Stephany Writes

Categories: About Me

Reader Survey Results

At the end of last year, I put together a reader survey for you guys to fill out and I was thrilled by the response! And then my world fell apart and I promptly forgot all about it. But since I’m finally feeling a little like myself again, I thought it was time to talk about your answers and what I want this blog to be in the coming year(s).

Here are some of the stats I learned from the survey:

  • My readers are full of women. In fact, 100% of the respondents checked the “female” box when filling out my survey, which is not surprising in the least. My blog is definitely geared toward the ladies and I wouldn’t have it any other way.
  • Most of you are in your thirties. Ready for this staggering statistic? 68% of you are in your thirties! I really thought most of my readers were in their twenties, so this was surprising to me, but maybe it shouldn’t be. I started blogging around the time that Twenty-Something Bloggers (remember that community?) came into popularity and I was on the younger side of that demographic, and since (spoiler alert) many of you have been reading my blog since its inception, it makes sense that most of you are in your thirties. 27% of my readers are in their twenties and I have around 5% of readers in their forties.
  • No surprise: mostly US readers. Every now and then I check my stats to see where my traffic is coming from and while I have a few international hits, it’s mostly US-based. The majority of you are located in the US, a few in Canada, and just one UK reader (hi!).
  • You’ve either been reading my blog for a very long time, or you’re totally new to Stephany Writes. It was so interesting to find out that most of you have been reading this blog for five years or longer (45%). Thank y’all who have been around for the whole journey because, believe me, those early blog posts are cringe-worthy. Thanks for sticking by me as I figured myself out in my twenties. It was also surprising to find out that 23% of you have been reading my blog for a year or less. I don’t feel like I promote my blog as much as I used to and I’d love to know how some of you found this blog in the past year.
  • Most of you use a feed reader to get my blog posts. This is how I read blogs myself, so it wasn’t surprising to find out that 46% of you are subscribed to my blog via a feed reader. What was surprising is that 36% of you just come right to my blog to learn about new posts! There are also 14% of you who get my blog posts by email (there’s a signup on my sidebar to get my blog posts by email!)
  • Blog posting schedule: just right. The majority of you are happy with my two-posts-a-week schedule, but some of you want to see more blog posts per week.
  • What do you guys like to read about? A lot of you enjoy some of my regular series, including “Currently In…,” “Week in the Life,” “TGIF,” and “Five for Friday.” I was really happy to see that people love Week in the Life because that’s one of my favorites series to do every year and I’m glad it resonates with all of you guys, too! You guys also love when I talk about introversion, social anxiety, high sensitivity, personal finance, and singleness.
  • Nobody loves book reviews. Ha! I think I should have specified between my monthly book reviews and book reviews when I just talk about one book. But 55% of you said they weren’t your favorite, so you might not be keen on the weekly “What I’m Reading” series I’m starting. Oops. I’m not going to write one-book reviews anymore, so hopefully those were the blog posts you guys didn’t love so much, not the multiple-book reviews.

I also asked you guys what you like about my blog, and you guys were seriously the sweetest. The majority of the responses said that you love my honesty and that I’m not afraid to be vulnerable. You love the authentic and thoughtful nature of my blog posts. And having an honest, vulnerable dialogue about the messy parts of our lives is exactly what I wanted to create from this blog. I didn’t want to sugarcoat the hard parts, but be open and honest about my life.

I also asked for suggestions for how to improve my blog and I got some interesting responses to that question! Some of the suggestions:

  • Don’t be afraid to monetize your blog
  • Write more blog posts
  • Talk more about your dating life
  • Write fewer book posts
  • Keep sharing the hard stuff

I loved these suggestions, but there were two in particular that stood out: monetizing and talking about dating. I have thought long and hard about monetization when it comes to my blog and have decided it’s just not for me. It takes a lot of time and effort to search for monetization opportunities and I just don’t feel like it is worth it for me. And I’ve always felt a little icky writing sponsored posts. If the right opportunity comes along, something that feels right and authentic for me and my audience, I would consider it. But as it stands right now, monetizing my blog is not something I’m considering.

