Tomorrow

Well here we are. December 31st. The last day of the year and the last post of "The Year of Living Imperfectly". How to finish? So much pressure. Well actually not. The Hattie of last year would have freaked out over a post like this. The opportunity to say something poignant, meaningful, and perfect would have overwhelmed me and thus I would have said nothing instead of trying and falling short. My conclusion to this year's blog experiment can be stated simply as: it worked.

I am not who I was a year ago. I am still troubled at times with an abnormal amount of anxiety, but I think I can honestly say that I am no longer a perfectionist or at least my perfectionism doesn't inhibit me anymore. I have learned that it really is better to try and fail than to never try at all. I realized I had 28 or 29 years worth of thoughts and emotions that I never voiced before. I had 28 or 29 years of desires and things to try that I was simply terrified to attempt at the risk of appearing foolish or worse...mediocre. This year I can proudly say that I wasn't quiet anymore. I expressed myself in new ways. For the first time I didn't sit on the sidelines. I got out on the field and joined the game. I lived. When I wrote the title of this blog the key word to me was "imperfectly". 365 days later the word from the title that jumps off the page at me is "living"! With the perfectionism broken I feel freedom to finally get on with the living part already!

I talked for over an hour yesterday with some dear friends about blogging. We discussed a lot of different things but one thing I shared was how having an audience was essential for my process because of the vulnerability, but that ultimately I have been writing for myself. The posts in which I found myself while writing conscious of my audience, attempting to appear witty or clever or even admirable, well those posts come off as disingenuous and insincere. The posts where I was most honest and "myself" got the bigger responses. This was a good phenomenon for me. It taught me that all people (my audience) are looking for from me is to be just myself and that who I am is good enough. I have loved having an audience. It is at the same time terrifying and comforting. The most encouraging things that were said to me this past year all had to do with a comment about something I had written. If you belonged to one of those comments, facebook messages, or emails I want to say thank you one more time. I have loved have a caravan of people join me on this journey. Thanks for traveling with me.

In answer to many of your questions, Yes I will continue to write. The year long project accomplished what I had hoped it would so I'm not going to attempt a daily post any longer. And let's be honest, if you needed any evidence that I'm no longer a perfectionist just look at how delinquent I was in my posting the past 3 months vs. the times I missed posts earlier in the year and beat myself up about it. I'm not sure what the blog will look like from here on out. I'm still finding my voice as I continue to find myself so I'm not sure how and if the subject matter may change. I think next week I'll be doing a "best and worst of" the year just to remember the journey and really reflect on how far we've come.

In the meantime I want to leave you with the lyrics from the refrain in a song we sang at the midnight Christmas Eve service this year that had me weeping. It is my prayer, though I think it may have already come true.

"Welcome to the end of your sorrows
Welcome to the end of yourself
Welcome to tomorrow
Where hope lives."

Could it be that I've finally woken up to my tomorrow? Could it really be true that I have left that yesterday and those things of the past actually in the past? I think so. Happy New Year and welcome to a beautiful tomorrow.