11 – An Honest 2019 Wrap-up
2019 was really hard. I started the year by working my ass off to finish and defend my master’s thesis, and after I finished it I was so exhausted I barely did anything else the entire semester besides my classwork.
The imposter syndrome got worse this year. I’m struggling to push through my rejection letters to keep submitting my research. 2019 was the first time I’ve seriously, genuinely doubted whether I’m in the right career or actually good at any of the things I want to be doing with my life. I feel like this doubt is somehow a sign of a lack of resilience on my part, which I feel embarrassed by.
This year my emotional boundaries really got tested, and I had to learn the hard way that boundaries are only as real as the consequences for crossing them. This year I blocked both my parents on Twitter. We left our church. I ended a couple friendships.
This year was also really lonely. I have a few vibrant, close friendships in grad school, but one of my closest friends moved away this year, leaving me feeling untethered in a still somewhat-new place. Keeping up with long distance friends is important to me, but it’s hard to find the time and no matter how much I want it to be, it’s not the same as having people nearby.
We left our church at the very end of November, and I still feel that I’m responsible for the friendship I lost because of that choice. I’m afraid we’ll never find a spiritual community that is good for both me and Logan and is full of genuine, kind people. It’s sad that the bar is so brutally low, but here we are. God only makes sense to me in community with others, and it is a source of frustration and grief to me that community has been so hard to find.
I’m not really interested in ending this on a high note. There were good things that happened this year; new relationships, a new newsletter I started in 2019 with a dear friend, ways that I stepped up and in to take on new challenges. But I’m okay with this letter being a confession. There was a long time when I adopted the mantra, “write from your scars, not your wounds” and applied it to my entire life. To only ever speak about my scars, and not my wounds. Because speaking about my wounds was rash, and letting myself bleed in front of others lacked dignity. I’m leaving that belief behind in 2019. It’s okay to talk about our hurts while they still hurt.
I’m ringing in 2020 quietly, with some snacks and books and Logan and a few friends. It’s becoming a tradition of mine to do very little for New Years, because I like to start the new year feeling rested and ready to begin again. I hope you are able to slow down and ask yourself, “What is it that I need at the end of this year?” And I hope you are able to give yourself the thing your soul most needs. Happy New Year.