mirror, mirror / new year's resolutions

16 Jan, 2025

2024, the year i saw myself in others and others in me, not in an endearing way, but in the ugliest and most uncomfortable of ways that would catch me off guard and remind me how difficult it is to be the ideal person i strive to be. like my father's silence amidst conflict, so loud, so like me. like the anger my mother would harbor in silence that anything said outside her bubble would have no chance of getting through, that's me, too. my sibling welcoming opposing opinions with such ease, not me at all, but how i wish.

for the longest time - until recently, to be honest - i thought myself to be self-aware and selfless. i would rather do solo activities like reading or journaling than mingle. all the time spent alone, the hours and hours talking to myself, contemplating all the ways i should've said something differently, or analyzed my relationships add up to a high level of self-awareness and empathy... right?

a rude awakening to discover i had been selfish the whole time. i was so focused on my own endeavors that i neglected others. i think, too, that being pulled into this generation's obsession with cultivating personal safe spaces has caused me not to see anything wrong with investing more into my hobbies than socializing. i swung the pendulum too far and forgot that there was joy to be found in community, too.

this is all a longwinded way of saying i'm embarrassed by what i see in the mirror; i want to change my reflection by shining the light on others.

for my new year's resolutions, i want to stop isolating myself and channel my energy outward. i've had no results with using myself to accomplish my resolutions, so why not use others as that encouragement and inspiration?

i'm approaching my goals like this tip from a self-help book: it is easier to accomplish something when you are doing it for someone, like baking a cake for a friend, even though you never bake, or cleaning your apartment because visitors are coming. consider your goal as a promise to another. so, while my resolutions are for my self improvement, i want them to benefit others first and foremost.