I don’t know about you, but I find the start of a year puts me in a rather reflective sort of mood. Sometimes it is just a general sort of ‘hmmm I ought to think about’ sort of mood. Other times, a topic or a theme hits me and I feel like I keep getting hit with it over and over again. This year has been of the latter sort.

Early in January, while preparing for our family celebration of Twelfth Night, I was drawn to the bible verses that talked about the three magi returning home ‘by a different road’. “By a different road” just jumped out at me in bright flashing neon lights. The sort that one probably should not ignore.

I encountered the thought, (and those some flashing lights) again as I was going over the past year as part of my tax prep process. And again, while I was preparing a workshop for a friend’s writing group. And once more while reading an author coaching book called “Dear Writer, You Need to Quit” by Becca Syme. The core theme of the book was ‘Questioning the Premise’—essentially questioning the roads we take without thinking about it.

Ok, ok, already, I’m getting the hint! Enough with the flashy lights!

So, what does all this fuss and bother about ‘another road’ mean? In part, for me at least, there is an element of taking a different path from the old roads that kept producing the same old results, which, while familiar, were not beneficial. Sometimes we can get stuck in old ruts, which can look like settling for old, and even dysfunctional patterns and even relationships. One of my new roads will hopefully distance me from those old patterns.

Another new road I’ll be exploring is one which takes me beyond the same old way of doing things. It’s the safe way of doing things. The way I know how to do things. The way that produces the sort of results it always has. Another new road is veering away from the familiar to new destinations.

Not all ‘new roads’ are actually new. They can also be the choice not to go down the same path again. That’s another one I’m going to need to explore. I’m apt to head down the familiar way without even thinking about it. But it seems like there are some familiar paths that I just don’t need to go down at all anymore, paths that I need to put up a ‘road closed’ sign on, and just avoid all together. I think that’s going to be difficult. I like the familiar a little too much, I think.

And finally, there are a few places where I want to do, but need to give myself-permission to take a different path to get to. Many people take Road A to get there, but I’m discovering Roads B, C and D can also get there, sometimes more quickly, sometimes less, sometimes with better scenery or less traffic. Taking a different road also means allowing myself to get to where I want to go by the road less taken, as it were.

I know it’s not going to be easy, going by another road. It’s going to be an interesting journey for sure, which leads to my theme for this year, ‘Stay the Course.’ I look forward to seeing how this is going to play out.

What about you? Do you have new roads to travel this year or old roads to avoid? Tell me in the comments.