Imagine that you are the main character in a novel, the plot of which is going to unfold over the next year. Where will you go? What will you do?
What’s my character arc for the next year?
What was it for 2020 aka 30 years old?
I can only think of specific achievements, really. I don’t know that I changed and grew or realized anything because I had so little social interaction to reflect myself. (I have, however, talked to myself a lot.) And my overall mental state was so influenced by the overall state of the world. How can I separate how I was doing from how I was doing “considering the circumstances”?
I can only think of achievements because in between those definable, quantifiable events was a fog of depression, anxiety, confusion, and fatigue. So much confusion. Never knowing what’s going on in my own city or anywhere in the world. Not being able to make plans really brings me down. You may recall my Core Desired Feelings; joy, connection, hope. I did get out in nature last year to feel some joy, but connection with anyone was tough, and hope? Ha! I can hope we all get vaccinated and wipe out the virus and get to do all the messy, crowded, gross things we used to do again. But I didn’t have much personally to look forward to via making plans (Oh, how I love a plan, a schedule, a list).
Let’s just say no one’s writing a novel about me in 2020. (Please, no one write novels or plays or TV shows or movies about anyone in 2020. Let us forget.)
Let’s practice some hope and write optimistically about what and who I could be in 2021 aka aged 31 years.
This will be the year I started taking my writing seriously. Whether or not I have accomplishments like writing for online publications or other career goals happen in this year, I will look back on this as the turning point of when I got consistent and stuck to plans and goals.
This will be the year I got vulnerable with sharing my creative work. It’s uncomfortable but I learned to sit with it anyway because I knew I wouldn’t get anywhere keeping those walls up and gates locked.
This will be the year I deepened and expanded my friendships. I made an effort to keep in touch with friends in all kinds of ways from video calls to hanging out to accountability partners and emails and maybe even letters. I asked them to be involved in my projects and also made time to just be with each other.
I somehow combined future and past tenses in there, but you get the idea.
I hope there’s more to this year, but I can’t exactly plan anything, can I? I guess we’ll find out next year how I did, considering the circumstances.
See you next Tuesday, during this unprecedented time.
Let’s keep telling ourselves…
Sharing is Caring: This writing prompt is from The Isolation Journals. I signed up for the emails and have been collecting the prompts into a doc for future TwTs when I don’t know what to write about. Maybe follow them on Instagram or somewhere if you want something to think about.