Rather than "wash away" my last year's troubles or "start fresh" this year, I'm simply going to reflect and build on what I've learned these past 365 days of 2013.
Here are the top 3 things I'm addressing in my life this next year:
1) I get so stressed out about getting it "right" that my expectations cripple my actions
2) My negativity breeds negative outcomes and that whole "holding onto anger is like drinking poison and expecting other person to die" is so much clearer when you get "let go"
3) I was so scared of my voice that I suppressed it
Of those three things, that last one may just be the most revolutionary to me. I was definitely born a writer...I have Lisa Frank journals full of scribbles to prove it.
When I went to college, I had every expectation to travel the world and cover "real" issues--funny how your definition of "real issues" changes over time. Blame Blood Diamond and almost every other movie for making journalism look so noble (and sort of easy).
However, during college I got burnt out. To be completely honest, I was burnt out long before college. But the whole figuring your life out was just not happening for me. Quite the opposite was taking place. I was figuring out who I wasn't and becoming disenchanted with who I thought I would be. I was used to getting straight As and acknowledgment for straight A's, doing sports, having a regimen. You don't get that in college. In fact it's everything outside of those straight A's that gets you ahead.
So, when I got that degree I was literally dumbfounded on how I had spent my last four years. It was a blur. Fragmented moments. I didn't feel....anything.
Then I landed this whirlwind unpaid internship that turned into a part-time job and then my first "real job"--or at least as "real" as it gets in the start up world.
I LOVED it. But, soon enough the same pattern started to emerge. On one hand, I began to feel stagnant, writing the same things over and over, and over again. On the other hand, I got to dabble in PR, social media scheduling, and branding campaigns...so I sucked it up. I tried to run away from the writing title. But, it always came down to me to "write copy for this..." "write this review," "rewrite the Pinterest comments."
My voice didn't belong to me there. However, for as much as I bitched about it, I was secretly comforted knowing that I didn't have to take the blame for any negative comments. But, let me tell you...it was hard not to say anything when things were going good. I was becoming a credit monger without the right to a byline. (Though I do wish I had demanded credit at times!)
Being let go finally gave me time to face my weirdest fear: I am a writer. Not a journalist, not a PR person, not a "creative." I'm a writer.
I had all these preconceived notions of what "good writing" was and what I had to be as a graduated "journalist." My heart seriously ached when I wrote my tenth "how to pump up a push up" article. I wanted to write something deeper. It was like Catholic guilt, but journalism style.
After clicking "submit" on the 20th faceless, impersonal application, it finally dawned on me. I needed to stop analyzing everything I was doing or "would do." No publication was going to magically appear that let me write "what I wanted to write." Better yet, I didn't have to have a specialized track.
I had to make my own platform. All these half-started word documents...my first (and currently only) page to my novel, my seventh drafted post...they need to come to life. I need to be honest with myself and truly believe that I had every right to write.
My voice is my everything. It goes beyond the writing. I had trouble accepting me--not the me I thought I was going to be, but the me I have always been. My voice guides my ideas, beliefs, and dreams. It's my one way ticket to anywhere.
I simply didn't have a destination in 2013. I was the typical aimless wanderer because I was afraid to be rejected, to fail, to do the "wrong thing." I played into my role at the office rather than establishing my true title.
I hid behind someone else's name and dream as a detachment mechanism. It was a way of putting mine on hold.
So this year, I'm going back to my roots. Before the degree, before the insecurities, before the worrying about "life," I had my voice--and my kick ass Lisa Frank stationary.
Cheers to everyone finding their "voice" in 2014--even if that means they have to re-find it.