Top Ten Lessons I’ve Learned This Year

Taking a cue from commenter BrookeR and a page out of BrainyJane’s book, I’ve decided to start wrapping up the year.  And what better way to start doing that than with the lessons I’ve learned this year.

If ever there were a year to learn lessons… (fill in the rest on your own)…

10.  Hard Work Won’t Always Get You Everywhere. At my old job, I started with the notion that if I worked hard, good things would come to me.  So I did.  I worked harder than I’ve ever worked before.  I did early mornings, late evenings, weekends, etc.  I brought work home, I put work over not only pleasure, but work came over life in general.  Yet, in the end, it didn’t matter how much I worked because the Old Boys Club had a way of always biting me in the ass.  It seemed that working harder wasn’t getting me anywhere.  It was the first time in my life that this was the case.  I was always able to wow an employer or a professor or anyone with my work ethic.  Then I met a group of people who decided work came before life…and I learned quickly that I don’t want to live that way.  So although hard work is important, it’s equally as important to realize there are other powers at play.

9.  Creativity Needs to Be Exercised. If there is anything I learned by writing a novel, it’s that you have to keep writing.  You have to “prime the pump” so to speak and just keep plugging away at it.  Creativity will strike, but not as often as you’d like.  And if you wait around for the next big idea, you’re likely to find yourself  creating nothing.  A big pile of nothing.

8.  Rejection Toughens You. I’ve sent out more query letters for my novel than I’d care to admit.  I’ve had some great reactions and some not-so-great reactions.  I still have hope out there in the form of a few agents interested in my novel.  But each rejection turned out to be harder than I thought.  Some days they would come in groups of two or three.  Some days I’d hope to get one just to know that my work was still out there.  With every “thanks but no thanks” I learned to stiffen my lip and thicken my skin.  I know this is a lesson that I’ve had to learn before, but never in such a pervasive manner and never about something so personal to me.  If I’ve learned nothing else, it’s that expecting the best or expecting the worst doesn’t always mean shit–it’s a crap shoot.  And it’s better realizing that now than getting your hopes up or being negative about the process.  Reality dictates that it’s a gamble.  Live with it.  Or at least try to.

7.  Money Comes and Goes. Once upon a time, in a land not so far away, The Mister and I had a savings account with money in it.  We were building a nest egg and living a decent life.  Things were good.  Then our basement flooded–twice.  Yet we persevered.  Then we decided to go on our first expensive vacation only to be hit with a costly emergency pet surgery right before we left.  Then our appliances went.  Then my car decided to start quitting this bitch.  It was one thing after another.  We even had a second pet surgery to boot.  The thing is, though, that there are two approaches you can take:  you can get nervous about each nickel and dime that leaves your wallet, or you can take a deep breath and do what needs to be done knowing that you’ll make room for it in your budget.  The latter will give you less anxiety, for sure.

6.  Memories Sustain Us. This year was incredibly hard on me for reasons that you’re all privy to because, well, I air my grievances with the world here.  If there is one thing that made this crappy year easier, it was memories.  Memories of good people, memories of good times, memories of easier roads.  Knowing that it once was good in ways we couldn’t before imagine makes us open to the fact that it can be that way again in ways we hadn’t imagined.

5.  Good Family Might Not Always “Get” Us, But They Try to Be There. My parents may never understand my depression.  Try as they might, they’re just not ones to get the whole metaphysical crisis of self.  They’re more the “pick your chin up” types.  Mom was keen on asking questions as to why I feel that way–questions I can’t very well answer.  Dad was heavy on the “hang in there” commentary.  While dealing with that type of psyche is incredibly frustrating for someone in my position, when I look back on it, I can see that I’m a very lucky person.  Even if I don’t have parents that always “get” me, I have parents that want me to be happy…whatever that may mean.  It may not make it easier to deal with the questions or the commentary, but it makes it easier to live with the aftermath.

4.  Working For Tomorrow Screws Up Today. My entire life feels like I’m on the edge of something bigger–on the edge of doing something different.  I keep waiting for tomorrow as an excuse to do away with the crap I hold onto today.  It might sound trite, but living for tomorrow really fouls up your chances at having a good today.  I’d like to think that I’ve learned this lesson so well I’ll immediately put it into practice, but I know better.  It’s a hard lesson to implement.  It’s one of those things where you hold your nose, pour it down your throat, fight the gag reflex and pray that it makes its way down to your stomach before you fight it off.  It’s like the Fear Factor of life.  I’ll keep relearning this lesson until the day I die it seems.  But at least I know that now.

3.  A Wagging Tail Is Well Worth It. For all of the crap that I dish out about Rocky the Dog costing us thousands of dollars in the fifteen months we’ve had him, the cost is well worth it.  Every day I get to come home to the happiest dog in existence.  I wish more people would be open to adopting dogs in general, but adopting senior dogs in particular.  Our lives have become dramatically better because of Rocky’s presence in them.  When things are going wrong, it takes no more than one look at that smile and wagging tail to at least put a blip in your anger or sadness.  No matter what, I know that we saved a dog from an otherwise lonely life…and that makes me happy.

2.  Sometimes You Need to Feel Your Sorrows. Growing up with the practical parents I had, feeling emotions was something of a sin.  Sure you can have them, but don’t feel them, don’t do anything about them and certainly don’t talk about them.  But what I learned this year is almost a paradigm-shift in my way of thinking.  You have got to feel the sadness, the anger, the depression in order to get through it.  Ignoring it doesn’t just get you nowhere, it gets you in a place worse than the one in which you started.  So I’ve learned to feel the emotions that find me and give them room to breathe.  It’s only when you learn to live with them that you’ll learn to live without them.

1.  And sometimes you need to just jump off of a cliff. One of my top ten moments in my life was jumping off a cliff in Negril, Jamaica.  Some people might not see this for what it truly is–a game changer–but I do.  I know that up until that point I always let my fears rule me.  I know that up until that point I gave in to fear more often than I gave into bravery.  But I also know that after that moment, I’d have no excuse not to jump (metaphorically) again.  After that, leaving a horrible job was easier.  Dealing with change was easier.  Standing up for myself was easier.  It sounds trite, but trust me, when it happens to you, it is not.  Jumping off of that cliff, a fat, accident prone and fearful woman emerged a fat, accident prone but victorious woman–one who, at least once, didn’t let circumstances change her desire to do something amazing.  I’ll never forget the moment I lept off of the side of the cliff…and I never want to.

What lessons did you learn this year?