Now let’s talk about dating. It’s true – I only make mentions of my dating life, but very rarely provide specifics. For example, in my 2017 wrap-up posts, I talked about how I had been seeing someone for the first couple of months of the year, but he was absent from the blog. Why? Because our relationship never evolved from “casually dating” to “boyfriend and girlfriend.” And I just don’t talk about relationships that are in that “casually dating” stage. The first (and only, sigh) guy I’ve ever talked about on my blog in detail is someone I had had the boyfriend/girlfriend talk with. So that’s something that’s not going to change because my blog isn’t about other people. It’s about myself and my life and my journey. Hopefully one day, that journey will include a romantic partner, but until we’re serious, it’s something I will continue to remain quiet about.

What I Want From This Blog

So, what did this reader survey teach me about my blog? Nothing new, actually! This is good – it means the posts I’m writing on a regular basis resonate with you guys, even the less-serious ones like Five for Friday and TGIF. It helped me to see that talking about introversion, high sensitivity, and social anxiety are topics you guys really want to see more of, and it reminds me to continue writing about these topics and bringing awareness to them. I’m also grateful to see that you guys do like me to talk about singleness and dating, and even though I’m not dating this year, I’m going to try to write about that journey and what it’s like to be consciously single. And, finally, writing more about personal finance and my neverending quest to be a better money manager is going to be a priority this year. I’m not sure how, just yet, but I’m going to figure out what needs to be said.

Another thing that you’ll notice is that I’m going to try to stick to a three-days-a-week posting schedule: Mondays devoted to my current reads, Wednesdays devoted to a personal essay, and Fridays devoted to something fun like “Currently In…” or “Five for Friday.” I’ve been doing the two-days-a-week schedule for years now, so it might take some getting used to, but I’m going to try to make it work. And if it doesn’t, it doesn’t. A little experimentation didn’t hurt anyone, right?

Categories: About Me

Life Lately

It’s been three weeks since Dutch passed away, and I’m slowly trying to get back to myself.

I thought about coming back to blogging last week, but I just wasn’t ready. I’m not even sure if I’m ready now, but I’m trying. I need it, even if the words don’t come as easily as they used to. I mean, I spent two days just trying to figure out how to start this post, deleting paragraph after paragraph.

But I’m here. And that’s all that matters.

In the last three weeks, I’ve tried to figure out how to live my life without my best friend and it’s so hard. Every morning is a constant reminder that he’s gone. And when I’m asleep, I dream of him. I still expect him to be waiting for me when I come home. I hear phantom noises when I’m alone in my apartment. I receive these little reminders on a near-constant basis, like when I opened up my laptop for the first time after losing him and saw a pop-up from Pinterest: “20 more pins for dog birthday party,” because I thought about planning a birthday party for his 16th birthday back in early January. It’s these little things that remind me of the significance and impact of losing him.

But I’m not going to lie: as heartbroken as I am, life has been easier for me. I was not shy about how hard it was to be the sole caretaker for a special needs dog, and my whole life basically revolved around him. I couldn’t leave him alone for more than 3-4 hours, which meant I always had to have someone check in on him in the middle of the day (usually my mom) and I had to race home after work to take care of him. If I had evening plans, I would either have to ask my mom to check on him for me or do it myself, rushing him through his evening walk so I could get to wherever I needed to go. And if I did have evening plans, I would always worry about what kind of scene I might come home to because in his last year, Dutch had developed a habit of pooping and then stepping in the poop and spreading it all around. (Sorry to be TMI, but damn, I had to deal with this constantly and it sucked.) There were times when it took thirty minutes to clean it all up, between washing him, cleaning the floors, and disposing of the mess. Listen, I don’t miss that. Not one bit. There’s a sense of freedom in knowing when I come home, I won’t have a poop-splosion to worry about. And let’s not forget his sleep struggles, which were especially bad in the last year and prompted me to put him on a pill that essentially made him lethargic at night so he (and I) would sleep.

So, yes, life is easier in a way. There’s less worrying – about him and if he’s happy and thriving, about his sleep struggles, about arranging my life to suit his needs. I can say “yes” to evening plans without checking in with my mom first to make sure she can take care of his evening walk. I can go to the gym after work without first going home to check on him (which, let’s face it, when I’m home, I’m staying home). I can run errands and not worry about the logistics of what time I need to be home for Dutch.

