I’d love to say that 2019 was the best year ever, but if I’m being honest, it was far from it. I stumbled… A LOT. I failed… A LOT. I felt angry and stressed… A LOT. It may have been a struggle most days, but I learned my lesson about a lot of things and have quite a few key takeaways.
While the main point of this post will be to share some of those key learnings, I wanted to take a second and celebrate our relaunch!!!! YAYYYYY!!!! I’m just a little bit excited. Like I just mentioned, 2019 was a long, hard road, but it’s time to get back on our feet. We’ve wasted too much time. Step number 1 is getting this blog going again and in a better way.
So, what actually happened in 2019?
- The blog got hacked and ALLLLLL of the posts got taken over and deleted. Silly me, I didn’t back any of the posts up so all of them are lost. I would like to take the easy way out and say that the blog getting hacked prevented me from growing and continuing to work on it, but that would be a flat out lie. I was tired, angry, and just didn’t want to do it.
- I got incredibly burnt out and depressed. A big contributor to that is the fact that out of all of the goals I set for myself in 2019, I only hit 1. And I only hit that goal because (a) it wasn’t a super difficult goal and (b) I kicked my own ass into gear because I was tired of feeling like a failure.
- I came up with and scrapped about a dozen different business ideas, just looking for that one thing that was going to allow me to quit my job. I wanted to blog, become a freelance writer, become a freelance editor, build a subscription box, start an online store, and a whole bunch of other ideas. How many did I actually do? Zero.
- I fed into the bullshit that other people told me and the bullshit I told myself. I get really wrapped up in other people’s opinions. I tell myself that I’m not good enough and can be a real Debbie-downer on the inside.
- I blew my money on stupid crap or things I didn’t follow through with. I’m honestly not even going to check how much money I wasted in 2019. I just know that it was too much.
- I went back to school. This is actually that easy goal that I mentioned earlier. This will be my 4th time going back to college. Yep, I said 4th. I’m only doing one class at a time to start, but it’s just one baby step at a time. I set a goal of not only finishing a class (which I haven’t done since the first time I went to college), but also to get an A. Which I did! This is literally the only real goal that I achieved in 2019 and I did it less than a month ago. But I’ll take it!
- I got a new job. I’m still in the banking world for now, but this one is less stress. I have a tiny bit more freedom than I did before, which is nice. And I like the people I work with.
My Key Takeaways
- Stop asking others for approval. You don’t need it. Seriously.
- Keep your goals and plans to yourself unless you’re fine with being judged.
- If you don’t get to the root of your problem or what’s holding you back, you’re just going to keep repeating what you’ve already done.
- You are in control of your own success. If you make excuses or don’t put in the work, you have no one to blame but yourself.
- Take baby steps.
- Set realistic and attainable goals.
- BACK UP YOUR WORK! While losing my blog posts was kind of a blessing in disguise, I still wish I would have backed them up.
- Starting today is better than starting tomorrow.
- Make time to take care of yourself.
- Just because someone else was successful doing something a certain way, doesn’t mean you will be.
I’m not going to say that 2020 is going to be THE year because everyone says that. But I’ve got a good feeling.
What are some of your key takeaways from 2019?
