5 Lessons I’ve Learned in 2023 🪩
the lessons that made this year not only great, but made my life easier & better.
If you had told me when I was tucked under the lip of my kitchen island, stuffing my mouth with 12 grapes at the strike of midnight on January 1, 2023, that 2023 was going to be one of the greatest years of my personal life, I would’ve eaten 12 more to seal the deal.
Good Luck Grapes aside, I was beyond pleasantly surprised with this year.
I believe that how you start the year sometimes feels like a precursor to how the year is going to go. And by January 1st, I was already three days into a stomach bug that lasted until January 5th.
My new health insurance kicked in on January 1st, so I hobbled over to the ER and was pumped with so much fluid. I remember thinking, “If this is how this year is going to go, it’s gonna be a bad one.”
But this year I actually felt really good about my health, body, career, passions, etc. I know this year wasn’t for everyone, but it seemed like in 2023, everything came together so beautifully for me.
I now look back at that end-of-year-to-beginning-of-year stomach bug and think, “WOW. What a purge that my body so desperately needed so that I could start this year fresh.”
As we crawl into the new year, I see so many people posting their 2023 recaps, and what did and didn’t work for them this year.
I tend to be pretty optimistic so making a “what didn’t work this year” list was kind of a challenge for me. I’m not saying that everything is always perfect over here - not everything goes right or according to plan. New challenges are presented every day, but I tend to look at things from the lens of what they’re trying to teach me versus how bad they’re going to make my life.
While being an eternal optimist isn’t for everyone, keeping this mindset has made my life better and - dare I say - easier than when I was clinging to the negative or waiting for the other shoe to drop. So, even though this year probably had a handful of less-than-picture-perfect moments, I’ve found that embracing the chaos and shrugging off what I cannot control has taught me a lot about life.
So here are my top 5 lessons I’ve Learned in 2023 and what I hope can be some key takeaways to how we collectively enjoy the new year.
Lesson 1: Let Go Of What It Should Look Like, Focus On How You Want it to Feel
At the start of 2023, I was still coming down from my transformational trip to Tulum, Mexico in October. It was hard to go from such a safe, spiritual environment back into the swing of reality which can sometimes feel unsafe. I remember coming back and thinking, “I cannot be the same person I’ve always been. I cannot do the same things I’ve always done,” but it was easier to say this than to embody it. It wasn’t until I started asking myself, “How do I want this to feel?” that I began to find myself casting my ego aside and finding my life much more fulfilling. This came in the form of how I took care of myself - the meals I ate (“this plate looks weird but I know it’s going to fuel me”), the workouts I chose - going on long walks instead of pushing myself in cardio which I dread, and even how I spent my time - staying in most weekends instead of my usual going out.
I truly became more consciously aware of this “letting go what it should look like, focus on how you want it to feel” principle when I met my partner. Joe is about 22 years older than I am, and I remember being so nervous about how I was going to explain it to other people. I had already recognized from the very first date that he was who my soul desired to be with. As I drove home from our first date, I started internalizing how I would tell my friends and my family that I was dating an older man. It was then that I realized that the outside perception of MY intimate relationship just did not matter and that if I was going to let it catastrophize something that immediately felt SO right for me, then I’d be making a huge mistake.
It’s been 6 months of joy. 6 months of learning someone else and letting him learn me. 6 months of healing and growing. Everything I’ve ever desired in a relationship and more. And it’s all because I loved how I felt when I was with him more than I cared about how we would be perceived. Leaning into the feeling versus how it’s going to look wins every time.
Lesson 2: You Are The Sole Proprietor of Your Time and Energy
When you realize this, that YOU and you alone, have single ownership over your time and energy, you start spending it wisely.
It is so easy to give your time away. I know this because I realized in 2023 that I was giving so much time to other people; committing to plans when I didn’t want to, staying out for an extra drink or two because the night was just “turning around,” taking on extra money opportunities that I didn’t want but I need the money, etc., etc. And, look, I already know that it is my Human Design type to do as I do and hold onto my sacred “no’s,” but the reality of it, is sometimes it’s hard to hold onto your energy when you’ve been conditioned to give it away. I cannot stress this enough, though - when you reclaim your time for things that are most important to you, you set an example to others of how they can reclaim their time, too. When you set boundaries at work, or stay home on Friday night to clean up and binge-watch new episodes of your favorite shows or finish your new book, or take your lunch break early so you can soak in the tub at 10 AM on a Wednesday, you show others that it’s okay for them to take care of themselves as well.
