Turning 33...Happy Birthday to Me!

Tomorrow I turn 33. Happy Birthday to me!

I’ve already done a lot of reflecting on the past year in my last two posts, but I can’t break tradition. I’ve done a birthday post for the last four years. So I’ll try to keep this brief and hurry my way to the real purpose of this post – my goals and resolutions for the next trip around the sun.

If you’ve already read my last two posts, thank you and I’m sorry, but you already have a pretty good idea of how the last year went for me. For those of you who haven’t read them, no hard feelings, but last year was a strange year. A good year, that felt busy and chaotic. I felt like I did so much and nothing at all, all at the same time. It was a year of unexpected, but amazing and necessary growth.

I feel more like myself, more excited, and more at peace with the world than I have in a long time. My relationship with my body is rough. My anxiety and insomnia are still in need of some serious management. I still feel lost and unsure of where I’m headed or even want to go. Life is still hard, but life feels doable finally.

Taking a moment to read over my “Now I’m 32 Post,” I’m honestly surprised. I didn’t remember feeling that optimistic, although I understand why. And that feeling of optimism and excitement didn’t last throughout the year. That being said, it all feels very applicable to this year.

“I’m walking out of 31 and into 32 so proud of what I have accomplished and energized to keep pushing forward. Last year was just the beginning. Just a sample of what I can do, and an appetizer, if you will, to what I want to do.

It wasn’t necessarily the year I planned or intended, but it was the year I needed. I feel like I’m finding my path and my place. I’m just beginning to scratch the surface of what I can do and crack the door to what I want to do. Before last year I don’t think I ever fully let myself dream as big as I really wanted, but now I’m slowly pushing that door open inch by inch. I’m slowly letting myself believe that the impossible is possible.

Last year was amazing, but this year can be better.” – Excerpt from “Now I’m 32”

Last year definitely wasn’t the year I planned, but it was the year I needed. And rather than scratching the surface on what I can do, I scratched the surface on the me that I buried a long time ago. And now that I am starting to rediscover who I am, chasing my dreams and building the life I want feels even more possible.

So now to the real purpose of this post, how did I do with my goals? Let’s take a look –

Read more, once again, hopefully, one book a month. I read a few books, not nearly one per month, but I read…kind of
Rather than hiking more, this year I want to go camping more. We are aiming for every 6 weeks. We went camping twice, but we scheduled more. They just didn’t work out.
Build this blog and my social media up. Create better more consistent content and begin to monetize in some way. I have no excuse. I neglected this blog so much during the second part of last year. But I did launch a new Instagram account and did start focusing on my catgram and the garden account.
Continue to grow my freelancing income. I picked up a few projects
Get strong, eat right, and love my body. Still in a love-hate, heavy on the hate, relationship with my body, but I am eating better and getting stronger.
Build or refurbish something on my own. Nope
Start a side project – podcast, t-shirt company… Nope =(
Launch my candles officially! …Nope
Take more pictures with my DSLR and get better at photography again. This took a turn. I actually decided to take a break from the DSLR and instead just start focusing on photography in any form.
Meditate regularly. Did consistently on and off
Daily face yoga. Monthly???
Get the VW running again. Money was tight

So what do I want to accomplish this year? As usual, a lot of them will seem repetitive…

Read more, ideally one book per month.
Go camping more.
Create better more consistent content and begin to monetize in some way one of my many platforms.
Continue to grow my freelancing income.
Get strong, eat right, and love my body.
Start a side project.
Perfect my sourdough.
Learn to properly can food.
Meditate regularly.
Daily ice facial.
Get the VW running again.

And my intentions for the next year are (the same as last year) –

to be more intentional with my time.
to slow down and be ok taking a pause.
to focus on the good, live life with gratitude and positive energy, and less pessimism and negativity.
to create memories and spend intentional time with family, friends, and all my loved ones. To build myself my true tribe of people.
to start speaking my mind.
to not be afraid to dream and chase those dreams.

As usual, besides my goals and resolutions for the year, I also created a bucket list for myself. That bucket list, rather than a list of goals I plan to accomplish, is a running list of fun and exciting things I want to try to do this year.

Cover Image by mehmet lafdinleten from Pixabay