Tag: 2020

Give this gift to yourself today

This post is going live on Christmas Day, 2020. As I write this I’m looking back at the year we’re getting ready to leave behind. 

I don’t need to tell you what kind of year it’s been, you know. We’ve all lived it together. And it’s hard to not come to today without some amount of regret. 

We regret that we couldn’t be with our families. 

We regret that there’s not a lot of gifts under the tree.

We regret that maybe we’re just barely making ends meet. 

We regret that we might have had to take another job. Or leave a job because it was just unsafe. 

Insert your regret here. We’re going to do something together today. Grab a piece of paper and a pen. Maybe grab a cup of tea, too.

Now, write down everything you wish you’d have done better this year. Everything you regret doing or not doing. Every single thing, big or small. 

Do you have your list? Great. Now you need a candle and a fire-safe container. Fold your paper up, and set the damned thing on fire. Let it burn, then flush the ashes.

Because we need to let that shit go.

This is the gift I’m giving myself today. I’m letting go of my regrets from 2020. It was a hard year and we got through it. Now, it’s time to leave all our baggage behind and move into 2021 free from it. 

2021 can be a time to learn. We can be better as a community, as a society, as individuals. We can choose to make 2021 brighter.

Let this be the gift you give yourself. Forgive yourself for doing what you had to do to survive. Let it go, and thrive now. 

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Should we even do Nanowrimo this year?

2020 has been a dumpster fire of a year. Literally, the worst one I’ve ever lived through. I’m not going to try to make light of this.

So what if we don’t do Nanowrimo this year? What if we throw our hands up and say it’s too much. With everything else we’re dealing with, who could add writing a novel in there? Shouldn’t we all spend November trying to just survive and figure out how to have Thanksgiving on Zoom?

Hell no. 

Mind you, I’m not shaming anyone who doesn’t participate. But I’ll be doing it. And if you were thinking of writing a novel this year, you should do it too. Here’s why.

Publishers are still buying books

Agents and publishers are still accepting queries. Books are still coming out. People are still reading. So why not write a book?

Fiction can reach hearts and change minds.

If you’re feeling helpless, write about it. Write about your story of 2020. Write out your anger, your pain. Write about losing your job, your freedom. Whatever this year has been for you, write it out. 

Or you could write a fictionalized story about a country that let a deadly pandemic run wild even though they had the means to fix it and save thousands of lives. Just a thought.

Fiction can reach hearts and minds that straight facts can’t. Think of how many times fiction has hit you right between the eyes and made you see the world differently. You have the opportunity to do that now. Writing is the voice we have in addition to voting.

Vote!

So let’s use every tool we have. Get your story into the world. 

It’s a needed creative outlet

Okay, so not everyone wants to change the world with their words. Some people just want to create something. 

It’s in our nature to need a creative outlet. To make something. To paint, sing, write, draw, knit, whatever. If you just want to write a little something for fun or to say you did it, go for it! Write something and don’t worry about what you’re going to do with it later. Just love the process.

We can get something good out of this year 

We know how hard this year has been. There hasn’t been a lot to be happy about. Everything went wrong. People will be spending holidays without loved ones they had last year. 

We have to get some good out of this year, damn it. Any good we can. And if we can end the year on a high note, be able to say we did this one big thing, that’s a win. 

Let’s win just a little this year, together.

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My year of adventure

Do you ever feel like you’re just repeating the same day over and over? Not like, Groundhog day level, but that you’re just stuck in a rut? That’s where I’ve been. I go to the same day job, write the same series I’ve been working on for years. I eat the same food, read the same sort of books from the same authors, watch the same content creators on Youtube.

It becomes dull. And while I’m not in my twenties anymore, I’m not old. I’m sure not ready for my life to be stuck in a predictable rut. I’ve never been a fan of ruts.

The long term solution for this is to buy an RV, quit my job and write full time. Become a digital nomad. I’m calling that Project Serenity. And if anyone’s interested, I’ll be happy to do a post detailing how I’m doing that. 

But that’s long term. It’s potentially years in the making. And I have no intention to wait until I reach that big hefty goal before I’m happy. 

So I came up with a plan to make this year exciting. Every week, I seek out a new pablo(2)experience. An adventure.

The rules are simple. Find some new experience every week. It can be a Youtuber I’ve never watched, a book from an author I’ve never read, a recipe I’ve never tried. It can be something big, like going on vacation to a city we’ve never been to. Or something small, like driving down a road we’ve always been curious about right here in our hometown.

Now, I’ve been doing this since the start of the year, and I’ve been keeping track of all my adventures in my planner. So far it’s been nothing big. But still quite enriching.

We tried the Incredible Sausage sandwich at Dunkin. It was pretty good. 

We’ve discovered some cool new Youtubers.

We’ve had several driving adventures, exploring our hometown. It’s amazing how little we’ve seen of it. 

We have so many plans for new experiences this year. I don’t think this is going to be some major life-changing experience. My only goal is to have little new experiences that brighten my life.

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