The New Year is a time for new beginnings, a time to wipe a clean slate and start fresh, but it is also a very important time to reflect back on the past year and all we have been through. As a society we tend to be constantly looking forward, worrying about what the next hour, day, year will hold for us. We are constantly planning, or attempting to plan the next steps in our future. We want the future to be more successful than the past, we want to be better in whatever area of our life we are trying to plan for. Unfortunately because of this constant pressure of the future, we forget about the past. We forget about how far we may have come in the last year, how much we may have accomplished. We worry about the challenges ahead rather than patting ourselves on the back for the challenges we managed to overcome.
2015 was an amazing year! Looking back on my 2015 I started the year being a second semester senior. I applied to the YAV Program and was accepted and placed in Scotland, I visited my sister in Minnesota and got to see her life as a med student. I graduated University with a business degree, I had an amazing last few weeks in Oregon with my best friends. I had the amazing opportunity to travel around Europe for 3 weeks with one of my best friends Sophie, I spent time with my wonderful family, I moved to Scotland, started volunteering for the Church of Scotland and Gorbals Parish Church, I met many new people, struggled to understand a new accent, grew in my faith, learned about the Presbyterian domination of Christianity, made new friends, spent the holidays away from my family for the first time, and then rung in the New Year in London with my parents. It was a CRAZY year! And if I really think about it, it will probably be one of the best, most memorable, exciting years of my life.
Being a YAV now for 4 months I am reflecting back on the program and my progress. I was stuck thinking about how I can challenge myself these next 7 months and put myself in situations that are out of my comfort zone in order to push myself. I was struggling with the idea that I don't feel extremely challenged here in Glasgow and how I feel like I might be doing something wrong. I was focused on the negative and the criticisms we all tend to give to ourselves and others around us. What I didn't realize until talking with my flatmates and having my sister convince me is that maybe my challenges have been smaller ones and I am just better at overcoming them then I ever thought and I should relish these times.
My sister encouraged me to go through and reflect back on my first 4 months and the challenges I did have, no matter how small, and think how I did get through them. While doing this I realized that I do not give myself enough credit. Sometimes we need to appreciate ourselves and acknowledge just how great we are. So this will be the one post where I am congratulating myself for the amazing person I have come to be. I am proud of who I am and the growth I have seen in myself over the last 4 months even if I needed other people to help me see that growth in myself. I have learned that I am more independent than I thought I was. I am more resilient and can adapt to change extremely easily. I also know what I need to be happy and if I am not happy, I change whatever needs to be changed so that I will be happy.
I would encourage all of you to think back about your 2015, what challenges did you overcome? When you look back on 2015, rather than making a list for 2016 of what you can do better, write a list of the proud moments of 2015! Take a moment and pat yourself on the back, give yourself a round of applause, or take a moment and gloat to someone who cares about you. Tell them you are proud of yourself and then let them have the same moment about themselves with you!
Then after you have praised yourself and the people around you that you care about, make a list of hopes for 2016! Here are my hopes and resolutions for the New Year. I hope by writing them down, I can look back next January and have fulfilled all if not most of them.
My New Years Resolutions/Hopes:
- Visit 4 more countries this year
- Get a job I love
- Try praying a novena
- learn more about the Bible and the Catholic faith
- Run a 10k
Blessings,
Julie
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