Puzzle Pieces

The week between Christmas and New Year’s is typically quiet, but this year is more silent than most. If you’re lucky, it becomes a blur of movies, dog walks, cozy reads, near constant pajama wearing and a holiday puzzle or two. Amazingly, puzzles can contribute to a practice of mindfulness and lowered feelings of anxiety, all while stimulating our cognitive functioning.

This holiday season, our chosen puzzle was a snapshot of Radio City Music Hall, complete with the Christmas Spectacular marquee and waving Santa Claus. It is the first year in a long while that we wouldn’t be enjoying the holiday tradition of seeing the Rockettes, and I know most of us are missing the familiar rhythm of traditions this year.

Photograph by Vardan Papikyan

 Separating the pieces, creating an outline of the picture and my dog inevitably chewing up one or two of the pieces that fall onto the floor (leaving at least a couple puzzle shaped holes in the finished product), I felt that a simple puzzle seemed to speak to life and its’ seasons.

Some parts of the puzzle are easier to complete than others. Some appear incredibly clear and others take a long while to come to fruition. The edge pieces create an outline for our goals but the end game of filling the portrait can be accomplished in any number of ways, unique to our skills, hard work and style. Sometimes we are certain that two pieces belong together yet no matter how hard you try to rearrange, they are not meant to be. Some pieces surprise you when they fit together, and you feel you’ve stumbled upon a happy accident. Other pieces that are lost will never be replaced. Loss of those we loved, endings, goodbyes-we learn to see our finished picture with the missing pieces rather than trying to replace or fix it. Rather, those pieces, both present and gone create our finished scene, unique to our path.

 This season, honor those missing pieces. They are still a beautiful part of your picture. Honor the parts that seemed like an uphill battle-the trying and failing, arranging and rearranging-these too are part of your portrait. Honor the place you find yourself in now. The good and bad-neither are permanent. We practice gratitude for our health, our jobs, our loved ones, our food on our tables. We honor others by giving back to our community. The pieces will continue to fit together, if we continue on.