twenty-four

wow, I've abandoned this blog for a whole year -- only remembering about when I saw the auto-renewal charge on my bank statement. What a year it's been.

Every week I kept thinking I should return to writing. I have some things weighing heavy in my heart that I need to get out. I have so many thoughts in my head. My stress is actually starting to manifest.

But twenty-four, my god. This year I fell down and picked myself up. And then I fell down again, and again, and again, and I picked myself up each time and found another lesson to learn from. Look at me, actually learning.

Except these are the lessons that aren't easy to learn; they're the nasty scabs on scraped knees that bleed when you bend. They're the kind of wounds that get worse before they get better. But I found myself white-knuckling, crying at inappropriate times, and finally saying fuck it and following my heart. And it led me to being broke in my parents house and relying on them to buy my groceries. And watching a lot of Netflix. And finally breaking a self-deprecating cycle.

Last I wrote I had broke up with my boyfriend of four years. And I have handled that amazingly well, if I do say so myself. I'm almost surprised as to how well I handled it. After a few months of repressing any emotions, then letting myself feel horrible for being a heartbreaker, I forgave myself. Sometimes things just don't work out and it's not my fault or anyone else's. We just weren't meant for each other, and if it's not head-over-heels exciting, breathtaking, beautiful love -- I don't want it. And when I happened to accidentally stumble into love again, I didn't stop myself. I didn't carefully calculate. I let it happen. And it is sweet and blissful like I hoped.

I learned about myself through the opinions of others. Which is probably the antithesis of how you should measure your self-worth, but if you are a major self-deprecator such as myself, then maybe it's nice to learn how you rub other people. And I found out, shockingly, that I'm not so bad. I'm not annoying and clingy, I'm actually kind of funny, and my friends actually like me and genuinely care about me. My job allowed me to mingle with people who I probably would have otherwise never met and they like me -- they really like me. Wow! Who would have thought, I am actually a people person.

And the most important thing I learned this year was that I actually matter and have valuable, marketable skills. I guess this year I was pretty down on myself for not landing a job in my field, for being unemployed for a few months, coupled with the politic atmosphere, I sort of convinced myself that I was a special millennial snowflake who will rely on my parents forever and mentally cursed myself for not going into finance... then I remembered that what this country needs more than ever are people like me, with specialties in fields like health, psychology and research. As soon as I stopped fighting it, opportunities opened up.

Even more so, I have a sense of peaceful contentment. I haven't had a panic attack in weeks, I stopped drinking so much damn coffee just to stay awake, and the future doesn't seem so scary. The pieces will fall will they will. I will be ok.