You do not have to constantly be giving away your precious time and energy to show up for everyone else. You can show up for them by painting a clear picture of what practicing self-sovereignty and self-care looks like.
Lesson 3: You Don’t Have to Match Everyone’s Energy
I see a lot of posts on social media that glamorize “matching energy,” but they use it as reciprocating someone’s negative energy with your own. Remember that you are the sole proprietor of your energy… you have a choice to give your energy away by being negative back and holding onto that exchange. However, in my opinion, this choice just propels more negative thoughts and it becomes harder to get past it, letting that person live rent-free inside your head.
In 2023, I felt a friendship grow sour. Any time I would spend with this person, it felt like they were just never coming from an honest place with me. I felt like any good news I brought up to them, they would just shut down as if my joy didn’t matter. Whenever I’d come home from hanging out with them, I felt deflated, like I just spent so many hours validating my existence to someone who was never going to give it their stamp of approval.
I realized that how they treated me had very little to do with me and a lot to do with how they viewed themself, my joy was triggering a shadow part of them that wasn’t having the same experience as me. Instead of matching their backhanded words with some of my own, I reciprocated their energy by simply not spending time with them or entertaining conversations with them. If we are spending time together so you can talk only about yourself and dismiss anything I have to say, you’re not really “spending time” with ME, but rather your shadow self. I have to be protective of my energy and my time is better spent with connections who, at the very least, give a fuck about me and this version of myself as I am right now.
Lesson 4: Heal Your Money Trauma
I started the year off dead broke. I was living off of my savings, much to my financial advisor's dismay, and I was barely raking in money from my copywriting business. I basically could pay my rent and could get very little groceries to get by. I was dropping weight but not in a healthy way. I was so stressed about my finances to the point that I was losing sleep over whether I could pay my electric bill or not. However, quitting my full-time job with benefits in 2022 was a decision I made intending to launch a successful coaching business. The stress of money - and how scarce it had become - stripped me of any joy I had about coaching. Yet, I continued to invest what little money I made in myself.
In January, I took on my Yin yoga training in New Jersey and almost talked myself out of it because I argued that the money I would be spending on travel would be better spent on getting groceries or keeping my lights on. But I did it anyway knowing that I could eventually offer classes with the certification under my belt. It was a life-changing experience because I met my teacher Carleena, who wound up hosting an abundance challenge later in the year that astronomically shifted my money mindset.
In February, I applied for 50+ jobs in between gig jobs like Instacart and DoorDash. I sat down with my bills and said “This is what I need to make down to the hour to pay my rent and get on track with my bills.” I interviewed for multiple jobs, and almost took one that I desperately didn’t want to accept, before receiving a full-time contracting job as a Social Media Coordinator for a cannabis company. The hourly wage for two full weeks alone was enough to cover my rent, and my bills, and allow me to live some semblance of a comfortable life again. I vowed to not use my paychecks the way I was before, buying things from Amazon that I would wind up selling or getting rid of just months later, ordering takeout or going out to eat multiple nights a week when I am perfectly capable of cooking for myself and spending money on experiences that left me feeling drained.
Then, in June, I embarked on the 21-Day Abundance Challenge which greatly impacted my fears around money. Through meditation and some hardcore journal exercises, I was able to begin the healing process around my money trauma by recognizing that money is not scarce; it is constantly floating around us, we just have to stop accepting that we should be fearful of it. Healing my money trauma is always going to be a work in progress, but it’s gotten easier. I took intentional time this summer to list out when all my bills were due until the end of the year and how I could break up each paycheck to pay down most of my debts. To be honest, I had some slipups, especially when I committed to a high-ticket business coach, but she was an investment I do not regret making because I’ve learned MANY invaluable insights about my business and even got Reiki certified so that I can provide that service to others.
