Dear reader,
Happy 2024!!
It has been quite a while. I am still here. Thanks to YOU for still being here as well. I am sorry for being the unreliable narrator and dropping off now and then. Life keeps life-ing and this keeps getting deprioritised. Oh, how easy it is turn away from things that are generative! Anyway, I am quickly dropping into your inbox after all of this time to share a little bit of my 2023. I came across Aishwarya’s Instagram post on her 23 lessons for 2023. That got me thinking and I swiftly took a screenshot. Then I saw Raju’s post similarly inspired by Aishwarya. And that was it. I knew I had to stop putting this off already.
So, here I am, with 23-ish lessons from the year that was 2023. Not all of them are lessons I learned exclusively in 2023, but they definitely resurfaced during the year at different points. Not all of them are lessons that are complete, which is to say, I am not done learning them. Do we ever?
January
It is both beautiful and frightening to watch waves coming toward you. That is how I started my 2023. The lesson though that I am still trying to hold on to is:
Not all waves coming toward you will wash you over. Maybe some will sort themselves out on their way to you, way before they reach you.
If coming back to a space after a long time away feels like a relief, maybe that space has started to feel like home.
February
Neighbourhoods have a way of making you their own; that cafe worker who recognizes you by now, that cashier at the grocery store who smiles at you as a friend does.
Never underestimate the honour of a loved one cooking for you.
March
There is wonder to be found in the oddest of places.
Back alleys are like surprises you find when you don’t always run from discomfort.
April
Do not let anyone convince you that finding wonder is naive.
You make the choices you make for a reason. Just because that reason is hard to remember sometimes does not necessarily mean it was not a reasonable choice to make.
May
All pieces fit incorrectly when you are in a haste to solve a problem. Step away, hydrate, deep breathe. Come back and you’ll see a fit you may have missed before. Distance and stillness can do wonders sometimes.
Taking up space will probably always feel uncomfortable and awkward. Practice makes perfect-ish.
June
Scary things are a lot scarier from a distance. The more you tackle the scary, the less scary it becomes.
You know a lot more than you give yourself credit for.
July
Guilt-tripping and shaming yourself every time you indulge in a dessert is probably harming your body more than the dessert ever would.
A win that might seem small now felt like a mountain not too long ago. Pause and celebrate that.
August
Queerness is not a contest. There is no such thing as a perfectly queer person.
This is from a friend: Your late twenties end up being quite similar to your teenage years. There is a lot of loss, a lot of transition and way too much of what-the-hell-is-going-on!
September
All families are just a bunch of adults who love each other but also cannot stand each other for too long, the difference is how each family navigates this paradox.
You are your own person. No one can take that away from you.
October
Joy and sorrow always coexist, that is the fact of the world. But it never stops feeling like a cruel joke.
The loveliness of lovely things does not get taken away just because they happened differently than you had imagined.
November
Humans are the most tender and the most violent toward each other (and other creatures). Watch what you are choosing and participating in.
December
Maybe the loneliness of each loss will always feel heavy, but at least there’ll be sunsets.
Maybe big leaps don’t always have to be extremely measured & premeditated. Maybe they happen because they need to happen at that moment. And that’s a scary but also a wonderful thing.