Last year at Christmastime, I wrote a blog called A Different December. From the first of December until the twenty-fifth, I wrote a blog a day, every day. I didn’t want to wake up on Christmas morning as I normally did, with a home decorated and food prepared and presents bought, but completely unprepared spiritually to welcome the day and my Savior. I wanted that December to be different. So I forced myself to sit at the computer for awhile every day to contemplate and prepare my heart for Jesus’ coming.

It wasn’t easy to do, and just because I sat down every day didn’t mean that the distractions and to-do lists and obligations and piles of laundry magically disappeared. It was more work, yes, but it brought a wealth of spiritual blessings. And it reminded me: the truly good things in life are worth fighting for. After completing that month I was tired, but incredibly fulfilled.

That’s why it’s time to do it again. This time in September, when the school year is fresh and scratchy new. When summer is the farthest away from us, and the calendar pages feel fat and full. When routines are yet to be established, and we make our first efforts to carve new ruts of familiarity and comfort.

“If we can just make it to October…” That’s the saying in my family, among my sisters and mom, come every August when we’re pushing into new school years, new jobs, new homes. We’d all rather skip from the all the firsts, right over itchy September into the crisp, cozy days of autumn. Of course that’s impossible, but it helps us remember that all these new things, all these unpacked boxes and unfamiliar faces and unknown routines are temporary. Soon things will feel lived in and comfortable again, and that usually happens around October.

So I’m going to do what my psychologist sister tells me to do:

Lean in.

Lean into the discomfort of all the new things. Lean into the unknowns. Lean into the fears. If you’ve never heard this expression, it means to accept what’s going on and to sit with it, instead of trying to avoid it or explain it away or give up on it. It’s accepting what is, taking a deep breath, crying if you have to, and then moving onward. The shortest distance isn’t around something, it’s straight through it.

So while I’m leaning into the discomfort, I’m not going at it alone. God is standing right next to me. He made our lives with day and night, firsts and lasts, seasons that come and go. And while we’re standing at the beginning at the start of a new day, a new month, a new season, a new job or a new school year, it’s the perfect time to let the past go (he’s forgiven it all) and move forward with Him (he sees what’s ahead). As we begin, we know that we’re walking with him.

September is the perfect month to lean into Him.