Five Thoughts Before the New Year

It's been way too long, friends. I've been MIA, but hopefully you all can forgive me for that. I've been relaxing and reflecting, as well as spending well-deserved time with friends and family. Yet, to break my blogging drought, I'd like to reflect on five thoughts, or better yet five things I've learned this year.

1) Writing will never be just a pastime. Writing is how I not only digest the world, but my emotions. It's how I lift others, shed light, and bring joy to not only myself, but every single person I interact with. I'm a writer. I'm a poet. I'm no longer afraid to label myself as so. I wasn't as committed as I hoped to be with blogging, but I think I have a great start, and hope for 2019 to allow room for my writing to burgeon.

2) If you're going to be unwavering in who you are and who you want to be, you can't have everyone like you. There will always be people who believe you are too much or not enough, and to change yourself to fit their mold only makes you fall short or way too far in another's eyes. It's cliche, and it makes me heave a sigh to type these two trite words out: be yourself. Unapologetically. Passionately. Ceaselessly.

3) I deserve all the good things that happened to me this year. It's easy to get caught up in the bad, but just as easy to think What did I do to deserve this great life? It wasn't chance or good fortune: I earned it. It was earned by me working tirelessly for the life I wanted, and putting my own good karma (using the term loosely) into the world. It was surrounding myself with those that uplift me. It was me being brave and confronting injustice, suffering, and immorality as best as I could. I'm putting it into the universe before the year starts: I deserve a good life because I work for it every single day.

4) Relationships with people are complicated because people are complicated: people don't live lives on linear paths from point A to point B. Whether it be familial, intimate, friendships, or acquaintances, you're going to reach points where detours, u-turns, and alternate routes need to be utilized. One thing I've learned through navigating all sorts of relationships, and especially the most intimate of them all, is that if a person truly cares about you, he or she will make an effort everyday to put your happiness and well-being as a priority. This is not to say it is a priority above his or her own bliss, but that he or she fervently wants a coexistence of both people's happiness. Love isn't furnished out of necessity, but want. How pure is it to want someone in your life knowing you fulfill your desires all on your own? Beautiful, and so very rare. More of this in 2019, please.

5) Teaching is hard at any level. This semester I had the opportunity to take a pedagogy class. Through discussing the struggles freshmen face, specifically in entry-level English classes, I realized how much time and effort goes into giving students equal opportunities to succeed, no matter what background they come from. The thought that goes into digesting varying discourses, reading material, grading scales, and feedback was much more complicated than I ever thought possible. It not only deepened my respect for educators, but made me cognizant of how students often become disenfranchised by the system before ever getting the chance to prove what they have to offer. Let's all hope for more strides in uprooting the systems in 2019!

That's all for now. Goodbye 2018, in case I don't write another post before 2019.

Stay loving, stay kind.