What Have You Learnt from 2018?

It's that time of the year again; the time when people look back on the year that they've had and try to make changes for the upcoming year. 2018 has been a rollercoaster of a year, and for some reason, it also seemed like it was an excruciatingly long one. I saw tweets that literally reminded me that Black Panther came out in February and that the entire Tide Pod fiasco happened in January. In case you've forgotten, the FIFA World Cup also happened this year. Fortnite feels like it's been around for a couple of years, right? Nope; this year. No matter which way you look at it, 2018 feels like its been here forever. It definitely feels nice to finally put a lid on everything bad this year has brought and look forward to 2019, and the most common way to do this is, of course, make resolutions. Now, I've made my stance on New Year's resolutions pretty clear in an earlier article, so I'm not going to talk about that today. Instead, I'm going to give you a bit of advice on something that you can do to ensure that you get some form of closure for everything you've been through, good or bad, for 2018. Don't worry, it's not a very complicated process or anything of the sort; in fact, it's quite simple. All you need is a pen and a piece of paper.

Take a moment (or if you want to be really thorough, a couple of hours), and think back on your year. Think of all the ups and downs, all the things that went right and the things that went horribly wrong, all the lessons you've learnt and all the experiences you went through. Now, think of what you learnt out of all those experiences. It can be the simplest of things or a mind blowing epiphany; either way, write them down on your paper (preferably in a sentence, or in a couple of sentences) and keep listing as many as you want. When you feel like you need to stop, put your pen down and look at the list in front of you. Ask yourself why you think these are the things that came to you. Ask yourself what led you to realising that these were things you learnt throughout the year. Read each item on your list again, in your head, and really let the lesson sink in. More often than not, there would have been one or two events that happened throughout the year that would have influenced you to write that particular lesson. Remember those moments, what led you to the realisation on the list. Revisit that moment in your memory, and let yourself be immersed by the feeling that led you to pen those words down.

This is something that I did last year, and while it wasn't a goal oriented exercise that so many other New Year related things are, it really helped me because I was able to really what I took away from the previous year and what I needed to do better in the next year. I realised that it is what we take away from the moments in life, big or small, that help us in becoming better people. We can all become good at our jobs, make tons of money, and be financially stable and well off. But to be a better person, and to keep improving yourself as much as you can is something everyone, no matter who they are, should all strive for.

It's important to remember that these aren't resolutions for you keep, nor are they goals that you have to accomplish before the end of the year. They are simply reminders for you to do better in the years to come. In the end, isn't that what all of us want to do?