I don’t want to pressure you, but yes it’s time to think about what you want. It’s time to discover what you’re capable of, and it’s time to start believing that you can do more next year than you did this year.
I’ve been struggling a lot this year. I had all these grand plans for a panty line, and for a workshop, I was going to finish my 2nd book and this year was going to be amazing, but emotionally this year was rough as fuck.
For a lot of this year, I spent myself asking the question “Who The fuck Am I?” It was a question that should have led to Uncomfortable II being called that, instead of Uncomfortable II.
The last half of this year was filled with music because even though I didn’t make it out to as many events as I wanted to, I’m still pretty gunshy about being in public, I still got to meet some really cool people and have some moments this year that mattered.
This year I got to be in one of the most culturally, economically, and physically diverse rooms in my entire life. There were people there from several different cultures, many with disabilities, myself included, and many who just came out to support a great cause in a documentary called Lauren’s Story about houselessness and poverty in BC.
Now That I’ve Had Those Experiences, I Want More – Devon J Hall
All my favorite bloggers quit around this time in their writing careers. Or at least, under the blogging platform that helped me find them anyways. So I don’t have a frame of reference for what comes next, but what I do know, is that what I had this year that was great? I want more of it. I want to spend more time meeting new people and less time talking about trauma.
I want to spend more time saying “hey guess what I got to do,” instead of “hey guess what I had to go through, again.”
I spent a lot of time this year thinking about what I went through and reminding myself if not the world, about my own greatness, and it hurt a lot. It was a lot of nights filled with tears, a lot of sadness, a lot of shame, fear, guilt, and anxiety about what may or may not happen next. A lot of “holy shit, I’m still alive.”
I remember my 21st birthday was a shock. I didn’t expect to live that long, and it wasn’t because I was making bad choices, it was because I was surrounded by abusers and the only way that I knew how to fight back, was to remain silent.
So when I’m setting goals now, I’m asking myself how it’s possible, to remain soft, but loud at the same time.
- What issues are important to me in this time of my life of change?
- What does it feel like to be here compared to what it felt like last year around this time of the season?
- What do I want to highlight most using the platform I’ve worked hard to earn?
Each of the goals that I’m focusing on setting for the 2023 season of Loud Mouth Brown Girl is about building a future with this brand, instead of walking away just as things are just starting to get interesting.
Like, I started a blog because I got arrested on an airplane while having a panic attack, excuse me who else can say that?
Who else can say 2022 would mean that 5 years later I’m still bitching, moaning, complaining, and making a change in the world by contributing to the Black and white mixed race cultures in the only way. Iknow how?
I want to discover more about my mixed culture. I want to understand what it means to be Scottish, English, Irish, Gypsy, Jamaican, and essentially Creole. Which to me is a truly sacred word.
I want to know what these cultures had in common that brought them together so I could exist, and the only way for me to do that is to keep going, if this is supposed to be a record of my life, then clearly my life isn’t over yet.
Thus I’ve proven to you that if you read that as I was speaking to YOU reading, instead of about ME writing this, you’re needed here and there for are not allowed to end your life yet.
You have goals to reach, you just don’t know what they are, don’t you think you should find out? Because baby if you got to the end of this post this is a message from the universe.
Sending all my love,
Devon J Hall
If you have thoughts you’d like to add about this post, please leave a message, and let’s talk about them
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