Now is the time of year when everybody wonders what the coming year will be like. Since I’ve been making predictions all morning I might as well not stop now …

I predict 2021 will be a year filled with both triumph and tragedy.

I wish it wouldn’t but 2021 will still provide pessimists and conspiracy theorists just enough drama and intrigue to be able to say, “See, I told you so.”

But it will also provide optimists and truth seekers just enough hope and light to say, “See, I told you so!”

Conservatives will do a little conserving, progressives will do a little progressing, and neither will do as much as they’d like.

We’ll lose some important people this year, and many nurseries will be filled with fresh new occupants.

Once again, fear and brokenness in some will manifest into acts of hate and evil. And once again those acts will be met with love and wisdom, great sacrifices and simple kindnesses.

In 2021 apathy will continue to damage us, and empathy will continue to heal us.

Life in 2021 will continue to be a wonder, because that’s what life is, a wonder. It will be epically big and unexpected and uncontrollable and also very simple and pedestrian and routine and predictable.

So I predict 2021 will be, as always, one part what we choose mixed with three parts whatever just happens.

If it seems like the odds are stacked against us, they are. In this universe the odds are always stacked against life. But odds be damned, life is going to continue, and there’s one thing that you can absolutely count on: the quality of your 2021—like every year before and every year after—will not be determined by whatever happens next but rather by what you chose to do with what happens next.

That’s the real wonder and magic of life. That it’s so big and you’re so small and yet, whatever may come that is beyond your control the one thing that will always be yours and your alone is what you make of what you’ve been given. And that, my friend, is what makes all the difference.

So I have but one suggestion for you and your 2021: whatever may come, choose to make the most of it, and get busy building yourself a beautiful life.