I've never done resolutions. I'm not into this 'new year, new me shit' either. Because *puts on Pastor voice* we should be striving to better ourselves with each passing day. Not just the beginning of the calendar year.
What I decided to do was write a list of things that I'd learned over the course of 2017, that I could carry with me into the new year. Keeping them close as a form of mantra's and life lessons to live by.
I listed about 10 things. (I fucking struggled to make it to 10). But upon reading the list over and over, I found that I could place them all under the very first thing that I'd written in my list.
The decision that you need to make may not always be the easiest one, but trust your heart that it's the right one.
I was going to use Mass effect as a reference, because I'm an oddball fuckwit. But life is really a bunch of choices that we make and live out. Every single day. Everything we do is a choice. Some micro. Some macro. Some monumental.
A large factor which governs many of our decisions is fear. Especially when one choice places us into the unknown. I made a bunch of bold decisions over the course of 2017, after years of avoiding doing as such. I'd left a job with a company that I'd worked at for over 8 years, with nothing else to go to. I cut a relationship off with my Father. I cut friends off. I made a conscious decision to be more of the person I am and less of who I feel people around me felt I should be.
For far too many years prior to 2017, I'd played it safe. When I look back on those years I wasn't so much living life as I was sleepwalking through it. I knew I wasn't always making the right decisions that would truly push me forward, but the comfort of the easy ride through that decision made me feel safe. Even if that safety came with regret.
With every 'safe' decision I made, I was unknowingly relinquishing a part of myself in what felt like some Tom Marvolo Riddle horcrux bullshit. By the end of 2016 I found myself alone in New York inadvertently coming to a realisation.
I miss me.
With every safe decision I was making, I was losing a piece of myself. However small a piece, it was still a piece of me. Over the years I was chipping away at myself for the sake of being safe. Not being a casualty to risk. Unbeknownst to me that I was losing myself the whole time.
I had to start making the right choices, even if it meant that they'd come with hardships, pain, heartbreak and all the shit that we could all do without. But I also had to accept that not every right decision is hard.
I had to start making the right choices, even if it meant that they'd come with hardships, pain, heartbreak and all the shit that we could all do without. But I also had to accept that not every right decision is hard.
The decision that I need to make may not always be the easiest one, but I'll trust my heart that it's the right one. I may make a wrong call, but it's a risk I'm now more than willing to take.