Thank you, 2024

Dear Younger Me,

Tomorrow is the last day to wake up in 2024, it has been a year of healing. Currently, I am so excited for 2025! This morning, I made a list of goals for the next six months and am expectant of watching those unfold. If you haven’t started action planning yet, maybe this can be your year. I’ve found that having the categories of relational, spiritual, physical, financial and leisure (others might include occupational and one day you might haha) help me break down what areas I want to be intentional with. Positive reinforcement has also been huge in successfully meeting those goals!

I mainly wanted to be vulnerable with you about the healing that’s taken place this year. I know vulnerability can be scary/uncomfortable due to your past experiences. I am sorry for the times individuals didn’t handle your heart with care when you needed it. They are human and we all miss moments of loving each other well. Take the good and bad examples of what is or isn’t beneficial so that you hopefully can be an example of love to your neighbor! 

A couple ways I was loved well this year were in safe spaces. I learned in the right environment is where I grow best. If something has been wounded then it needs the space to regrow and repair itself and that’s what happened to my heart this year. 

For me this has been in the context of relationships. I want to give others what I received this year, which was a space to let the rawness of my heart be seen. No filter was used to express the highlight of the day to the thoughts/pains causing me discomfort. In that I established who are core individuals that I could let them see it all, be heard and be known. Once I felt known is where I felt I could be confident again in the parts of me that shine. Once I felt known is where I felt I didn’t have to be alone in the areas that I desired to grow in. Some of the greatest gifts I believe have ever received from another person have been being seen, heard and known. Through that combination, I have experienced feeling loved for every part of me and the environment my heart needs to grow. I hope everyone can experience the love my heart has had this past year. I hope everyone has or finds safe spaces. I hope I can be the example of love to others that I have received. 

So many things happen in a year, a month, a week and a day. I hope you take time to hold onto what made you feel loved today and continue to write about those things. Before you know it, it will be hard to see anything else. Everyday has been filled with blessings, some obvious and others in disguise. Sometimes it’s a note of appreciation and other times it’s having a hard conversation that’s uncomfortable at the time, but you realize it is strengthening your relationship and that far outweighs the uncomfortability that lasts for a moment. 

When I look back at 2024, all I can say is thank you. 

What do you think when you look back on your year? What do you need to have a safe space to grow? Where do you want to go in the year to come?

With Love, 

Older You