“Still, I am learning.” — Michelangelo

What a difference a year makes.

I wrote an upbeat post about this time last year, something I hoped contained a positive message. But I’ll admit now, I struggled with it. You wouldn’t think writing something positive would have been so difficult at that time; after all, the last quarter of 2011 brought some pretty amazing events: publishing my book, catching up with some great friends, going back to my college town for a quick but great trip to see a basketball game. Yet through the month of December last year, especially, I remained unsettled.

I didn’t like where I was at with my job. I’d known for over a year that I wanted to go down a different path; besides the anxiety of of opening up my e-mail every Sunday and the daily stress, the bottom line was I was no longer passionate about what I was doing. I had, by this time last year, figured out a new path to go down. I’d apply to graduate school, and hopefully start up the next year. But without even a letter of recommendation written, that all still seemed a little up in the air — I had a long way to go.

My book was published, and I even had a visit scheduled to talk to the seventh graders at my old middle school about it. But something had happened at the end of November to throw a wrench in the message I was trying to convey. A chance encounter brought some negative of the story back to haunt me, reminding me about some things that had never made sense, and some events I hadn’t fully found closure with. I wondered if I ever could.

Speaking of the book, I also remained unsettled about my bigger plans for it. I’d owned this website domain, Sky Blue Mission, for a few years, blogging and talking about my ultimate goal to use the funds to help kids get to college. But I still didn’t know exactly how I was going to do that. I couldn’t even promote my bigger plans, really, for fear of false advertising. Was I going to spend the proceeds? No. But until I started my own non-profit — an initiative that seemed a little far off and overwhelming — they sat idly in a section of my bank account.

So there I was last December, trying to inspire people, but not feeling very inspired myself. 12 months later, I’ve come a long ways. It’s been a transition year for me and thus not always easy — there have definitely been some low points. But there have been some pretty amazing high points, and I’ve learned lessons from each and every experience. On this last day of the year, I thought it appropriate to reflect on them.

(Quotes courtesy of my favorite quote book, I Believe in You, which has been providing me inspiration since I was a junior in high school).

1) “Many of life’s failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.”–Thomas Edison

I was ready to throw in the towel at my job in January. And in February. And really, really, in March. And I could find a lot of quotes and wisdom that says I should have. Life is short, right? Don’t waste any more time doing what you don’t want to do. But I had a bigger plan, and that bigger plan involved accomplishing two goals: 1) Saving the money I’d need to pursue my dream and passion in graduate school that coming fall, and 2) Achieving the company’s reward for 5 years of hard work that I had coming to me.

So I put my head down, fought through the stress, the challenges, the bad attitudes, and stuck it out. It meant taking things day by day, and continually reminding myself of the bigger picture. Again, conventional wisdom will tell you to quit as soon as you’re ready, but “ready” can mean a lot of things, and fighting through tough times to reach your ultimate goal can teach you what you’re made of. Perhaps someday I’ll look back and wish I hadn’t kept at it those months I was so unhappy, but I accomplished what I set out to, and it seems to be paying off. Oh, and that reward (besides the padding to my savings account), was a pretty amazing opportunity….

2) “Go as far as you can see. When you get there, you can see farther.” — BJ Marshal

When my (now former) company announced a few years ago that they would offer a one-month, overseas sabbatical to employees who reached the five-year mark, I thought “well, that’s cool, but I’ve got a long way to go to get there.” Even though I could feel myself fading towards the end this past year, I couldn’t let the incredible opportunity slip away.

Incredible does not even begin to describe it.

My mom and I spent the month of May in Italy this year. One month in another country. At a couple points, I grew homesick, yet for the most part, I just soaked it all in. The canals of Venice, the cliffs of Cinque Terre, the rolling hills of Tuscany, the busy streets of Rome, and, oh yeah, the Eiffel Tower — I couldn’t possibly go to Europe without making a brief stopover in my favorite city. It was a vacation, no doubt, a chance to relax, read, and explore  (I told my mom at one point: “Our only “job” for the next three weeks is to figure out where to go, and how to get there”); but more-so, it was a chance to gain perspective, on both the world and myself. I came back with my eyes open much wider, my horizons much broader. If you haven’t traveled across that big blue ocean, I highly recommend it.

3) “Life is not the way it’s supposed to be. It’s the way it is. The way you deal with it is what makes the difference.” — Virginia Satir

Despite being unsettled with my book’s message at the beginning of the year, I visited that classroom in January. I even brought up idols, fielding questions about my own. “Do you still talk to her? What made her your idol?” I answered the inquisitive seventh-graders as honestly as I could, trying to remember the positive to pass on, trying to extract the lessons from the negative.

In February, a fellow author posted a review of my book in which she described the plot: “It’s {Megan’s} journey to find the strength within herself and become the person, the example to others, that she really wished Maya had been for her.” I cried. A lot.  And then I refocused. After all, my reviewer was exactly right. The overall lesson of my book is not about wishing things could be different; it’s about accepting the things that you can and cannot change, and doing all you can with what you have. I realized this year that part of that acceptance is that “closure” doesn’t always stay closed. Once in a while something creeps up and eats at you a little bit, and that’s okay. We’re all human, and letting go is the hardest human thing to do. The important thing is to hold the power over your own emotions and know what it takes to overcome them. Maybe you need a good cry. Maybe you need to write a blog post that you never publish or write a message you never send (yes, an important lesson, do not hit send). I’ve done all of those things, but most importantly, I’ve continued to channel that negative energy and anxiety into something much bigger and more positive.