{*Did you know you can write on Elephant? Here’s how—big changes: How to Write & Make Money or at least Be of Benefit on Elephant. ~ Waylon}

January feels like the longest month of the year.

And probably the saddest too.

The end of a year always marks the end of our hardships. As December comes to an end, we look forward to January, as it brings the hope of fresh beginnings and new successes.

We enter the new year with a strong sense of hope. Even if we don’t usually make New Year’s resolutions, we often have the determination to do or not do something.

We might want to lose weight, start exercising, stop smoking, drink less, love ourselves more, give more time to charity, start new friendships or end toxic ones. Whatever our decisions are, we always seem to have high expectations and look forward to making them all happen during the month of January.

Because we have too many things to do, we often feel rushed and stressed. And when things don’t go according to plan, we might feel exhausted and slightly upset.

When the real world and our strenuous schedule don’t meet our buoyant expectations, we become desperate and fall into the trap of thinking that another “bad” year is on the horizon. And so we wait for the next year and…next January.

How do we avoid the imminent disappointment that January often brings?

It’s not January per se that’s depressing; maybe it’s our idealistic attitude.

In Buddhism, hope is regarded as a form of suffering. Weird, right? Let me explain.

Hope—despite the strength and motivation it gives us—is a mental state that is rooted in desire. When we have a desire for something, it’s because we are not fully satisfied with how things are. We want something different, something better. And so we hope for the best (which is good) and deeply attach to it (attachment is not so good).

Attachment is also a fundamental form of suffering in Buddhism. When our source of attachment changes or goes away (because impermanence is inevitable), we might be tormented.

Having said that, our attachment to hope and outcomes makes January the saddest month for us. When our diet fails or self-love weakens, we give ourselves a hard time and abandon our New Year’s resolutions within a few minutes. Then we binge on food and drinks and…self-hatred.

The solution is quite simple: We set goals and stay hopeful, but gently and diligently, without attachment or unrealistic expectations. We relinquish our idealistic attitude and accept the fact that our goals might fail (or succeed) at any time. We anticipate obstacles—not perfection.

Hope, according to Buddhism, is good only if it helps us to see things as they are—in a state of flux. We walk slowly and mindfully toward the rest of the year without rushing, without stressing, without judging.

If we are able to maintain this disciplined attitude, we can accept the unknown and the uncontrollable and welcome them with arms wide open.

So instead of focusing on achieving our goals within a few days or weeks, we focus on the breath, on the now. We slow down because what’s the point of chasing a goal if it becomes another source of suffering?

~