Normally, around New Year’s, I spend some time reflecting on the year past, answering a series of 10 questions my therapist once gave me. Questions like, “Is there something you wish you had done differently this year?” and “Describe a world event that impacted you this year. How? Why?”
I took one look at that list this year and thought: No effing way. 2020 was full of pain, loneliness, and trauma—collective and personal—that I don’t wish to relive. At least not right now. Actually, I’m not even sure it’s possible to process a time like this while we’re still very much in it. I might be personally processing all of this for the rest of my life.
That said, I do think it’s worth taking a moment to pause right now. But instead of looking back, I’m looking forward at the year ahead of me.
I’m making the conscious decision to feel a shred of hope. I think I have to. I don’t know when things will get better, but they will. And as I take these first steps into a year that will hopefully (god I hope I’m not jinxing this) go from worse to better instead of better to worse and worse and worse, these are the things I want to take with me.
Choosing how I spend my time and energy.
With an abundance of unstructured time and so little energy this past year, I’ve realized how precious both of those things are. While the past 10 months have felt like they might as well have been 7 years, I also couldn’t help but feel how quickly a year really goes by when it’s not filled with anything to break it up. Time is fleeting, and I want to be intentional about how I spend it.
I also realized this year that when I used to say, “I don’t have time,” I really meant, “I don’t have the energy for that.” My energy is precious and very quickly used up. Simply getting through the day, working a creative job, and showing up for people in the way that I want to takes a lot out of me. But I now know that I just need a little more emphasis on rest and space to process than others might, and I need to be very careful about where I direct my energy. And that’s okay.
Presence.
I think I finally know what it means to be present. I’m not saying I spent 2020 feeling grounded and happy (I most certainly did not), but rather I was forced into having to wait for things longer—grocery store lines, packages arriving, hugs.
I found myself multiple times recently thinking, I just want to speed up time so that all of this can be over. But wait no, I’m also completely anxious about the social pressures and exhaustion of “re-entering” and “normal.” And then I laughed and said, Welp, it’s a good thing I can’t control time anyway. I might as well just be here.
Understanding my personal balance between alone time and people time.
Being a social introvert is already hard, but the pandemic has really put that to the test. I made it 5 weeks living alone before I had to move in with family, but then I went 7 months where I didn’t even realize I hadn’t had a day entirely to myself since April. Neither of those situations is healthy for me.
While it’s hard having those limits stretched, it is comforting to finally know where my line is on either end, and what I need to return to equilibrium.
New tools for managing anxiety.
I already had a pretty solid toolbox for managing my anxiety heading into 2020, and man have I needed to whip that out in full force.
But the thing about what we’re going through right now is that mental health has become a much more prominent and acceptable topic of conversation, and people are sharing resources left and right. My favorite new one I’ve picked up has been asking myself the question, “Who told you that?” when I’m having an anxious thought. In most cases, I end up figuring out the answer is “nobody,” and everything stops. It’s amazing, try it.
The trust that things will get better.
I’ve been thinking about February 2020 a lot. For many reasons I won’t get into now, it was the most alive, hopeful, and connected to myself I’ve ever felt—and I was still blissfully unaware of what a pandemic even was. Now, a lot of what I had then is gone. No wonder I’ve felt so much grief this year.
But if this drastic life change and the dances between grief and contentment I’ve had to endure this year taught me anything, it’s this: I should be proud of myself for creating a life that is worth missing this much, and I can trust that I’ll rebuild something even more abundant and beautiful when the time is right. Everything ebbs and flows, and things will get better again.
I don’t know what 2021 holds, but I do trust that the home I’ve built within myself will get me through whatever is coming, so long as I’m intentional about nurturing and accessing it.
And whatever you’re feeling at this conjunction in time, I wish you a year of more ease, hope, and joy than the last. Cheers.