2021 Year In Review: Grief, Gratitude, and Grace
Before I get into what we're all here for, thank you for being part of my 2021 story...
Whether you were here for the whole wild ride or just caught the tail end of the adventure. Or maybe you're just now getting to know me in 2022, in which case, buckle up for a rollercoaster of cliff notes. Okay, now let's do this...
If this graphic represented my entire 2021, you would absolutely only be looking at my highlight reel. Sometimes I wish this really did sum up that past 12 months. In truth though, the pendulum of events that took place in 2021 - personal & professional - have only continued to help shape the woman I'm becoming & I fucking love her already!
2021 was hard.
Period.
That could actually be the entire summary.
If you can't tell from the way I titled this post, 2021 was filled to the brim with grief, gratitude, and grace. I grieved people & memories. I was so grateful for an abundance of blessings. I extended more grace to myself (and others) than I probably have in my entire adult life. To say 2021 stretched me would be an understatement. It broke me and put me back together so many times that the cracks left behind are now just forever part of my story.
When I sat down to write this post, I contemplated how transparent I wanted to be will all that transpired last year, and in doing so, I realized, I am still actively grieving & healing & learning from all that went down, so a lot of it... I am just not ready to share. I do hope, however, to share enough that this post (essay?) resonates with you on a personal level so that you leave here (1) knowing me a bit better and (2) feeling seen if you're maybe in a very similar season of life.
For me, 2021 was in many many ways worse than 2020.
I've talked about this before, but in case you missed it, the events of 2020 - namely the pandemic - didn't impact me in the same way that it did many others. Why? Because I'm a very anxious person, and that anxiety actually made everything around me feel "normal" because my mind is in a constant state of fear/worry/paranoia/panic.
In 2020 I watched as we collectively held our breaths through unprecedented political events, racial reckonings, health inequities, and death... so much death. Many moments felt like, for better or for worse, we were all in this together. 2020 brought me #ShareTheMicNowHomeEdition, which lead to a wealth of other experiences, and the year was punctuated with my family purchasing & moving into our very first home! I started that year with 2 vision boards (personal & professional), and while I didn't do a 2020 year end review - this is actually my first since 2018! - if I had to sum everything up, I can actually say more than 50% of what I'd placed on my boards came to pass.
I wish I could say 2021 was as kind.
For starters, although I started, I never completed my vision boards for the year. Maybe that was a sign of things to come because lemme tell you... what came in the months to follow most certainly weren't part of the vision. Ironically, the handful of things that I did start to put on my digital board did pan out in some ways... so there's that.
Personally, I don't know that my self confidence, mental health, and general will to keep going have ever been more tested. And yes, you read that correctly. 2021 was the year that I truly sat and asked myself, "Do I want to keep living?" Not keep l living this life... but keep living life... period. Before anyone panics, while I don't know if what I felt would fall under "suicidal thoughts" it was enough to rattle me & prompt me to get back into talk therapy... which I did & have been doing since. With the help of a dear friend who was aware of some of what I was battling at the time, I found a therapist who's a woman of color & specialized in a lot of what was weighing on me.
Like I said...
The timeline image only tells a fraction of my 2021 story!
Yes, I did start the year on a high note of being named one of Apartment Therapy's 2021 Design Changemakers - an honor that I never imagined for myself and that I truly believed would set the tone for my year ahead. This honor stemmed from my spearheading the STMN instagram initiative and I sincerely believed that it would trigger a new wave of opportunities. Spoiler: it didn't... well not really.
Much of what I accomplished to kick off 2021 was residual from work I'd put in in 2020...
premiering a 4-part home buying series with House Beautiful
teaching a Skillshare Originals course on reversible design solutions
speaking at Better Homes & Gardens' Anniversary Stylemaker event
getting my 2nd AMARA Living Interior Blog Awards nomination
I don't say this to downplay these accomplishments because I am deeply proud of them all; instead, what I am hoping to covey is that while they may have come to fruition in 2021, they're the fruits of 2020.
Something to keep in mind is that I am a HOME content creator - or at least that's what I was at the start of 2021 - and so it also being our first full year in the new house, there was a lot of overlap in my personal & professional ambitions. As a homeowner, we crossed a lot of projects of our list which meant, as a content creator, I hit y'all with a lot of reveals! P.S. all of those reveals don't reflect all the work we actually did because not everything was for public consumption.
