My 2023
This is the fifth year in a row that I’ve written these end-of-year reviews and year-ahead planning articles. And every year — without fail — I surprise myself with how much happened in the last twelve months. And while I can’t say that 2022 ended up being better than the last few years, it definitely has felt… unique.
And it makes sense given that my word of the year for 2022 was: Alchemical
It truly did feel like an alchemical year, too. A year of transforming whatever came to me into something new (usually through writing).
What I’m most impressed with this past year is how many trials my husband and I faced together and separately and how much stronger we are because of it. Between health issues and housing renovation projects and bilateral TPLO surgery for our dog, Moose, and losing our two dogs within eight days of each other and turning around to getting another puppy to fill our hearts… we’ve managed to come out the other side of a rough year.
Professionally, I had one of my best years ever, even though, on paper, it doesn’t seem like it. I didn’t have too many “major” external accomplishments, but I had so many little wins that added up that it feels really significant. It’s that time when I list them all out for myself for posterity's sake, so here we go:
I completely redid my website and branding and realigned my business stuff
I finished my book proposal and query and sent them out to agents
Rewrote my curriculum for WF2H Workshop and relaunched
Finished writing, revising, and editing Forged in Fire: Writing Fiction to Heal
I started my Rebel MFA project
Submitted writing pieces to several places (and was rejected for most)
Submitted a writing piece to get into Dublin, Ireland Writing Workshop (and got in!)
Hosted four masterclasses
Wrote curriculum and launched Oracle Card Creation workshop
I did 12 months of journaling workbook content for my community
I kept my community active all year
Wrote and published 40+ articles/blog posts
Presented at a business mastermind
Wrote 2 million+ words
Okay, now that I got the nitty gritty of what I did out of the way, I want to talk more about what I learned this year because that’s where I feel like I got the most juice out of this year. It was such a rich year for learning and lessons.
Community
This was a massive year of being in community. Whether it was my morning writing group, RAW, a business mastermind, my own Write Minded Community, or being in my witchy community — I felt extremely held this year more than any other in my life. It’s not by accident, either. I believe that cultivating the relationships within these communities is one of the best things that could have happened. I don’t know that I would have made it through the trials of this year without the people in these communities (and I’m not sure I would want to, either). It really does take a village, and I’m so blessed to know that my village is big and beautiful, and wonderfully supportive.
Grief
I firmly believe that as humans, we constantly live in a state of grief; some just hit harder than others. This was a year of heavy grief for me. A lot of death, in particular. But also really feeling the loss of loved ones that have been gone for a while and the freshness of wounds for others that I’m close with. I actually started 2022 with something I call a “weekly grief ritual,” and it’s really helped me lean into these moments of intense grief. In fact, I’ve found that creating little rituals or traditions around this idea of “honoring” our beloved dead can be such an impactful way to embrace our grief in a powerful way. This year, right before finishing this article actually, I started a new tradition/ritual in honor of my Grams by making a hot toddy on Christmas Eve and toasting to her. Just a little something to tell her that I’m thinking of her, missing her, and wishing I could be close to her again. And in a way, that very intentional act brings our beloved dead closer to us. It’s like putting energetic karma in a piggy bank.
The Rebel MFA Degree
Sometimes, I get these wild hairs up my ass to do things, and I don’t know why exactly; I just know that it’s really important to do them and follow my gut. The Rebel MFA Degree is one of those things. I knew from the start that I had my surface-level “why,” but there was something much deeper at play that I couldn’t articulate. There had to be — why else would someone spend hundreds of hours and dollars building their own MFA program? I mean, I don’t have disposable income OR time, so it wasn’t for shits and giggles. Basically, I knew there were more layers to this whole thing, I just didn’t know what those were when I first started, but I’ve learned not to question these things in the beginning. They tend to work themselves out and make sense.
Lo and behold — the Rebel MFA Degree has morphed and evolved into something much more profound and much more significant than when it started. I realize now that I was building the foundation for what was to come. I was learning what I needed to learn to help others learn what they needed to learn to follow their own paths.