But life is also a lot more empty, a lot more purposeless, a lot less happy. Even as hard as Dutch was to take care of, he was my buddy. My best friend. I always knew I could come home to him after every bad day, bad date, bad experience. He was there, exuberantly happy to see me and ready to slobber kisses all over my face. He was my constant companion and I really don’t know what to do with myself without him.

I’ve thought a lot about my next pet because yes, I’m pretty sure there will be another little one running around my apartment before 2018 is over. Before Dutch passed away, I didn’t think I would. I thought that I would just wait until I was in a serious relationship, so I had someone else to help me with taking care of a dog, but who knows when that will happen and I don’t think I want to wait until it does. (If it does.)

However, I’m also not making any decisions anytime soon. I’m just not the type to adopt a new pet immediately after losing one. After my beloved dog Minnie died when I was in college, it took me about six months to be ready to start looking for a new dog and suddenly, that’s when the opportunity to adopt Dutch happened, which was serendipity at its finest. And there’s also the question of whether I want to adopt a cat or a dog, which may surprise some people, as I’ve long identified as a dog person. But I like cats! I love them, even. And I’m really intrigued by how much easier they are to care for than dogs, so all my cat people: I want all of your advice in the coming months! I don’t plan on beginning to look for another pet until the summertime, which will give me time to be alone and grieve Dutch, as well as save money for a new pet and make the decision between a cat and a dog.

In the weeks after losing Dutch, I’ve leaned on my mom more than I have in a really long time. And she’s been there for me every step of the way. I slept at her place the day before we put Dutch down because I just didn’t want to wake up alone that day. She was there in the room with me when we put him down and stayed in there after I left sobbing. She’s checked on me constantly, sometimes just showing up at my apartment unannounced, which was so needed for someone like me, who has the hardest time reaching out. She’s the one I can text when I’m having a bad day and she’ll help me take my mind off my pain – or let me talk it out if that’s what I need.

And my friends have been great, too, especially my friend M. who has checked on me almost every day, even now. And that’s what I’ve discovered from this period of grief – sometimes, I just need someone to text me “How are you?” and allow me to word-vomit about what I’m feeling. She allows me the space to do that. Other friends have taken me out to lunch and let me be a big cloud of gloom, not asking anything more than that of me. I’ve had blog friends send me emails, care packages, messages to check in, and one special friend who donated to the Florida SPCA in memory of Dutch, which made me cry big tears when I found that out. It’s times like these when I find out how loved I am, and it means the world to me. I can only hope I can pay this kindness forward.

And now I’ve talked for 1,200 words, after saying writing has been difficult for me. Obviously not. But I think it’s so helpful when people talk about grief and get real about how they’re feeling. It’s this weird taboo topic in a sense, and I can understand why because it’s so vulnerable and hard and dredges up so many emotions that we’d rather keep tucked away. But I’m trying really, really hard not to keep my emotions down. I have a tendency to do that – so much so that I have been relieved that I’ve cried a lot in these past few weeks because crying is not something I do often, not even after my grandma died – and I’m trying to allow myself the honesty of grief.

So that’s what my life has been like lately. This isn’t a fun season in my life, unfortunately, but I’m learning to live better with the grief of losing my best friend. Certain days are better than others, but I have also been surprised about how easily grief slaps me back on my knees just when I think I’m doing okay. I guess that’s just the way grief works, though. It’s not linear and I just have to accept that I will never understand it. One step forward, four steps back – that’s grief in a nutshell.

But I’m doing okay most days. I’m finding my way through this season as best I can, and that’s all I can ask of myself.

Categories: About Me

The State of My Faith Today

If you haven’t been reading my blog for very long, you might be surprised to know that this blog used to be very heavily focused on my faith. Back then, I wrote about my faith on a weekly basis, but I can’t remember the last time I wrote about it. It’s been a few years at least.

And the answer as to why I haven’t written about my faith is a simple one: I’ve been wrestling with what faith means to me, if I even believe in God, and how Christians are viewed in this culture today.

I should start from the beginning. Settle in, my friends. This is going to be a ride.

I grew up in a Pentecostal church. If you don’t know what that means, basically I grew up thinking someone interrupting a church service to “speak in tongues” was totally normal. I grew up thinking everyone danced in the aisles and front of the church during worship. I grew up thinking I wasn’t “saved” enough if I wasn’t slain in the Spirit whenever a pastor prayed over me. (“Slain in the Spirit” basically means falling to the ground because you’re so overcome by the power of the Holy Spirit; or, if you’re me, it’s because you don’t want to be seen as “unholy” so you fall down by your own power.)