Now I am going into the new year in a much more abundant place than I came into it, with a raise and a new spreadsheet of paycheck allocation that doesn’t even take into consideration the relaunch of my coaching program or my Reiki sessions.
Lesson 5: Think About What A Past Version of Yourself Would Do, And Do The Opposite
I seriously laugh about this one, because it’s such a simple concept, but I hadn’t thought of it before until recently. I can’t even remember the exact situation that had to occur for me to come to this actualization, but I’m sure it was somewhere between starting to date my new partner and my work around abundance. I remember one of the first arguments Joe and I had, and it felt like we weren’t getting through to each other, every word we said was just spiraling us further into miscommunication. A past version of myself would’ve continued to fight my point of view and would’ve said things that I couldn’t come back from. So, amid this fight at his house, 230+ miles from the security of my own home and the comfort of my environment, I packed my work bag and went to a coffee shop.
On the drive to and from, I practiced resetting my nervous system through breathwork. Instead of playing out the conversation in my head and rehearsing what I would say when I got back, I sat in the coffee shop, sipping an iced coffee and finishing a work project I had wanted to get done before the end of the day. A past version of me would’ve discarded the work project because I was too upset to do it, but I knew someone was depending on me to get it done and that, when you’re an hourly contractor, every hour counts. When I was done, I drove back to his place with a clearer head and felt like I was grounded enough to fully hear him and express myself without anger. And I cried, which is something I used to forbid myself to do in fights for fear of seeming weak or too vulnerable. When we started dating, I vowed to make this relationship different than any I had ever been in, even if that meant letting myself express my intense emotions through tears. It was cathartic and healing for both of us and we put the fight aside by embracing and getting out of the house and going on a great dinner date. It felt good to sit outside, eat a filling meal, and express our thoughts now that we had reset our nervous systems.
I’ve learned that various versions of myself would have perseverated on these dark moments and stored them away, only to let them fester into more negative patterns of thinking. So I did the opposite, I let this moment go into the abyss and chose to focus on the new, healing moments.
Now, when making so many decisions, I pause to think about what a prior version of myself would do, and how I would let that decision affect me, and I literally do the opposite. It’s been a real game changer because it allows me to learn from something new instead of reverting to old patterns.
Bonus Lesson: Give Up Control & Release Expectation
I wanted to sneak this one in here because it has had a tremendous impact on my life.
In 2023, I started to let go of the reigns a lot more than I had previously done. I realized that for most of my life, I needed to have control over everything - and even though I thought I had everything tightly wound between my fingers, I still found myself losing a lot.
When my mom passed away in 2018, I was reminded that life continues even while you’re trying to grasp control. From 2018 to 2020, I was deeply depressed and in that depression, I tried to control the outcome of my life. I NEEDED to know what was coming from every angle because I was so unprepared to lose my mom when and how I did. I tried to control my grief by medicating instead of dealing with the ups and downs that are attached to sorrow. I tried to manipulate my friendships to better serve what I thought I had lost, which only bred resentment. I created expectations of everything, from what I should be doing by 30, down to how conversations would go. Feeling the need to be “on top” of my life only set me back. So this year, I focused on giving up control and releasing any expectations of how things could go. And you know what? Life started piecing itself together in ways that were better than I could’ve ever expected it to be.
Because I just let the Universe do its thing without expectation of what could go right or wrong, I often found myself in awe of the life I was creating. I wasn’t trying to control others' perception of me or control my schedule to balance what others expected of me versus what I wanted to do, I didn’t let my money scarcity control me, and I gave up control of how I thought life should be. No control, just vibes. I set intentions for myself and let them manifest into my life naturally (with aligned action of course). I set out to do me and to live in my energy and appreciate the abundance of the world around me, and because of this, I have been rewarded over and over again.
2023 was a year of great change but change that might not have happened had I been trying to stop it from coming. I am looking forward to applying these lessons in 2024 and am excited to see what this new year will bring.
Thank you for your support this year. Your messages about your takeaways from Settling Inn posts mean the world to me and bring me so much joy.
I love you. See you in 2024.