2015: Year of the Adult

Hello dear sisters! Happy New Year 2015! I know I'm a few days late with this post - I was huddled miserably on the couch with an autoimmune flareup on New Year's Eve, busy helping my family clean the whole house on New Year's Day, and suffering from lack of motivation plus back-to-work sleepiness ever since.  :-)  But I'm trying to get back on track today. I am sitting swathed in warm knit clothing, drinking Earl Gray tea, trying to stay warm in the house with an absolutely blue-icy-frigid wind howling outside. If I had a fireplace it would be roaring tonight!!

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Looking back at 2014.  I hardly know where to begin in looking back on this past year, to be honest. It was a very momentous year in many ways:

- I graduated with my Bachelor's degree. Only the knowledge that I have 2 more degrees ahead of me dampened the amazement and happiness I felt at finally donning cap and gown to celebrate earning my Bachelor's degree. This time felt totally different than walking for my Associate's years ago - then, I was soberly preparing myself to go out and work; now, I am celebrating crossing the threshold into the world of research and academics. So much wonderful discovery, hard work, and academic investigation awaits me now! I felt positively buoyant striding across the brightly lit stage in my high heels and voluminous gown. 

- I got accepted into the same university for graduate school. I applied for an exclusive graduate position and was selected ahead of my class! My spot is waiting for me and I'll start next fall. 

- I got my first car! I wish I could show you how beautiful my baby is ... she's like the TARDIS, compact on the outside and spacious on the inside. She purrs like a kitten or roars like a tiger, as the situation calls for. Her steering wheel was just made for my hands, and her dashboard is low enough for a little bitty girl to see over. She is perfection on four wheels. 

- I made the first of my lifelong friends, some of whom showed me a lot of beautiful and unexpected love during a rough time I went through early in the year. I've never before had any friends whom I truly loved and wanted to hold onto for the rest of my life, but this year I have met some wonderful godly women whom I want to walk beside me for many years to come. 

- I got my first real-world experience in my future career field, and got very excited for the day when I'll be a fully certified practitioner seeing patients of my own. I took some classes in the actual hands-on procedures I'll be using, which were awesome, and also some counseling classes, which got me motivated to care for the social and emotional health of my future patients as well as their physical needs. I look forward to showing the love of Christ to the people who come into my clinic someday.

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I also end 2014 feeling less than satisfied with my personal and spiritual progress. On the plus side, I have been much more vocal about my faith this year, mostly thanks to the encouragement of my confident, outgoing friends. I've talked with coworkers about why I'm pro-life, and explained the Gospel to some of them. But on the negative side, I believe I was far more self-indulgent this year than I was even a year ago.

I spent more nights in my final semester writing papers until 4 or 5AM than I ever thought I would, almost exclusively because I refused to discipline myself to stay off of Facebook or Pinterest and work before the very last minute. I'll always vividly remember dragging into my research class almost a half-hour late, my entire body aching and my eyes burning after only one hour of sleep, and handing my professor the worst 10-page paper I have ever written - finished just ten minutes before staggering into the classroom. As a student and as an adult, it was a critically embarrassing moment ... but even worse, it was only a few weeks later that I was up until 5AM again, finishing a paper due just hours later. Why? When academics come naturally to me and I thrive on studying and participating in class? Discipline. Lack of discipline. Hearing my conscience whispering "get off, stop scrolling, you need to work" and pushing it away.

It's very discouraging. I'm now twenty-six. I should be getting better at this, not worse.

So this discouragement forms the basis for many of my 2015 New Year's Resolutions:

- Set a monthly budget for myself and follow it. Now that I'm working full time and have to save for grad school, I want to be intentional about where my money is going and why. That's one of my projects for this weekend. 

- Do a little bit of exercise every day. Or more, of course.  :-)  At the very least, I want to start walking over my lunch hour; and at most, I'd like to take a class or get back on my summer weight lifting schedule. 

- Begin eating real food at lunch instead of lunchbox foods. My other project for this weekend is to begin planning my meals once a week and cook/prepare food every Saturday. Right now I'm eating a lot of peanut butter sandwiches and packaged puddings, and I'd like to incorporate more fruits and vegetables, meats, and whole grains so I feel better and have more energy. 

- Again, start going to church regularly. Another area where I ended up failing this year. I have no tenable excuses or reasons not to, and all the tenable reasons that it just needs to be so. If nothing else, I need to learn how to be vulnerable and accountable - two areas that I'm really bad at right now - and to get back under good preaching/shepherding to make sure I haven't gotten "off" somewhere. 

- Get more sleep. You wouldn't think this would be hard to do ... it involves getting off the Internet. *Sigh.*  I'd like to get at least 7 hours of sleep every night. I come from a family that habitually only sleeps about 5 or 6 hours every night, so I may be heading for bed by myself; but I need to have the commitment to do what my body needs to stay healthy regardless. I'm concerned about these vague, painful flare-ups that I've been having, and I think more sleep may help. 

- Spend at least 30 minutes every day learning something new. I'm planning to learn beginning Irish Gaelic and possibly begin teaching Spanish; I also want to learn about cooking and nutrition, volunteer in my future major professor's lab, and play more freely with clothing and hairstyles (within my budget, of course!). 

- Finish my best friend's afghan before she graduates! I really want to give her a handmade afghan for her graduation present, but so far I haven't had the - guess what? - DISCIPLINE to work on it much.  :-(  I'm also picking really special gifts for my brother and sister, both of whom are also graduating this semester. I can't give many details about that - they read my blog!  :-)

And finally,

- BLOG MORE OFTEN. Like, say, 2 times per week. Because I have no excuse not to!!!

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I will write about each of these goals as I work on them, and with God's help, achieve them! My next few posts will be about the results of my budget and meal planning this weekend, thinking about how to stay energetic and engaged with life now that I'm sitting at a desk for 8-9 hours every day, and related to that, plans and progress on my very first cosplay!

Happiest of New Years to you, my dear sisters! I'm so glad to be jumping into this new year with your love and friendship!!

Sending hugs and warm thoughts to your homes and hearts,

Vicki