👋 This isn't a Waste of Time

It's Monday. I'm Here for You.

Ps. I’ll be back in your inbox on January 6th. Wishing you a delightful and inspiring end of 2024. I can’t say this enough, I am forever grateful for you dear reader. You make my Mondays have meaning and you give me purpose unlike anything else in my life.❤️

I have been prancing around declaring 2024 a complete waste of time. I did absolutely nothing and I became no one.

What do you mean you became a no one? A patient friend asked me over decaf cappuccinos. Who did you want to become?

Oh, you know, all of the things. Rich, famous, in the best shape of my life. Those things.

She took two long gulps and rolled her eyes. Did you ever think that maybe you became other things instead?

I rolled my eyes back and changed the subject.

But it got me thinking...

There's a quote from the TV show Mad Men that I've always loved: Nobody knows what's wrong with themselves, and everybody else can see it right away.

Perhaps the same can be said about how we change.

We cannot live a year of our lives and not change. It's impossible.

We cannot live a year of our lives and not find a lot of things to celebrate. It's impossible. Even if there were some hard moments too.

But it is possible that we don't see it. How often do we look in the mirror and see beyond our surface?

When do we ever think: Wow, there's so much that has happened to me, for me, with me, because of me, since January.

Whenever I bore my friends with the monologue of 2024 being a slog of a year, each one of them will reply with 2-3 things I should be proud of.

I decided to look backward. I opened the photo app on my phone and scrolled back to January. I went through 2,763 photos from this year and kept repeating to myself: I can't believe that happened.

I was shocked at how much of my own life I had forgotten about because my head, and my anxiety, had me flying too fast ahead and up high that I missed all of the delicate beauty right beside me.

2024 wasn't a waste of anything. It's just so hard to feel that unless we see that.

Sometimes the most meaningful changes, and years, don’t look how we hoped they would. But if want proof of how much we lived our lives in a year, it’s easy to see if we look at the photos we took, the memories we slowly forgot about, and the tiny little moments that made us become someone stronger, when we didn’t realize they would matter as much as they do.

I hope you can find little glimmers in the collage of moments from this year. I hope those glimmers show you just how far you have come.

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👏 Progress Report

• Last week, I finished my Co0o0ol Little Thing. Sigh and phew! I have wanted to finish writing my third book for 5 years and I finally did it. I only had one chapter left but felt so inspired that when I started writing, I wrote three more chapters. I kept wanting to put this off for another year but then I thought about you and this newsletter and I didn’t want to let you down. In the new year, I’ll share

• In 2024, I wrote 51 Monday newsletters and here are the top (3) newsletters that people read, shared, and commented on the most:

  • You Make Decisions Based on What You Know

  • Social Media is Making You Lonely

  • Take Care of Yourself

• I’m thinking about revamping the newsletter in 2024 and changing the name! Do you have any ideas for this newsletter? Topics? Themes? Changes? Pretty please let me know! I’d love to hear from you (hit reply and let me hear it all!!)

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👏 Instant Pick Me Ups

🛒: I did Black Friday shopping at one place and one place only — Athleta. Everything is well made and the prices (when items are on sale) aren’t very expensive. I’ve recently become obsessed with their clothing (workout/comfy gear). Here are my top picks that are still on sale.

• I bought this in a few colors. It’s in between a sweatshirt and a top. I wore it with silver pants and jeans this week for work meetings.

• I’ve been living in this in black. I wear it as a final layer in the cold weather before putting on my big winter coat because it has a hood. It’s soooo comfy.

• The best fitting sweatpants. I usually size up but these were so big I sized down and they weren’t too tight at all.

• I only buy things from Athleta when they are on sale (because there’s a sale like once a week). Here’s what is currently discounted.

📖: I just finished this book and can’t stop thinking about. One of my new favorite books that I plan to reread again next year.

🎵: Loved watching and listening to this.

📺: A great show to binge while folding laundry or walking on the treadmill.

⏰: A fun way to remember the month is to find a new song you adore and play it every morning or afternoon at the same time. Then, years later, when you hear that song you’ll always attach it to saying goodbye to December 2024.