My grandparents were the pastors of my children’s church, and so we faithfully attended church every Sunday morning. We also typically attended church on Sunday night and Wednesday night. That was my life throughout my entire childhood and most of my teenage years. It’s important to note here that my dad never attended church with my mom, my brother, and me. He did not believe he needed church to be a Christian, which is true, but I’m not so sure he is/was a Christian. Mostly because of the way he used to make fun of my mom for attending church. So I had that dichotomy: my mom, a strong Christian woman who took us to church, and my dad, a nonbeliever who made fun of everything that had to do with Christianity.

In retrospect, my dad’s bullying ways are probably what led me to become an even stronger Christian. And, in truth, having my faith helped me through some of my more troubling years of childhood when my dad was at his worst. There’s something comforting about faith when times are tough.

My faith was a huge part of my identity from the time I was young and throughout my early twenties. I was fully invested in everything the church preached: I didn’t curse, dressed modestly, believed sex outside of marriage was sinful, didn’t listen to secular music or read books that didn’t have Christian themes. I wore a “True Love Waits” ring on my left ring finger for years and felt pride in the fact that I had never “given up my special gift” for some random guy. I was highly judgmental of people who didn’t follow the Christian faith. I believed that the only path to happiness was by being a believer. I didn’t believe in gay rights and was staunchly pro-life.

It’s comical to write all of this out, honestly, because it reminds me of a time when I was deeply unhappy. I wasn’t stretching myself and trying to find different viewpoints. I was stuck in a white conservative Christian bubble where things were strictly black and white. Gray areas did not exist.

So, what shifted? Because it’s obvious that I don’t necessarily prescribe to this same set of beliefs anymore. I’m more liberal, for one thing, and I can honestly say that it was the actions of Christians in my circle and the way they so easily supported Donald Trump for president that pushed me over the edge.

But truthfully, I was nearing that edge way before then.

I quickly became disenchanted with the church in my mid-twenties. It started when I tried joining church groups and was ignored. It’s always my worst nightmare – to push myself outside my comfort zone and join a social group alone, only to be completely ignored the entire time I’m there. I didn’t know about my introversion and social anxiety before then, so I thought it was just me. I thought I was good enough for the church. I wasn’t holy enough or friendly enough or pretty enough or skinny enough. And when this happened over and over again, it was easy to believe it was me and not them.

That’s when the cracks in my faith started to appear.

After not finding a place in my church, I started attending church less and less and subsequently, started to read my bible and pray less and less. I was still a believer. I still yearned for God, but it was less important to me. I didn’t think I was holy enough for Him.

And that’s when I really started to examine my faith and what it meant to me. What does being a Christian mean to me, personally? Do I even really want this life?

Every time I opened my bible, my guilt jumped out at me. There was just something about being told, over and over again, that I am a sinner and the only way to make up for my sinful nature is to believe in God that started rubbing me the wrong way. I couldn’t get away from this idea that I am a sinner, I have always been a sinner, and I will always be a sinner. This is really the basic tenant of Christianity, and it seemed like every time I opened my bible, I would learn about a different way I was a sinner and needed God.

Every time I did something that went against the faith, I felt an enormous amount of guilt. It could be as simple as reading a romance novel or as massive as masturbating (yes, I’m getting really real here). The guilt followed me everywhere and I honestly believed I was the only one who wrestled with my faith like this.

I’m not, of course. It’s the simple truth of the faith journey is that we all battle against our “sinful nature,” but what if… I just didn’t have to battle anymore? What if I just let myself do the things I wanted to do – things that, mind you, aren’t hurting anyone and actually bring me great pleasure – without the guilt I always attached to them?

It’s a question that followed me for years. There wasn’t a light bulb moment where I just stopped battling against my faith. It was gradual. I stopped attending church. I stopped reading my bible. I stopped reading Christian fiction. I stopped listening to Christian music. I stopped praying.

Gradually, I stopped battling against my faith. I just began to live my life without the guilt. It was freeing in the way my faith never was.

