50 things I've learned this year

🎁 Happy birthday to me! (& a gift request)

Happy birthday to meeee!

Tomorrow is my birthday. I’ll be 36 years old young. I wanted to mark the occasion by sharing a few things I’ve learned/relearned/tried to learn from the last year. It feels like something of a return to my old school blogging days. I dug out the list I wrote for my 25th birthday, 11 years/a lifetime ago. Some of my lessons aged reasonably well: 

Good communication is not about what you say, but what other people hear. Listen deeply, without an agenda. All anybody really wants is to be heard.

It’s OK to fail, to really screw it up, to make a huge mess. Whatever’s going on, if you’re on top of the world or in a pit of despair, know that this too shall pass.

Every morning is a new start. Things always seem better in the morning. Don’t make decisions in the dark. Wait for the sun to come up.

Rest assured that my 25 year old self was full of ridiculousness too. I advised readers to make their lives “juicy”, and earnestly quoted Dolly Parton! 

Whenever I sit down to write a piece like this, I feel entirely incompetent. Like I have nothing of value to say and y’all would be better off opening a few fortune cookies rather than listening to me. But, let me at least try: 

What have I learned this year? 

1. Things take longer than you think they will, but that doesn’t mean they’re not worth doing. I remember reading a post on my pal Rachel Hills’s old blog about how the goals and dreams she had for herself didn’t happen by a certain age, but they did happen. The idea stayed with me as I watched my 30th birthday sail past without a book deal. As I entered my mid-thirties and had to accept that very few of my professional ambitions were realised. But I’m not a dancer or a sportsperson. My writing has gotten better as I’ve gotten older (10,000 hours & all that). I know I’ll achieve my dreams someday, and I’m (mostly) fine with taking the scenic route. (Also, those dreams I had as a younger person, they fulfilled their function. I could imagine a better life for myself and held on so I could one day achieve them. I couldn’t, it turned out, write a book while deeply traumatised or figure out how to deal with the pressures of a writing career while trying to keep my head above water. But those dreams kept me alive until I could make them a reality. And this year, to a large extent, I have.)

2. It’s OK to live inside a decision. I wrote a little about my choice whether or not to have children, which is the clearest example of this lesson but I do find myself at a few different inflection points. In my youth, I was more of a  black and white thinker. It was a survival mechanism. These days, I'm more comfortable living in the gray. I don’t need to force a decision so the pain of uncertainty will be over. This, like many things on the list, is no doubt helped by having a stable income, home, career and life. With the comforts of middle age, there is more buffer in my life. And with that, I am more comfortable with all that I don’t know. 

3. On the list I wrote for my 25th birthday, I talked about the power of consistent small steps. This remains true. I’ve been learning Italian on Duolingo daily for more than 300 days and I have seen how knowledge and practice accrues over time. 

4. Body first, work later. I put this on a post-it earlier this year. Rather than trying to force myself to work through hunger/exhaustion/being cold, it always makes more sense to pause, care for my body and come back to work afterwards. 

5. Protect your fundamentals. Your physical and mental health. The people closest to you. Your relationship with yourself. Don’t take them for granted. 

Delirious but happy on a train in Vietnam, earlier this year

6. Travel is a lot more taxing - emotionally, financially, physically - than you remember, but it’s also worth it. 

7. Do yoga. You’ll feel better after it. You might feel like you can’t spare 30 minutes, but you can. 

8. When I think back on the elaborate writing plans I made when I was too sick to work, I really wish I’d read great novels instead. Which I think means that I want to read more great novels now. Reading is one of the surest ways I have to calm my body and mind, to restore myself and to find a way forward. I do read a lot (36 books so far this year) but I’d like to prioritise it even more. 

9. I’ve had some really tough times this year. Weeks where I cried for days, couldn’t eat and was haunted by nightmares. I described them to my therapist as being like a bout of food poisoning. It was hell for a few days, but it passed. It’s also a metric of how far I’ve come. I lived years like that. These days, it’s often just a few days or weeks. 

10. You get a lot from compromising. It feels kind of counter-intuitive, but doing something for someone else actually makes your life richer. It feels like you’re giving up what you want, but you’re also gaining another way of being in the world. 

11. You should bake cakes. Life is too short not to. (If you have this book, my favourites have been: the citrusy almond cake (which is also gluten free), the chocolate beetroot cake and the wholewheat raspberry. The Citrus and Poppy Seed cake is also very good. They’re ALL very good.)

12. Make one packing list. Treat it as a living document. Add to it after every trip. 

13. Make the thing you wish existed. After a few disheartening experiences freelancing, I decided to pour more energy and attention into growing this community. Investing in this space has allowed me to do work that feels important to me, even if an editor would never commission it. My audience is small, but my readers are more engaged and invested than the folks I reach through mainstream media. You never regret investing in yourself. 

14. Stay the hell off social media. I never learn, but also maybe I am slowly learning. Everyday I’ve spent away from scrolling, algorithmic spaces is a day that I’m more rooted in my body and the world around me. 

