POLITICS: What Are We Carrying Into the New Year? – USSA News

What Are We Carrying Into the New Year?

Rev Kat Carroll

As we move through the final days of the year, during Hanukkah, Christmas, at the threshold of the Winter Solstice, and just before a new calendar cycle begins, it feels important to pause and reflect on what we are choosing to amplify.

Prepare for Change has always stood for awareness, discernment, and awakening. That includes looking unflinchingly at corruption, injustice, and the shadow aspects of ourselves and our world. Truth matters. But so does how truth is shared, and what it does to the people receiving it.

Over the past weeks, I’ve noticed a pattern that feels worth examining together.

Much of what we are publishing and sharing centers almost exclusively on dark, sensational, and generally, externally sourced material: crime, conspiracy, corruption, threat narratives, frequently without context, commentary, or integration. In some cases, links are broken, articles lack explanation, and the emotional weight is left entirely with the reader. But the title alone can still plant seeds – but not always what’s healthy for planting in our consciousness.

This raises an honest question, not as criticism, but as care:

What does this focus do for our community—especially at a time of heightened emotional and energetic sensitivity?

We are living in an era of information overload. It’s heavy with political perspectives that are often hard to discern, since much is based on opinion or a lack of critical thinking and research… The media is often politicized and leans one way or another.  Opinions are outsourced to others.

Many people are already feeling overwhelmed, fatigued, anxious, or grieving, personally and collectively. When the dominant signal we send is one of constant alarm without balance, it doesn’t necessarily awaken. Often, it exhausts. It can deepen despair rather than empower action.

This is not a call to ignore shadows or to “look away.” Balance is not bypassing. But neither is it wise to feed the nervous system a steady diet of fear without also offering:

• context

• discernment

• agency

• healing

• or hope

Especially during sacred seasonal thresholds, times that cultures across the world have long recognized as moments of reflection, renewal, and inner light.

The Winter Solstice reminds us that even in darkness, the light returns. Hanukkah speaks to tending the flame. A new year invites intention.

So it feels fair to ask:

What are we choosing to carry forward?
And just as importantly:
What are we asking our readers to carry with us?

There is another kind of truth we could amplify alongside necessary exposés:

• stories of resilience and regeneration

• examples of ethical innovation

• grassroots compassion and community care

• humor that lightens the heart without trivializing reality

• content that helps people process, heal, and re-center

These are not distractions. They are integration.

I believe our community deserves not just awareness of what is broken, but reminders of what is being repaired, and what is possible when consciousness, compassion, and courage are applied together.

For that reason, I’d genuinely like to hear from our readers and contributors:

What kind of content supports you right now?

• More investigative and dark material, as we’ve been sharing?

• A more balanced mix that includes uplifting, solution-oriented, or healing content?

• Practical tools for inner work, nervous system regulation, or discernment?

• Or even moments of lightness and humor amid serious times?

This isn’t about choosing one instead of the other. It’s about intentional balance.

Prepare for Change has the opportunity, and responsibility, to ask not only what is true, but what is helpful, what is timely, and what sustains rather than drains.

As we approach the turning of the year, I hope we can reflect on this together, with openness and care; for ourselves, for our readers, and for the collective field we are all contributing to, whether we realize it or not.

Light matters.
Context matters.
And so does how we choose to tell the story of now.

For those of you who have stuck with Prepare For Change, even through the darkest of times, you are appreciated. Even more so by those who take the time to read and respond to my articles. It means the world to me!

 

And as you’re rushing around this week and the stress is building, remember to take the time to just breathe, and feel gratitude. Sometimes the best gift is simply being “present” in the lives of your loved ones!