And then the 2016 presidential election happened and I saw Christians throw their support for a man who went against everything I thought they believed in. A man who bragged about sexual assault and didn’t believe in helping those less fortunate and made misogynistic comments about his opponent and other women. A man who wasn’t faithful to his wives. A man who said terrible things about other people. That is who you want to support?

It was the beginning of the end for me. I couldn’t reconcile my faith with the way the Christian community was behaving. If that is what it meant to be a Christian, I didn’t want any part of it.

So what’s the state of my faith today? The truth is, I don’t really know.

My faith looks nothing like it did when I was growing up. Even still, I take so much comfort in faith, in bible stories, in hymns, in sermons. I believe that God exists, but that He takes different forms for everyone and it’s not my job to judge that. I miss being a part of a church family, but I’ve been burned so many times by the church that I’m not sure I have it in me to try again, even with a church that ascribes to my beliefs. There’s also the fact that I have social anxiety and joining a new church is downright terrifying for me.

But also, I don’t want my faith to be a defining part of who I am. For most of my childhood, it was my main identifier and it’s really hard when your main identifying characteristic is something you’re actually bad at. And something that makes you feel guilty nearly all the time.

At my core, I’m not a Christian. I’m just a woman who is trying her best to be a good person. And not a good person because of my Christianity, but a good person because it’s the right thing to be. A woman who tries to fight an administration that doesn’t embody any of Christ’s teachings. A woman who tries to help out those in need as much as she can, accept everyone as they are, and keep her mind open to differing viewpoints.

My faith today is less about guilt and trying to live up to the impossible standards of the perfect Christian woman. My faith today is to simply be the best me I can be. To honor my needs, to love people where they are, and to live in a way that makes me proud.

Categories: About Me

A Year-by-Year Review of My Twenties

For the past two years, I’ve documented my year month-by-month, assigning the emotion I was feeling most strongly to each month. I thought it might be fun to document my twenties in the same way, which meant I had to dig through my blog’s archives and my own memories to figure out exactly what happened each year and how I was feeling. It was an interesting experience, helping me to see just how damn far I’ve come in ten years. I can’t believe that ten years ago, I was a scared college student who thought she was meant to be an elementary school teacher. How times have changed, eh?

When I was 20, I was stressed out.

I was studying to be an elementary school teacher, which involved three different internships in elementary classrooms. During my last internship, in the fall of 2008, my internship coordinator met with me in the middle of the day to tell me I wouldn’t pass. I needed to get my things and leave. It was heartbreaking and scary and I didn’t know what to do. I was the good student! I had always made Honor Roll or Principal’s List. I wasn’t the kind of person who failed things, and yet here I was, tearfully calling my mom to tell her I had failed at something and I didn’t know what to do next.

When I was 20, I became an aunt for the first time when my nephew J was born. This was also the last time I saw my dad face-to-face when he came to my small 20th birthday celebration.

When I was 21, I was at peace.

After some soul-searching and spending time by myself, I decided to change my major from elementary education to journalism. My heart wasn’t in teaching; it was in writing. I started over from scratch, taking pre-requisite courses on the art of journalism before being accepted into the College of Journalism and Media Studies at USF in the spring.

I adopted a dog this year, a nearly seven-year-old miniature dachshund named Dutch. I didn’t know he would become my entire world, but he did.

My mom and I ended up downsizing to a much smaller apartment. We were living above our means and needed something more affordable. We found a one-bedroom with a den and it was probably half the size of our old apartment.

When I was 22, I was focused.

My whole world was taken up by my journalism schooling and my part-time job at a daycare. When I wasn’t working, I was either in class, studying, writing papers, or publishing posts on my new-ish blog. (This one!)

This was the year I wrote a letter to my father, effectively ending our relationship. And it was the year my mom was hit by a car while running – truly the scariest moment of my life.

When I was 23, I was anxious.

I graduated from college this year, but the last semester of college was so anxiety-inducing that I probably should have been on meds (in fact, I was so anxious that I got shingles purely from stress.)

As a graduation present, my mom and I went on a five-day cruise and it forever changed my life.

A few months after graduating, I accepted a position as a marketing assistant at a direct marketing company. The pay wasn’t great, but it would get my foot in the door (and get me out of the daycare I was working at!)

