Here’s to planning out your New Year, or not.
Well, here we are, at the end of the year... nay, end of the decade. It’s weird, right? That we’re calling it that and making an already momentous day feel even bigger. As if it’s not already hard enough to sum up everything you’ve managed this year into one tidy little package and then setting it aside to start totally anew. Is that even possible? Can anyone honestly wake up tomorrow being totally different than who go to sleep as tonight?
As a person and a small business owner, this was a fun year. I took two pretty big trips almost on a whim. I saw the Oregon Coast where the mountains stop right at the Pacific and ate the most delicious and weird tacos at a cool Portland diner at 2 am. I hopped on a dirt cheap flight with 4 girlfriends and flew across the Atlantic to stay in adorable AirBNB’s in Valencia and Madrid. I added Spain to a list of places I thought I’d never go but can’t wait to go again. I attempted and failed royally at learning Spanish but had the best time exploring new cities with absolutely no agenda. I got to reunite with my best friends from college not only once but twice this year and had my soul fully refreshed. I set myself a goal of prepping for and doing the Southern Christmas Show over 12 days in November. I not only survived, but I crushed it. I realized that my support system is so much bigger and stronger than I ever imagined and that I am so incredibly lucky for it.
When this decade started, I was a junior at East Carolina. I was living with 3 roommates and working at Stein Mart part time. I was applying for internships and had no idea of who or what I wanted to become. I had no idea that later I would buy myself a sewing machine and design a dress I would wear to my first office Christmas Party. I would graduate college, start my first job in retail and marry my best friend. We would build our house and then turn around and pay it and our first house off the first chance we could. I had no idea that when my dream job that I’d landed just a few years earlier would leave my hands itchy and my soul unfulfilled and it would force me to try something I’d never had an interest in, jewelry making. I had no idea that those first little cobbled-together necklaces would spark a fire that can’t be contained.
Everywhere you look on the internet today and for the last few days, everyone is posting their “words for 2020”. Or they’re talking about the big plans they have for the year that’s coming. I understand the excitement. I do. I also feel the pressure of being one of those people who doesn’t really have a plan yet. So many of my best things have just happened to me. I didn’t plan them, I was just along for the ride. I want to plan big things, and I have high hopes for what’s coming in 2020. I’m already working on new designs and trying to lay a small roadmap of how I want my business to grow. However, I also want to leave room for life. I want to leave room for the plans working behind the scenes that I can’t see yet. I want to focus on being the best wife, friend, sister, daughter, business owner, designer that I can and see where that will get me.
So if you’re like me, and planning out your New Year feels big and scary and overwhelming, just remember that you’re not alone. And if there’s anything I’ve learned and taken over the last decade, it’s that you can’t plan everything. And you don’t have to. You don’t have to pick a word, or make a list of things you’re going to change about yourself. You can leave some room. Leaving room to just go along for the ride might just be the best thing you ever do.
Now, I’m off to finish Season 2 of You and drink Champagne from the couch. Happy New Years!
xoxo,
Kendle