15. Related: Add ‘quick’ books to your kindle and choose that over scrolling. 

16. Try to have one unscheduled day a week. A day to do whatever the hell you feel like doing when you wake up

17. Spend the time, money and attention it takes to create a nice work space at home. 

    

    A previous (messy!) iteration of my home office. That plant died. RIP plant!

18. I always thought I was too cheap/cerebral to care about clothes. But, I really love clothes and paying attention to this essential form of communication with the world. 

19. Take writing classes. You might write something worth publishing. Or you might just enjoy the experience of being in a learning space with people who care about the same things you do. I’ve made some lovely pals (who are also excellent readers of my work) through classes and have loved being in the (virtual) classroom again. 

20. I’ve always liked animals, but since moving into a home with cats, I have been surprised by how much I love them. I clean up their shit and puke. I put up with them drooling on me and leaving hair on every inch of the place. But I’ve come to love them much more than I thought possible. 

21. Eating dinner on the couch is cozy. But there’s something special about eating at the table, even on a random Tuesday. (Tablecloth, mood lighting and jazz optional)

22. I got sick a lot this year. I got a lot better at it as the year went on. Always take the drugs, and rest more than you think you should. 

23. I became a runner this year. I love it. It has changed how I am in the world. But, I suspect the meditation habit I’m trying to build will be both tougher and more rewarding than running. 

24. Celebrate yourself. Throw parties. Have people over. I did it a handful of times this year, and want to do it even more. 

Paaaarty!

25. Go to the freaking dentist. It’s miserable and costs a bomb, but you need to do it.

26. Don’t deprioritise therapy. Even when you think you’re doing fine and it’s such a pain to get the whole way across town on a weekday, it’s still necessary. 

27. Institute a weekly date night. It’s nice to always have something to look forward to.

28. You can still watch Disney films even if you’re an adult with no kids. 

29. Eat when you’re hungry. Don’t analyse it. Don’t worry about it. Don’t spiral. Just do it. Your body is wise. Don’t judge your appetite. Just eat. 

30. Take more photos. Print them. Hang them. Bring the people who aren’t in your everyday life into your home. (I got one of these for my partner for Christmas last year and have loved seeing our memories slideshow throughout the day. It’s a pricey gift, but for us, it’s been worth it.)

31. Life is too short to read shitty books!

32. Be kind to your future self. Put things in the slow cooker. Buy extras of the things you love. Spend money on things that make your life easier. It’s hard to do. It’s hard, at least for me, to believe you’re worth spending money on. But you are. 

33. Adriene (of Yoga with Adriene) asked in a video once: “Are you exerting more effort than you need to?” That simple question was life-changing for me. I grew up around the narrative of always giving 100%, of going above and beyond. But often, you can do less. People will be satisfied with less. They likely won’t even notice it’s less. And it means you don’t burn out. It’s OK to do just enough. 

34. There’s always more to life than binary systems will let you believe. This is true when it comes to gender, but also so many other ways. 

35. Please, please stop worrying about “wasting time”. What a waste of time THAT is. 

36. Solvitur ambulando. A latin phrase which means: “it is solved by walking”.

    

    One of many beautiful walks

37. “Don’t let anyone tell you who you are or what you are capable of.”

38. Try to get outside every day. A little sunlight, fresh air and nature changes everything. 

39. When I listened to Brene Brown and Glennon Doyle talk about not knowing how to stop working, my first reaction was very judgy. Then I realised I was judging them because I judge myself because they are right. When you dig deep, that soil comes from somewhere. It’s not a valorous thing. We need to learn to stop. 

40. Related: I’m so grateful for the full, rich life I’ve built outside of work.

41. Take care of your heart. Set boundaries. Sometimes you can’t help. Sometimes it’s better to step back, and let someone else take responsibility for their life.  

42. Try the pomodoro technique. It actually works, even if you don’t think it will. 

43. I have a planner which I use not for planning my life, but recording it. At the end of each work day, I jot down the things I've accomplished and what I want to remember about that day. It takes less than 5 minutes a day but gives me a high level snapshot of the kind of life I'm living. What's going well, what hurts, what I need to change. It’s a small, simple habit that has the biggest impact on my overall quality of life.

44. Pay the creators whose work gives your life meaning. 

45. I still can’t believe we’re allowed to listen in on people’s therapy sessions. I’ve learned alot from these podcasts, mostly that therapists are people too and they get things wrong. 

46. When something feels insane but you know you have to do it, do it. You can’t always explain what you need, but your intuition will guide you toward it. 

47. Give your brain time to be quiet. To be free of external input. To be away from screens and in the physical world. 

48. Cull. Unsubscribe. Always aim for fewer, better quality things. Declutter your digital space as much as your physical space. (Consider this your permission slip to unsubscribe from this newsletter if it no longer serves you. No hard feelings!)

49. People do friendship in different ways. There are lots of ways to have and be a friend. Don’t miss what’s right in front of you because you’re hungry for something else. 

50. And one I’m still learning: Try not to underestimate people

Insert cheezy line about the sun setting on another year!

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