A few weeks after starting the job, one of my coworkers was fired. We were a small company of just 10 people, so the aftereffects were felt by everyone. After that, I was so anxious and scared about being fired myself. Every time my boss had a closed-door meeting with the marketing director, I was convinced they were talking about firing me. I started having panic attacks about this, which prompted me to go to therapy.

When I was 24, I was lost.

Gradually, the persistent fear of being fired from this job dissipated and I grew in my role as a marketing assistant. But I was still unhappy because I did not love my job. It did not challenge me, I never had enough work to do, and my time was highly micromanaged. There were days when I cried in my car at the end of the day. I wanted more from my work life, and I fell into a quarter-life crisis of not having any sort of idea of what I really wanted from my career.

In the fall, my mom and I moved from our tiny one-bedroom apartment into a spacious two-bedroom and we were both all the more happy for it.

I went on two cruises, spent a long weekend in Georgia with my family, and started attending a new book club.

When I was 25, I was driven.

I made a promise to myself to leave the job where I was so enormously unhappy, so I threw myself into job searching. At the end of the summer, I accepted a position as a copywriter at a growing online marketing firm. It was one of the best decisions I made in my twenties. I received a significant income boost and got to do what I always wanted to do – write for a living.

It wasn’t until I started my new job that I realized I have debilitating social anxiety. I didn’t speak to anyone at my new company aside from my boss for the first three months I was there, and it took me a few days to even have the courage to walk into the break room.

At 25, I had my first kiss, bought my first car, and had my first vacation with friends.

When I was 26, I was happy.

There’s not much to say about this year of my life. I grew as a copywriter (and gradually even made friends with my coworkers), and learned that loving your job is a possibility. I developed deeper relationships with my friends. I dated from time to time. And I continued to live with my mom, which allowed me to pay down debts and save money. It was a good year for me.

When I was 27, I was engaged with my life.

This is the year where everything happened. It was the year I traveled to Savannah twice and fell head over heels for that charming city. It was the year I met a guy who changed my world for a few months and caused me to get super clear on what I need from my romantic relationships. It was the year my nephew, D., was born. It was the year I moved to Tampa to live with my best friend. It was the year my mom remarried. And it was the year I lost my grandma. Losing grandma was the most massive, soul-crushing loss I have ever experienced in my life, and I don’t think I’ll ever be the same.

When I was 28, I was lonely.

At 28, I was lonely. And then I was busy. And then I was lonely. And then I was busy. Rinse and repeat, that was my year. I was either overwhelmed with social plans and keeping myself so busy that I couldn’t see straight, or I was sitting alone in my apartment that was too expensive in a city I did not love. This was a hard year.

In the fall, I left Tampa and moved back to the city I loved, into an apartment of my own. It was my first time living alone, and I was terrified because transitions are notoriously difficult for me. But the transition was perfect and easy and stress-free. This is where I was meant to be – in this tiny apartment near my friends and my family and my comforts. This transition sparked a change in me, a feeling of being home and happy and whole.

When I was 29, I was content.

This was my best year yet! I started off 29 with a fun relationship with someone I met in Jamaica that never evolved past anything because, well, we live in entirely separate countries. But he was cute and fun to talk to and made me feel good, and who knows what will happen in the future. I participated in the Women’s March in my city and it got me fired up about politics for the first time ever. I settled into myself, my singleness, and my happiness. I traveled to Puerto Rico with my mom and Asheville with my girlfriends. I got a tattoo. I survived a hurricane. I read more than 100 books. I found out my old pup has dementia and taking care of him has become my utmost priority. I opened myself up to dating in a way I never had before. And I just enjoyed my life as much as I possibly could. Yeah, 29 was a fantastic year and it was the perfect way to say goodbye to my twenties and welcome in my thirties.

Categories: About Me

On My 30th Birthday

Today, I’m 30.

I’m celebrating by taking a day off work. My plans for today include sleeping in and lazing around in the morning, reading my book. In the afternoon, I’m going to take myself out to lunch and then pamper myself with a massage and pedicure. After that, I’ll probably stop at Starbucks for a peppermint mocha and some reading time in one of their cozy chairs. And this evening, my family is taking me out to dinner at one of my favorite restaurants. All in all, it’s a day of treating myself and I couldn’t be happier about it.

