It's a time of manifold anxieties: the end of the year, the end of a decade—and not just any decade, but the first of a new millennium. 

For most feeling human beings, it's a time of wistfully reviewing the past and assessing successes and failures. In a year plagued by economic downturn and unemployment, there may well a great number of you who see your year as a dark column in your personal ledger.

If we look around us, the news doesn't seem to be all that good either: war, starvation, terrorism, murder, politicians. Around the world an inordinate amount of poverty and suffering lies on the shoulders of women and children. We have so polluted the planet that the very water than rains down upon us may be poisoning us in return.

Things may seem as if they have been more horrible than they have ever been, but the one thing I've learned from studying history is that bleak horror is ever with us. The difference today is that we know it so much more immediately and vividly; but we also have myriad ways of coping with that dreadfulness as well. And that's where your New Year's focus needs to be.

The ancient Egyptians believed that after death your heart would be weighed against the feather from the goddess Ma'at's headdress. Heavy hearts get eaten by the lion goddess Ammit; the light-hearted proceeded on to paradise (reed fields for the Egyptians; you may imagine something rather different, such as a land of chocolate). While they were primarily concerned with the deeds of a good life, the lightness of the heart was an apt metaphor.

So while you can face the New Year with the usual caveats—don't drink or eat too much, spend time with your friends and those you love—you can also ensure a better year by remembering to value the things that make you heart light. Now I'm not talking about the blithe ignorance of the bad that Barbara Ehrenreich rightly denounces. I don't believe we are already perfect in ourselves anymore than I believe we were put in this world to suffer; we are neither angels nor demons.

Albert Einstein once wrote, "If you want to live a happy life, tie it to a goal, not to people or things." That I do believe. Not in the Puritan sense of having work ever before us, but in the sense of having our imagination fired by what we hope to be capable of achieving; and not just our personal goals of self-fulfillment and ambition, but our goals as humans, as animals as inhabitants of this earth.

But bad things happen along the way and anyone with the slightest empathy cannot avoid seeing the suffering around us. We lose hope, we made mistakes, we fail. How do we survive it? Love without expecting anything in return; share what you do have with anyone who needs it. Some of the simplest pleasures in life have been abandoned in modern society, given over to the professionals.

Sing: however badly you do it, it is a joy to share with others. Dance: joyful movement can lift the blackest mood; laugh. That uniquely human ability has marvelously restorative powers particularly when shared with others. Whether it’s something totally absurd or something fueled by anger, laughter is the cheapest mood-elevator and seldom leaves you with a hangover.

This New Year's eve, make your heart as light as Ma'at's feather: laugh.

Image via Wikipedia