In 2024, I adopted the phrase “Start the Ending“.

Hopefully, your first thought about this year’s phrase is not a morbid one, that I am proclaiming the ending is here. Not at all. In fact, I hope to declare exactly the opposite. This is about beginning something different or doing what we are already doing in the best way possible.

Unfortunately, I have a bad practice and perhaps it has become a bad habit. My brain immediately evaluates how much time some task should take. Somehow I have warped that into there being a cost paid in the amount of time that this task is worthy of receiving from me, and I am not going to pay more. I have always called that having a high level of efficiency.

I heard Father Mike doing his daily speech on Bible in a Year say something that ignited a thought about this year. He said that it is not how we start something, but how we finish it that counts.

That hit home for me like a newly placed bird feeder would feel to a hungry bird in the winter. Completely discovering a new thought or perspective is refreshing and even life giving.

There is a reason to do better than what I have been doing. It counts. Finishing a task brings closure and only the end result is what will be seen. That needs to look its best because it was me doing it. It is easy to start something and not worry much about how well it is going since it is only the beginning. Time to adjust that. Start like it is being finished so that every part is the best it can be.

Someone told me that Disney has a phrase, “The magic is in the details.” I am a big picture person so this will take a change in my thinking, to focus on details that have never been important to me.

This is my wish for you, for me, for us this year, in 2024. I pray we can put magic in the details of whatever we are doing. May we see the finish as we begin so that when it counts, it is the best. I heard another saying from some kid’s movie called Johnny Muhala. “Go big or go home, Bruh.” Time to put more into it before it counts.