Glimmers

Although I don’t go in for any of the ‘New Year, New Me’ malarkey in January, I do choose an overarching theme or intention for the calendar year ahead and try to aim my arrows in that general direction. 2025 was all about simplifying and this year I have decided to focus my attention on glimmers. Glimmers are those micro-moments which give you a warm feeling inside. Taking time to spot the glimmers in your day shifts the focus away from the negative, builds positivity and fosters a spirit of gratitude. It’s the antithesis of watching the news, scrolling through social media or reading the newspaper, which does tend to dwell more on doom and negativity. Something I found myself doing on more than one occasion in the year that’s gone. Of course we can’t ignore life’s difficulties altogether but by collecting glimmers we build the capacity to illuminate the darkness.

For folks who are grieving, the start of the calendar year to be even more difficult to negotiate than Christmas. The thought of shutting the door on a year – sometimes one where their special person walked the earth – and launching themselves into a new year without them is heartbreaking. You cannot put a time limit on grief. We’re still in the depths of winter. January 1st is a false threshold. Nothing really starts then. There’s time to go slowly, to adapt gradually; finding glimmers provides a manageable and structured way of doing this.

So whether it’s that clump of snowdrops on a walk, a cloudless starry night when the moon is bright, a friendly wave when you give way to someone on the road, the last piece of Christmas cake, your favourite film or a new book, glimmers make a difference and matter. They won’t fix pain but they will make it more bearable.

I hope you find some glimmers this week and perhaps you’ll make some for other people too. Some of my students have been sitting mock A Level exams; one thing we;ll be doing in our coaching sessions is looking for the glimmers (the things that went well) and building from there. Teenagers tend to be hard on themselves and my role is to help them gently shift the perspective.