ONE of the things we seem to be very good at in the UK is talking ourselves down.

Unlike our cousins across the Atlantic who invariably concentrate on the silver in any cloud, we tend to fixate on the dark lining. Perhaps we have been inoculated by hype or evolved a form of psychological self-protection – if we prepare for the worst things can only get better!

At the start of the year we may have had hopes for 2012 but most of us nursed doubts. Could we host a good-enough Olympics, let alone a great one? Would there be any real interest in the Paralympics? Would the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee celebrations be a damp squib? Now we have the answers to those questions.

In 2012 we were given a large dose of an antidote to our prevailing climate of cynicism. We had a taste of what it is like to make appreciation our keynote rather than criticism, to focus on what we have and can do well rather than on what we lack and do poorly.

Like everyone else, Christians can be guilty of dwelling on the negative and letting our misgivings have the last word. But the life of Jesus, whose birth we celebrate each Christmas, draws us into a very different trajectory: one which is anchored in good news and never loses hope, one which continually lifts our spirits and aspirations. This is what Jahmene Douglas has discovered and endeavours to live from.

At the beginning of 2012 few could have foreseen a shy and self-effacing shop assistant from a Swindon Asda Wallmart winning the nation’s heart on X-Factor. Yet this is what came to pass.

As you celebrate this Christmas may the God who reveals himself in the babe of Bethlehem lift your horizons and fill you with hope.