It’s been quite an interesting year although it did take me a while deciding whether to write a review of my year or not and the extent of the things that I can share with you.
I tried woefully explaining to one or two friends about my ‘attachment’ issues with the year. It was rather disconcerting because aren’t we mostly in anticipation to bade farewell to the year and open our arms for the new one? It feels like a vicious cycle of peaked excitement and enthusiasm at the start of a new year, boredom and a little bit of unmet expectations in between and hoping that it ends to pave way for ‘another’ exciting year.

Attachment wouldn’t be the right word for how I feel about the year. Rather, I’m struggling to come into acceptance of everything that has transpired this year and letting go of that which needs letting go of. It’s difficult to come to terms with and to accept the ugly aspects.
What makes up an experience? Literally everything. The good. The bad. The beautiful. The ugly. I know that all these holistically come together to show the big picture.
I’ve come to understand that grief and gratitude can coexist. With the ending of this year, I feal immense gratitude and yet I feel a huge loss as well.Inasmuch as I’m expressing gratitude, I’m also allowing myself to feel this grief/loss and hoping that it leads me to acceptance.

I had little expectations this year due to previous unsuccessful attempts to meet some unrealistic goals. I didn’t set any fast and hard rules and I winged it a lot this time around. Also, I didn’t pick any word for the year.The goals this year was to be happy, healthy and fulfilled. I can’t honestly say that I aced these mostly because I didn’t think of what these meant to me. Health as you know is a state of complete physical, mental, social…. wellbeing and not merely the absence of disease and it’s important to consider all the various aspects of it. Happiness is a decision that one makes; it cannot be handed over to me, that I know. I’ve been searching for it in the wrong places other than myself. We’re not meant to be a constant state of happiness but neither are we meant to be in a constant state of the opposite.
Merely saying that I want to find fulfillment isn’t enough. These things mean different things to different people. A year wasn’t enough to find that fulfillment but maybe what I could have done was to ask myself what fulfillment looks like to me in this year and what exactly pertaining to this year did I find fulfillment in?
So what does happiness look like to you?

This has been a year that I’ve been anxious about: the first year (or first few years) after graduating because of a few genuine reasons. Loved ones came through for me in ways unimaginable (I was put to shame).They eased my burden and fueled me with hope. My year was made so much better by some beautiful souls and it’s been so refreshing to see my relationship with these people blossom. I can’t fully express how much I’m grateful to these people. Thank you for reigniting the soul in me and for lending a shoulder to rest on. For the friends-turned-shrinks (because they had to rise to the occasion.LOL), I’m grateful.

I’m learning to leave room for surprises and gradually come out of the mental box that I’ve fit myself into.
Life is not a defined track and from time to time, I might lose myself but the most important thing is finding myself and getting back on track.
I’ve read a little over twenty books(more than this. I stopped counting) this year ranging from fiction to non fiction. There were some books I couldn’t complete and so I didn’t want to include them. Out of these lot, a few made quite the impact. I can honestly say that most of the reading I did this year was me trying to find a distraction and mostly some comfort. Two books had the big impact on me:
101 Essays that will change the way you think by Brianna Wiest
Brene Brown’s Atlas of the heart [Mapping meaningful connection and the Language of Human experience]

Brianna Wiest’s 101 Essays was a pleasure to read and I hope to share the lessons I took from them in a different post. It’s a book that provided me with loads of comfort. It reminds me of how breathtaking the little things could be and of how hope still abounds. It’s heart warming and soothing, suitable for anyone who needs to find strength to get through another day.
Brene’s ‘Atlas of the heart’ is one book that maps the human emotions in ways I couldn’t have thought of. It was just a beautiful journey through this book which revealed so many insights on research done on the emotions. I’d call it a textbook on emotions.

Aside my first poetry collection ‘My Prelude to Blooming’, I did not do much blogging this year. It was important for me to go beyond the stretch of my blog. I submitted some of my works to some magazines and received lots of rejections though out the year. I did receive one constructive feedback on my work that I’m still working on. Did I feel like a crappy writer? Yes! Did I almost give up?! Multiple times. One of my pieces was accepted just nearing the end of the year and it really felt good. I’ve added a link to it below.

I’m hoping to blog more often in the coming year and to do a bit more traveling. I did make deliberate efforts to see a few places this year and I must say, it wasn’t bad at all.

Here’s to strength to make decisions that are in our best interest
To not letting our worth be decided by a man/woman
To find courage to avoid that which drags us back into the dirt
Here’s to growth and making worthwhile connections
Here’s to daily reminders to fight the battles that rears its ugly head daily
Here’s to outgrowing our old self
Here’s to love and hope and faith
Best of wishes in the coming year
Cheers!!!🥂