The past year has proven to be a remarkable one: a year marked with tremendous personal growth, unforeseen challenges and strengthened friendships. A year mixed with love, loss and eternal hope that ignites my spirit and sends it soaring to unprecedented heights. A year fortified with people and places for which my gratitude is continuously extended.
In no particular order but with equal amounts of importance, here are 26 noteworthy lessons I’ve learned over the past year.
1. Some decisions are the products of hours, weeks and months of careful thought; some are made in a split second. In either instance, I regret none of mine.
2. Though, the decision to test the lactose intolerant waters with slices of pizza and the occasional scoop of ice cream (or Tasty D-Lite) will always be met, in the very least, with gastrointestinal upset.
3. Cutting way back on coffee: smart. Attempting to nix it entirely: unabashedly stupid and an experiment I doubt I’ll try again anytime in the next 26 years.
4. I really, really like my natural hair color, even with the occasional, single grey hair that keeps popping up on the left side of my scalp. Which I will continue to pluck out with tweezers.
5. Cooking is therapeutic, especially while watching someone else do it for me as I sip an alcoholic beverage.
6. There are times when it’s good to speak up to voice opposition, and others when it’s best to keep those thoughts to oneself. Remaining silent doesn’t mean that I haven’t an opinion of my own - tact can be a beautiful thing when employed properly.
7. Re-reading Strunk & White’s ‘Elements of Style’ has helped with my writing in countless ways. Adjective abuse is so 2008.
8. A sense of style goes deeper than the clothes on one’s back.
9. It’s okay (though a bit nouveau) for me to say that I have a budding writing career. No quotation marks, no apologies, and no existence without the people who pushed me to make it what it is today.
10. Flirting to cut the line, whether it’s at a bar or at Whole Foods, is a skill to be cherished.
11. Doctors can be very, very wrong. I trust my intuition and know my body better than anyone else.
12. ‘Family’ is the most transient word in the dictionary and goes deeper than blood relations. I have the best family in the world.
13. Home truly is where the heart is.
14. But nothing beats the feeling of sleeping in my own bed after days or weeks away.
15. I have a sick addiction to raisins, with tendency to eat multiple servings in a matter of minutes. (Shrugs.)
16. You only get what you give, and more often than not have nothing to lose by putting yourself out there, completely and entirely.
17. That one semester on the crew team has left me with pretty solid back muscles. I’ll take a halter top with built in bra for $400, Alec.
18. Betrayal can pop up in unexpected places. And what can I do about it?
19. Love can pop up in unexpected places. And what can I do about it?
20. I have chronic food envy and will never be entirely satisfied with my choice from the menu until I sample from the plate(s) of my fellow diner(s).
21. Lying about one’s age is an activity best saved for the birds.
22. I try to keep in mind what my grandmother, the epitome of class and elegance, would do as I make my wardrobe choices. Sayonara, sweatpants at the supermarket.
23. Focusing on what I don’t have will cause me to feel depressed and anxious. Focusing on what I do have makes me feel blessed and abundant.
24. On the topic of abundance, I have a love/hate relationship with my breasts - but nevertheless am happy to say they’re my own.
25. I will continue to fall down, step into uncharted territory and question my direction. And that’s okay, as long as I keep going.
26. Every day is happily ever after.
Haha, I love number 5. Number 9 is something I felt this year with my title as choreographer. What a great list, I can relate to everything you listed. Maybe I can try to think up a list for my upcoming birthday.