Between those two things alone - executing and revealing projects - 2021 was exhausting AF... but it felt like it was all I could do to be productive, useful, and profitable. If I stood still... if I caught my breath... it all just felt like sink or swim. So I just kept swimming (and yes I am singing the Dory tune in my head).
Q1 heightened my imposter syndrome as a content creator - could I still be as "popular" as I was in 2020 & meet everyone's expectations - as well as a wife & mother. I found myself wondering if I could actually be all those things at the same time or if I even deserved to be those things. It wasn't until the other day that I realized not a day will go by that I don't potentially let someone down... even if that someone is myself. These are just some of the things that I began unpacking with my therapist - imposter syndrome, staying small, pursuing big goals, money mindset, anticipating success, setting boundaries, balancing motherhood & marriage, scaling as an entrepreneur... and the list goes on and on and on.
Consider this my official PSA to anyone who's been considering therapy - it'll be the best investment you make in yourself!
As therapy continued to help me heal from deep personal wounds & professional anxieties, the world kept throwing its punches... and trust me... she got HANDS! I'm an empath, which in my old age (or at least my 2021 age) has gotten to be an extremely exhausting trait. It felt like everyday someone in my orbit was dying. To explain that... while 2020 claimed many lives, I didn't know them and there were a lot more than 6 degrees of separation. In 2021, however, it was day after day of 6 degrees or less - friends & family members of my friends & family members. So in addition to my own personal anguish, it felt like my heartbreak was on a Groundhog Day loop... never with time to heal in between.
Simultaneously, my home projects went from being a necessary creative outlet & source of income, to just being one more thing I resented about 2021. I was no longer getting the partnerships I coveted, I wasn't performing to my desired level of excellence, I certainly wasn't always getting paid my worth (granted that's also woven into not really knowing my worth), and I felt like I couldn't escape this very unhealthy cycle.
Who am I if I'm not Albie Knows?
How ungrateful of me to want to stop.
The nerve!
she said with sarcasm dripping from every word
The kitchen renovation, for example, while it's one of our biggest accomplishments in the house, is a project I grew to resent because it took SO much from me - time, money, energy, confidence, will...etc. The reveal was 6 months ago and I am STILL not over the weight of that renovation... especially since the renovation itself started a year ago, almost to the date! Even with the affirming words of friends, family, and peers, I couldn't see past my own perceived failures - my declining physical health, constant weight gain, never ending exhaustion, unpredictable income, unanswered brand pitches, cancelled brand campaigns, low social media engagement, thinning industry recognition. I spent the better part of Q2 just trying to survive. There was no thriving happening... not by a long shot.
Now let's skip ahead in the timeline, lest I find myself writing a 10,000 word post...
After spending most of the summer anxiously deliberating over whether or not to send our daughter to school - did I mention she was home with me full time this entire time? - my mother, who spent the summer with us, and my husband convinced me to let her start to new school year in school. Keeping in mind that we're still in a pandemic, this decision was not easy for me... but it was the best decision for all of us. She thrived. All the fears & worries I had for her I kept away from her to let her experience school untarnished by my own angst. And she continues to thrive. I was now, for the first time, a full time content creator & on my own time for 6 to 8 hours a day!
Her being in school & me now having more time alone changed nothing.
After 9 months of flailing, it wasn't the "fresh start" I fantasized about because I didn't even know where to start. Some very well meaning peers lent me their time & expertise to navigate this new season of my career but if we're being honest, I was already too far gone down the rabbit hole of depression and the most productive thing I could do for myself was continue to work on myself in therapy. Everything else could, and would have to, wait.
By the holiday season, I was all revealed out... and thankful for it.
I was more than ready to be done with those commitments, and with no new campaigns on the horizon - outside of being a brand ambassador for The Container Store & European Wax Center - I was both relieved & saddened. Relieved for the respite, saddened by the lack of work. My systems & routines were completely decimated, but I did allow myself - with gentle pushes from my therapist - to pursue at least one of the many big ideas I had for this year. I began "consistently" creating for Amazon, specifically Amazon live. It reignited my passions for recording - since clearly YouTube and I just can't get on the same accord yet - as well as for just talking to an audience, like I did with podcasting... man I miss podcasting, but more on that later. After a rocky start, and LOADS of technical difficulties, I still managed to earn more in one month as an Amazon creator than I ever had my entire time being part of Amazon's influencer program. This excited me! Finally... something actually excited me... and that's the high that I ended 2021 riding. It wasn't about the money - although it definitely felt nice to make the money - but it was a creative outlet that was "mine" and I was creating for me again without any external pressures... just goals I'd set for myself.
