Dead Poets Society, the Robin Williams movie from 1989, made the line ‘Carpe Diem’ or ‘Seize the Day’ famous. This simple line is profound in the movie and in our lives.
As we embrace repentance to look backward in order to move forward, we must be willing to act today.
This call to look back is more daunting the older one moves. For there is much greater landscapes of time we have crossed too often unexplored or marred that can taunt us with regret. And the foreboding reality of limited fields ahead can paralyze our movement.
Yet, wisdom encourages us to number our days. All of them. Past present and future.
“Teach us to number our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom.”
Psalms 90:12 NIV
https://psalm.bible/psalm-90-12
This deep discerning numbering is not meant to be everyday. The human soul cannot handle that kind of pondering. However, at least once a year we need to stop and number our days so that in wisdom we can fully experience the fullness of what we have remaining.
But have you ever considered needing a wake-up call to start a new year? Yet, for Jews around the world, that’s exactly how we start the New Year — with a wake-up call using God’s own prescribed alarm clock. We call it the shofar, a trumpet crafted from a ram’s horn, and it is a central part of services on Rosh Hashanah. In fact, the wake-up call is scripturally mandated: “On the first day of the seventh month hold a sacred assembly . . . It is a day for you to sound the trumpets”(Numbers 29:1). According to Jewish tradition, the first day of the Hebrew month Tishrei is when man was first created, and on this day, every year, humanity begins a new year. We start with a wake-up call.
https://www.bible.com/en/reading-plans/12652