What if I told you that this is the year you change the world?

You might laugh, shake your head, or roll your eyes at the thought. Maybe you’d label it unrealistic or rattle off reasons why changing the world is an impossible feat. But what if you allowed yourself, just for a moment, to let go of pragmatism and reach for that big, audacious dream? Perhaps it’s innovating a solution for climate change or fighting hunger. Maybe it’s eliminating homelessness in your community or creating free education and childcare. Or maybe the dream is closer to home—changing your world. Leaving a job that drains you. Paying off debt. Starting a family.

Let’s talk about it: shame. 

We’ve all experienced it, to various, debilitating degrees. For some, it’s the flush of humiliation when you realize that the toilet paper from the washroom stall followed you surreptitiously on the heels of your shoes, back to homeroom. For others, it’s the visceral discomfort of explaining an absent relationship with a sibling to a new acquaintance, or disclosing suicidal ideation in the emergency department. 

I vividly recall the overhead lights, the incandescent circular orbs that - in the midst of labour-induced delirium - looked like they were descending from the heavens. Maybe this was what it was like to transition into the afterlife, I thought to myself, as the bone-shattering contractions made their merciless march up my back, across my abdomen and into every atom of my body. Those who shared tales of near-death experiences talk about this light that beckons them forward, calls them home. In the haze from the waning epidural and the waxing contractions, I wondered if maybe the cosmos was proffering a glimpse into the mysteries of the universe - a recompense for experiencing the singular agony that is protracted childbirth. What befuddled me was whether this was simply a glimpse, or the curtain call of my final act.