Right now, we’re in July, which means we’re halfway through the current calendar year.
A few highlights from my personal life:
- attending the wedding of my cousin
- eating an amazing meal at a local Ethiopian restaurant
- preparing to get engaged
- bringing home the cutest puppy
- cooking more Filipino food
- learning more about my family history and roots
However, some of the lessons from the past year have come from less-pleasant situations:
- experiencing with insecurities about how people perceive me
- navigating challenges at work
- figuring out how to show up for family members experiencing difficult and complex health issues
- struggling to get consistent with my own health and self care
Lesson 1: It’s Time to Refocus on the Little Things
If you know me, you know that I’ve long been shaped by the “little things.”
Actually, I was raised Catholic and named after St. Therese of Lisieux, otherwise known as St. Therese of the “Little Way.” Though my relationship with religion is currently a bit more complicated, at a young age, this “Little Way,” taught me that a great way to live was to “do little things with great love.”
As I grew older and more cynical about the world as a teen, I realized that it was easy to feel hopeless and overwhelmed by the world. Social injustice and oppression, cancer, genocide, poverty, climate change, and war – it’s heavy.
While I was in college, though, I was deeply inspired to adopt a mindset of finding joy, whimsy, and love in the little, everyday moments. Things that you wouldn’t normally think twice about if you weren’t paying attention.
Noticing a bird or bunny in your backyard. Bumping into a friend (“in the wild”) unexpectedly. Treasuring the first bite into a freshly cooked brownie. Savoring the feel of sunlight coming in through a window. Making laundry “fun” by calling a friend while folding a load. Finding beauty in an empty jar of pasta sauce, a fallen leaf, heck – even the shape of the bottles of your cleaning supplies.
In this attention economy, everyone is paying for your attention – in many cases, literally. Social media and the current state of advertising are essentially big companies’ attempts at hacking into your brain.
That’s why I want to try to choose to pay attention – not to the constant stream of noise telling me I need to buy this or that to be happy – but to the things already in my life that actually bring joy and meaning to myself and others.
Lesson 2: What Other People Think of Me is None of My Business
This was kind of a major turning point for me in therapy, but over the past year, I’ve realized that I care way too much about what other people think of me.
Yes, it’s probably pretty obvious that I’ve been like this my whole life, if you know me at all.
But somehow, before, I truly felt that how people saw me was my business, and that I was personally responsible for making sure that I never caused anyone to think bad of me. What did I think I was, a living, breathing, walking, PR agency?
Obviously, I now realize that it’s completely unrealistic to make everyone happy all the time. While I’m not planning to do a complete 180 and start intentionally offending everyone I see, reminding myself of this mantra has in many ways left me feeling freer to live more authentically and not always feel like I need to censor my every word.
Another huge (and beautiful!) benefit to this mindset shift is that it’s given me the courage to have more honest and vulnerable conversations with people I love, which has deepened our relationship and understanding of each other, even when we don’t see eye-to-eye on things.
Lesson 3: My Love of Research Can Sometimes Be a Crutch
This one is hard to admit, but I’ve come to realize that while I love falling down a research rabbit hole (#ADHDthings), I sometimes use it as a crutch or coping mechanism to avoid making decisions on my own. However, the truth is that I often research things that don’t have a clear answer – like how to raise a puppy or live a healthy life or have healthy relationships with people or be a good and likeable human being.
Cooper and I recently (finally!) both watched The Good Place, after years of people telling us we remind them of Chidi (because actually, like him, it genuinely has driven me nuts (for years!) that I love almond milk and it takes stupid amounts of water for it to be produced).
For those who haven’t watched The Good Place (spoilers ahead), Chidi is a moral philosophy professor who is indecisive to a fault as he struggles to do the “ethical thing.”
I think that sometimes I find myself trying to crowd-source an answer on doing the right thing, when I just need to do something. After all, taking risks and trying new things is how we learn, and learning is how we grow and actually become better people.
Making mistakes is not a moral failing, as long as you are open to learning and growing from them. Never trying or making a decision on your own in the first place, though? Maybe that is the real barrier to self-growth and improvement.
Lesson 4: I Need to Stop Stressing Out.
On the opposite end of loving the small things, I need to also stop stressing the small things.
While raising a puppy, I kept reading that it was normal for puppies to adopt traits and characteristics of their human companions.
I think it’s a bit embarrassing to admit that this is what finally got me to start thinking about how to change this bad habit, but I knew immediately that I didn’t want my little Sylvie girl to be as chronically stressed and anxious as I was.
Unfortunately, my default is apparently overly anxious helicopter puppy mom… GASP! Everyone is shocked.
Haha, no, don’t worry – I am at least self-aware enough to know this is, in fact, probably not a shocker to anyone who knows me.
So basically, I’ve been challenging myself to stop treating everything like an emergency and panicking over the little things. I’m trying to retrain my nervous system to slow down before responding to things that would normally send me into a frenzy.
I mean, someone quite literally told me I had “frantic energy” in high school. That’s… not exactly the vibe I want to be known for, and well, not to be dramatic, but I think I might just die a second time if someone said that at my funeral.
So anyways, especially as I go into Q3-Q4 of this year, I think that it will be a big goal to try and figure out how to stop stressing the small things. Lots of deep breaths and movement (helps complete the stress cycle within your body) are the name of the game. Thank you Emily and Amelia Nagoski for your help. (Their book Burnout has been a huge help and source of information on this specific journey).
Lesson 5: It’s Okay Not to Have a Plan
Since I was in middle school, I’ve always wanted to have a plan for the future.
I remember writing down all the things I wanted to achieve by high school, by college, and by the time I was 30 in a little red notebook.
Also, as a “glutton for challenging myself” (thank you Mrs. Bradshaw), and chronic people pleaser/over achiever (yes, I’ve realized through therapy that those things are, in fact, related), I think that having a plan or roadmap has been a real source of comfort.
I like doing the “right things” and plans usually can help me do that.
But the truth is, life doesn’t have a plan.
You can’t plan for when a family member will get hospitalized, or when the right dog comes into your life, or when it will be the right time to quit your job.
People can give you their opinions until they’re blue in the face, but at the end of the day, it’s not up to them how you spend your limited time on this planet.
I’m trying to get comfortable with living in that in-between space of not knowing what is next for me or how exactly things will come together.
tldr
In summary, the main lessons I’ve taken away from 2026 so far have been:
- Refocus on finding joy in the little things
- What other people think of me is none of my business
- Research can be a crutch for risk-taking and real decision-making
- I need to stop stressing out
- It’s okay to not have a plan
What have you learned from the year so far?
Sending love,
Ana
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