Looks like we made it, 2023

Invitation to take stock

If this isn’t the end of year mood, idk what is

This is my last post in 2023 before fully signing off through the rest of the year to recharge, soak up all the family time, and hopefully see some New England snow. Wishing you a very happy, restful holiday season & see you in 2024 ✨

I’ve been reflecting with friends on how we made it through 2023 now that it’s almost a wrap on 12 months where we faced lots of instability and turbulence in our 9-5+ lives. It wasn’t easy and has me singing looks like we maaade ittt [shout out Shania Twain; I can’t get this song out of my head and yes, now it’s my year-end post theme]. Btw, if you’re job searching, I thought

The Career Whispers

Coach Erika’s piece this week diagnosed the recent trends well and led to tangible tips I’d recommend checking out.

Like many of us, I’m slowly transitioning from burnout to relief, and ready to embrace that sweet corporate calm during the one period in the year that feels universally quiet. You might be through your last full working week of the year already or about to embark upon it depending on when your company decided to line up the holiday schedule. Or you might be in the thick of the job search because this was one of the worst markets ever. Either way, you’ve still made it to this point and undoubtedly have personal takeaways from 2023. Anything coming to mind right away? I’ll come back to this in a bit.

Even though I can see the light at the end of the tunnel now, last week was long and grueling. I know this is how it always goes when working towards all the work deadlines, adding in the holiday parties, the gift shopping, and for me personally needing to go into the office every day thanks to the most Monday Monday….

Oh the irony. Just about 12 hours after I gushed over how blissful I felt coming back from our weekend in the woods, we woke up to a water leak covering my home office area this past Monday morning. Cue all the emotions that are the opposite of zen (and some swearing). The water came THROUGH the wall outlet to cover the corner area of the apartment where my desk is set up. The kind of water coverage that soaked my socks when I walked over to log in to work. Terrified to think of some kind of impending electrical disaster, we scrambled downstairs to talk to our building management about it. They take water leaks seriously and luckily started handling it right away. 

From there I dashed out to drive to my office in downtown DC. It was kind of a beautiful reality check in a few ways. As much as we want to own a home, I was relieved to be a renter at that moment and not have to deal with an end-to-end resolution. It also struck me how lucky I am to 1) have the ability to physically escape that situation; 2) change my work-from-home plans on the fly; 3) have such a quick commute from a neighborhood I have dreamed of living in; and 4) work from a perk-filled environment that makes it kinda fun to come in (I know I know, but I swear no BS here and if you’ve ever been a Meta visitor, you know what I mean). I’m grateful for ALL of this, and I’m acutely aware not everyone feels this way / what the more common office experience is. More to come on that and what the return-to-office research says in the new year:

All that said, it continued to be the monday-est Monday when I proceeded to spill cold brew on my jeans once I got to the office 😂 some days are just off, what can I say. And even though the water leak meant I had to go in every day last week (adding to my exhaustion), the coffee chats + happy hour convos from this week still gave me life. One in particular really stuck with me. A coworker described how she is pausing to “take stock” in the context of her own personal reflections, acknowledging how much we’ve all been through in recent years leading up to this one. I have not stopped thinking about it since, and I couldn’t resist - here’s what comes up as the online dictionary definition: 

Take stock (idiom): to carefully think about something in order to make a decision about what to do next.

Here is my invitation to you to take stock with me, and consider all that’s happened in our 9-5+ lives. You can do this from the lens of personal and/or professional development. I found this beyond helpful to do as an exercise before starting to think about any goal setting for 2024. Plus, it’s easier to digest and wrap my mind around while I’m still sprinting (eh, light jogging) to finish work. I broke it down into these two high level categories: 

• Top solo time memories that come to mind where I felt energized this year (e.g. creating vision slides for our wedding)

• Top solo time memories that come to mind where I felt depleted this year (e.g. rabbit hole consuming news about layoffs across tech)

Following part 2 of the above Take Stock definition, I’ve been writing about ideas on what to do next to create more of the energizing moments, and fewer of the depleting ones within my control. I’m surprising myself with some things that have come up, but when I think about how much has changed since Covid isolation times, it’s almost like I’m taking stock of how I want to show up for myself and loved ones at a basic level.

Let me know if the same happens for you and any other thoughts if you try this. And if you don’t feel like you have the emotional capacity to do this reflection, I get that too, and truthfully it won’t serve you to force it. For example, I had other ideas for this post, but this was the extent of what I could write and it was energizing to challenge myself to instead share one personal anecdote and one nugget I wanted to pass along this week. I’d love to write more but I’m spent, and the choice to give myself grace and compassion as I reflect on an eventful year is kind of the whole point of this message. 

So my revised, summarized invitation goes more like this: we made it, take stock if you can, and do what serves you best to feel peaceful when wrapping up 2023.

Thank you so much for being a part of Grade 17 the past month (AH yup just realizing it is December 17, so officially one month of doing this). I’m so excited to keep growing in this space together next year and have lots more to share. 

❤️