I also realized that I needed to fall in love with learning on my own again and accept that I was never meant for the “traditional” forms of education. In fact, in one of the readings I had with a medium, they told me that in a past life, I was a very important scribe and scholar that traveled around the world studying things and writing them down. That my education did not come from a university or a book — my education came from experiences. Whether or not that’s true — I find that the Rebel MFA Degree has given that back to me a bit. Instead of feeling like I need yet another “How to write a novel” workshop… I’m more interested in obscure and abstract experiential classes that can help inform my overall knowledge of humans and writing, like “Jungian Psychology and Storytelling” or “How fear impacts a character’s motivation.” These are the classes that will help me write more compelling stories. And these are the classes that will help me teach other writers how to write more compelling stories.
Shadows & Gifts
Every year, I’d like to think that I uncover a bit more of my shadows and gifts — but this year, in particular, I dove head first into some of the shadows and gifts that have been dancing around my periphery. The shadow of worthiness as it’s tied to productivity, value, worth, and money has been a big work in progress for me. This was a year when my inner child really showed up and wanted attention. It’s crazy how far down we can stuff some of these things. There have been parts of myself, specifically “Little Jade,” that I have erased from my memory completely. There are parts of her that I can only “see” by virtue of other people’s stories of her or pictures found in old boxes. There’s so much of Little Jade that I have yet to know or see or talk to, and it’s an evolving relationship. Before this year, I didn’t know she was even still in there, and now I know that she is. She’s been waiting for me to find her.
This past year has been an enormous rebirth for my creative soul, I believe. It’s the first year in maybe… six or more years that I’ve been able to write both nonfiction and fiction again steadily. I’ve been insanely prolific! And I think it’s because one of the essential shadows I had to face also happens to be one of my important gifts. You see, I think we all have one (if not more) thing that sets our souls on fire more than anything else in our entire life. For some people, it’s art, cooking, dancing, sewing, parenting, singing, skiing, etc. For me, it’s writing. It always has been, and it always will be. But when there’s something that important in your life, and there’s a rupture to it — it feels nearly impossible to put it back together. I don’t know when or how the rupture happened for me… just that it did. And those six or so years were a result of that. And I had to dig and claw and fight my way out of those shadows of despair, doubt, fear, and shame to rediscover that it was my gift. My precious and enduring gift.
The joy of the little things
Back in the pandemic, I found a project on Kickstarter — The Bird Buddy (a bird feeder that has a camera attached to it and will take pictures of the birds as they land on the feeder), and I sent it to my hubby with a message of “look how cool this is!” He agreed and backed it. Nearly two years later, it finally arrived, and I’m not kidding when I say it was worth the wait. I don’t think I expected nearly this much joy to come from this thing. I’m sure we’re like every other person who is “late to the party” of birding or bird watching, but holy shit, it’s so fun. Catching a glimpse of a majestic bird is much more entertaining and fulfilling than ninety percent of whatever is on the television screen. We find ourselves gravitating toward the windows that overlook the bird feeders more often than not now, and like true birders — we think that everyone should get to enjoy the pleasures of bird watching. As such, we bought all of our parents a bird buddy. I’ve also found that birds are my new models of choice for iPad watercolor painting. What can I say? I have some good models.
What’s next?
For the first time since I can remember, my plans for the beginning of the year do not include hitting the ground running on new projects or planning a year of new offerings. Instead, I’m doubling down on the projects I started and planned in Q4 of this year, plus my exciting launch/release of Forged in Fire: Writing Fiction to Heal book. Keeping in line with that and so much of the personal development work I want to focus on in 2023, my word for the year ahead is delightfully apt.
I’ve always loved the Japanese word and concept Ikigai — especially as it relates to the studies that have been done around aging, happiness, and peace.
So my word for 2023 is Ikigai, and my goal is to live daily with a reason for being. I feel like this word just encompasses everything I aspire to achieve in this crazy adventure we call life. I don’t know if we’re ever meant to achieve it or if the closest we ever get is striving to achieve it; either way, it feels like a worthwhile endeavor. So endeavor, I shall.
What’s your word for 2023?
