Happy New Year and Rudyard Kipling

January 2nd, 2025

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Happy New Year! I think it's natural to feel lost when jotting down goals and ambitions for the next 12 months. I'm half way through my sophomore year, and I'm beginning to have a sense of what I want to do in my career and after college. I'm still unsure what "moving with purpose" actually means though. Sure, I might have a good reason for doing X but X oftentimes is the supposed "good" reason for another Y and so on. But maybe as Rudyard Kipling suggests, living with purpose is not as abstract. I enjoy returning to Kipling's "If—" for some guidance.

 

Thought I'd share this poem with you. Hope you enjoy and wishing everyone happiness in 2025. ​

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If—

By Rudyard Kipling 

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If you can keep your head when all about you

    Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,

If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,

    But make allowance for their doubting too; 

If you can wait and not be tired by waiting, 

    Or being lied about, don't deal in lies, 

Or being hated, don't give way to hating, 

    And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise: 

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If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;

    If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim;

If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster

    And treat those two imposters just the same; 

If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken 

    Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools, 

Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken, 

    And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools: 

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If you can make one heap of all your winnings

    And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss, 

And lose, and start again at your beginnings

    And never breathe a word about your loss; 

If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew

    To serve your turn long after they are gone, 

And so hold on when there is nothing in you 

    Except the Will which say to them: 'Hold on!'

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If you can talk with crowds and keep you virtue, 

    Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch, 

If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,

    If all men count with you, but none too much; 

If you can fill the unforgiving minute

    With sixty seconds' worth of distance run 

Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it, 

    And—which is more—you'll be a Man, my son! 

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