I have a lot to say about turning thirty. First, I want to talk about how excited I am to be in my thirties. Everyone I know tells me that their thirties have been so much better than their twenties, and I believe it. For me, my twenties were a period of intense soul-searching and anxiety. There’s college and that first post-college job and making friends and trying to decide what exactly you want from life while still feeling like a kid.

At thirty, I don’t feel like a kid anymore. I don’t feel like a complete mess. I feel like a grown woman who has her shit together and knows exactly what she wants from her life. There is something so empowering and freeing in that statement. It means I have this incredible opportunity to shape my life exactly the way I want it to look.

My twenties were a turbulent period. I spent a lot of time being ashamed of myself. Ashamed of my shyness and introversion and inability to live on my own and codependency on my mom and financial instability and chronically single status and weight and sensitivity. But over the years, as I have grown into myself, I have accepted that these are simply parts of my story. My shyness, introversion, and high sensitivity are not character flaws, but some of my biggest strengths and they allow me to relate to people on a much deeper level. My inability to live on my own and codependency on my mom are things I grew out of, as I now live alone very successfully and find my mom leaning on me as much as I lean on her. I’ve become financially stable over the years, though I’m still not exactly where I want to be, but that’s okay. I’ll get there. And being chronically single? There’s nothing wrong with that. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with being alone if you are happy being alone. And I am. I go on dates and I put myself out there as much as I want to, but it’s a very low-pressure side of my life. I go on dates because I want to, not because I need to or because I feel like something is missing from my life.

Thirty doesn’t exactly look the way I thought it would look, especially as society told me over and over again that I was supposed to be married in my twenties and at least have a kid by now. This message is especially told to you when you grow up in church, where it felt like every sermon given in youth group was about saving yourself for marriage and waiting for your future spouse. But I honestly cannot imagine being married or having kids right now. I don’t think I was ready for either of those things in my twenties. And so I can’t be upset that I’m turning thirty, single and childless. Those things aren’t meant for me right now, and that’s okay.

If my twenties were my decade of self-discovery and coming into my own, then I want my thirties to be about settling into myself and not letting fear dictate my decisions. I want to put myself out there in fuller, richer, deeper ways. I want to ask for what I want in my romantic relationships. I want to finish that novel and publish it… and maybe publish a handful more after that one. I want to deepen my friendships, travel more, feel more financially stable. I want to have retirement savings and emergency savings and no debt. I want to read as much as I possibly can because reading is my happy place. I want more massages and pedicures and long walks in the sunshine by myself. I want solo travel and solo adventures. I want to find real, true, lasting love with someone who understands me and makes me laugh and can handle all of my anxieties and quirks. I want to have a baby, a little person who is a part of me. I want to get more tattoos, adopt more dogs, fill up my house with books.

And I want to never forget how I felt on this day – November 28, 2017 – when I turned thirty.

Today, I feel happy and whole and satisfied. I feel confident in who I am and what I want. I feel content with my life and the way it looks right now. This is exactly where I’m meant to be.

I believe in the Law of Attraction and that if I put good out into the world, good will come back to me. I believe that no is a full sentence. I believe that everything happens for a reason. I believe in the power of a good belly laugh. I believe that I am a good friend, a good daughter, a good sister. I believe that I am the best dog-mom for my old, blind, dementia dog. I believe that I have a gift for writing and I want to use that gift to the best of my ability. I believe in naps, in reading romance novels, in retail therapy. I believe in myself and my power.

I want to be clear – I’m not head over heels about everything in my life. There is a lot I need to improve on. I’m overweight and really unhappy when I look in the mirror. I have generalized anxiety, which means that every few months I go into a tailspin where I think everyone hates me and I need to delete my blog and never come out of my home again. I have trouble believing in my worth as a romantic partner, especially the hangups I have regarding sex. I spend too much money on things I don’t really need and I’m terrible at saving. I can be too sarcastic and too competitive and too sensitive at times.

We’re all works in progress, though. That’s the beauty of living. It’s messy and complicated, but even in the midst of it, we can find the beauty in it. And maybe that’s the lesson I learned most from my twenties: we’re never completely finished, but we can find peace in who we are, even when there’s more we want to do.

So, here’s to my thirties. I have a feeling they are going to be one amazing ride.