling of love from my husband may not be the version of love I envisioned growing up as a young girl, but to sit in the truth of being loved is enough for me. It doesn’t need to be shown in my version of love. That shift in perception has brought a peace I didn’t expect.
I’ve also noticed how drawn I am to simplicity and to slower ways of living.
I admire cultures that prioritize meals, conversation, and relationships over constant productivity. And while I may admire that from afar, I’m also learning to notice what’s already here, even in winter, even on ordinary days. There is a lot of beauty in life when we take the time to see it.
As we move into a new year, I want the conversations I’m having, especially on the podcast, to reflect these observations. Marriage matters deeply to me. Health matters. Faith matters. But life is bigger than any single category.
I want to speak with people from different countries, different stages of life, and various ways of living. Priests, artists, chefs, clinicians, parents, and others who are willing to talk honestly about what they’ve learned, not as experts giving advice, but as people who have lived and paid attention.
I hope that these conversations feel less like instruction and more like sitting together over coffee, talking about life the way women do when there’s time to slow down and be real.
I discuss this further in my December 30 podcast episode, where I share why I’m allowing the conversations on the show to expand in the year ahead.
If you’ve been reading my work but haven’t yet listened to the podcast, I invite you to join me there. I’m looking forward to a year of thoughtful, grounded conversations that reflect life as it’s actually lived.