2015 In Review

Happy 2016! I hope everyone enjoyed the holiday season and had a fabulous NYE. Me and all 43 of the chocolate chip cookies I’ve eaten enjoyed a little R&R over the past week, and we finished out the year at a friend’s house party in Boston’s North End (and caught the fireworks!). Wow, 2015 was *quite* a year, wasn’t it? I won’t go on a tangent about the very highs and lows our world faced this year, but I do have to say one thing: 2015 was the year of new Beliebers. (I know that you know that we’re all thinking it.)

All funny business aside, for me, 2015 was a very interesting and exciting year. After looking over my review of 2014, I feel that I’ve definitely grown a lot this year. Certain things have taken priority over others that never had in the past, and I think it might mean that I’m finally starting to realize that I’m not 17 anymore. But I can’t confidently say I’m a full-fledged adult, either. I’m not sure if I’ll ever truly feel that way, but the reality is I do have to act like one 95% of the time. My mid-twenties have been so weird. Some days I feel like I’m on top of the world and have my shit together, other days I feel like I’ve plateaued already, and on the gloomy days I just feel lost and want to throw in the towel. (Most of those gloomy days occurred during our hellish Boston winter, just to give you some context.) In the grand scheme of things, that is what they call life and I’m embracing it. Nothing’s ever perfect and I sure am not, and I’m trying to remind myself of that each time I face a new challenge.

Last year, I quoted Ferris Bueller in regards to how I approached my life. I took time to step away from the computer and meet with people IRL, chose a lazy Sunday over getting ahead on the following week’s to-do list, and made time to hang out with old friends and make some new ones. I think I’ve done a good job of sustaining that balance between my digital life and my social life. Heck, the digital life brought me some really fun in-person projects and adventures this year, so I can’t complain about that! For 2016, I’ve decided to write down some goals, just like everyone else, to give my future self a point of reference for how I do this year. I don’t think I declared any real resolutions or goals last year, but it’s funny how motivated I feel after simply hand writing these goals down. I’ve hung the list up on my wall and wrote it again in my agenda book so I’ll constantly be reminded of them.

In 2016, the quote I’ll be living by is from Jim Carrey’s 2014 commencement speech at the Maharishi University of Management in Fairfield, Iowa. I stumbled across a video of the speech on Facebook, naturally, after it resurfaced a few months ago. Carrey told a story about his late father who chose a practical career as an accountant, rather than chase after his real passion: comedy. His father was eventually let go of his job which forced the family to do whatever they could to survive. Carrey quickly cut to the chase in stating, “I learned many great lessons from my father, not the least of which, was that you can fail at what you don’t want, so you might as well take a chance on doing what you love.”

Boom.

I’ve done a lot of soul-searching this year about my passions and I’ve narrowed it down to three: fashion, tech, and entrepreneurship. Some of my 2016 goals are definitely inspired by these passions and I hope to make these bigger parts of my life this year. So without further ado, I give you my goals, my top posts of 2015 and my annual round-up of favorite bloopers.

What are your goals for 2016?