So to recap -
my mild anxiety and depression had peaked, prompting me to seek out a new therapist, who I am still working with
I didn't hit any of my financial goals, although I was able to find new outlets to earn
as both a wife & mother, I questioned my capabilities and struggled with how best to serve them
now a full time content creator, I underestimated how poorly I'd handled entrepreneurship & all that it entails
If you've made it this far, God bless you!
You're truly a real one & I am so happy to have you as part of my community. Also, if you've made it this far, then you see my year in review from a completely different lens - a point of view rooted in my mental & emotional health.
If you've been around a while, you likely know that I love a good round up of lessons & such. So where do I go from here? What have I learned from the events of 2021 & who am I now going into 2022?
If you take away nothing else from this entire post, take away the fact that I survived!
I promise you, for a period of time, I wanted nothing more to succumb to my depression - to curl up in fetal position, close my eyes, and disappear into a beautiful dream state... to end the pain... and to wake up with a clean slate to try again. That "factory reset" never came. Instead, I still carry all the painful memories of all 365 days of 2021... memories that, for better or for worse, will always be part of me. Coming out on the other side of everything that transpired is a testament to my faith & the strength granted to me by God's grace... because it most certainly wasn't my own strength.
2021 also reaffirmed the power of being still...
the restorative power of rest.
I kept thinking I had something to prove when truth is, I didn't. The only person I'm in "competition" with is the person I was the day before. I let myself get caught up & as a result, suffered from over functioning & hyper performance. I shan't be making that mistake again... not because I'm incapable of making that mistake but because I hated the feelings that came along with it - I never want to feel that helpless, useless, or meaningless again... because that's all there is on the other side of "doing the most". Tethering my self worth to how well I performed was mentally, emotionally, and physically damaging.
At the time of writing this, I'm in the middle of a social media respite that was prompted by needing to get away from everyone's grand declarations for the new year. Like so many other people, I'd let go of so many of the better habits I'd adopted in 2020 - working out, having a routine, prioritizing rest, etc. Hitting rock bottom in 2021 was the gut punch reminder to stop & take a hard look at what I was doing to myself, lest I regress to an even worse version of my 2019 self.
Going to therapy was one of this best (and most expensive to be honest) investments I made in myself in 2021, along with prioritizing other regular forms of self care, like getting my monthly waxes. Carving out those times specifically for me - not for work, not for content, not for my family - are likely what help keep me somewhat grounded through the difficult year. Those few hours a week/month that were exclusively mine allowed me to slowly shift my mindset into a thought pattern that was healthier & more conducive to progress.
Behind the highlight reel of my surface success was a year of pain, healing, and unlearning... a year of self care, growth, and introspection... And from that I take away probably my biggest lesson of 2021 - the wins aren't nearly as special without experiencing a few l's along the way... and they mean absolutely nothing without the headspace to actually enjoy em. Until sitting down to even write this post, I'd actually forgotten ALL of that stuff from "highlight reel" because it was all eclipsed by my trauma. I didn't appreciate any of it, much less allow myself to celebrate it, because I was too buy throwing myself a pity party... reservation for 1.
Going into 2022, I still had some emotional stumbles but I feel better equipped for the year ahead. For starters, I have lowered my expectations lol. I have goals. I have ideas. But I am also extending myself a very generous amount of grace, budgeting rest in between projects and prioritizing opportunities so that I am fulfilled by everything I take on. The work that I need to do on me is constant, however, I feel much better equipped because of all that I went through last year. Just today I had an emotional breakdown that ended with a lamenting prayer. My breakdown turned into a breakthrough. Me 6 months ago was just breaking down like an old car on the side of the road.
Now that I have very humbly wrapped up my 2021 to you in around 3,000 words, I hope you take from this what you need as you go into the new year - comfort in knowing you're not alone, insight into your own battles, and encouragement to seek out help... whatever you need!
