What I’ve Learned in 2020

I love sunsets. I have always loved sunsets, but this year, they’ve seemed a bit brighter than before. Maybe nature was trying to give us something good this year, that’s what I would like to imagine.

This year has felt about five years long. The only comforting fact of the matter is that pretty much all of us feel the same.

The events that have occurred in 2020, I couldn’t have imagined happening in the first place, which goes without saying. I remember December 31st, 2019, I was spending New Years Eve with my friends and my family, and the possibility of a new year beginning, a decade being gone and past, made the next year seem so big and full of possibilities. Little did we all know.

Everyone has handled this year differently. Personally, this year has been the year of my life I have been the hardest of myself than I ever have been before. In past years of life, I was usually pretty happy and carefree (to an extent, let’s be real here) and I’ve just tried to enjoy life as much as possible. I believe I’m still this way, but this year it has been a little bit more difficult to do so.

2020 started off rocky, then it was a spike upward. I went back to school after winter break and life seemed to be going better than it had been in awhile. I was living with my best friend, hanging out with my cousins all the time that also went to the same school as me, meeting new people, creating new memories, and it was so much fun. I remember constantly reminding myself, “Sammi, you have at least three more months before you graduate. Enjoy it all.”

Well.

I was heartbroken that my last semester of college was cut short, along with all of the rest of the students in my same position. Sobbing at home during Spring Break, when I got the news that I wouldn’t be going back. It was all over before I could even get to process it. All of my lasts in that town were had without me even realizing it. Now, we were all entering this period of uncertainty. I didn’t know when I would see my friends next. I didn’t know when I would see my family next, which was the hardest, most difficult part for me. In my case scenario, usually when things get hard in life, our family bands together to comfort and be there for each other, but we were unable to do so. How unfamiliar to not be able to see your family when you want to the most? It was hard to grasp, but we all had to be safe. No one knew what the right thing was to do, and it was all so new, we had to keep ourselves and the ones around us safe.

There’s a lot we’ve all learned throughout this year, about people, about ourselves, about the world around us — I could make this essay thousands of words long. But, I will condense this self-reflection into some main points of what I’ve taken away from this year. Maybe you, the reader, will agree.

• Human connection is important and it is something we took for granted.

The saying rings true: “You don’t know what you’ve got until it’s gone.” It was one of the most bizarre experiences to go through, not being able to see people. Human connection and seeing people face to face was completely ripped away from all of us as a normal thing to do on our weekdays/weekends.

There is not a moment spent with someone else now that I don’t appreciate. Each moment is precious, each picture taken, each laugh shared, each video recorded, each memory made — human connection is one of the most amazing aspects of our lives, and I know all of us can’t wait until it’s restored to it’s entirety.

• Little hobbies are important.

I easily got caught up in my day to day life. At the time it was, wake up, eat, go to school, do homework, study, go to the library, study, go get coffee, study, and then go to sleep, wake up and do it all over again. Quarantine infamously forced a lot of us to really focus on trying something new or perfecting/working on something we loved before, but never had a lot of time. My cousins and I did our first paint by numbers together. We made charcuterie boards. I played HOURS of Sims, and shamelessly so. I painted. I made resin art. I wrote stories, I wrote novels, I wrote scripts. I sang, I wrote music. I tried new recipes. I used FaceTime more than ever before, and almost felt closer to some friends than I did before quarantine due to our daily/weekly FaceTimes. Those little hobbies that take us out of our day to day life and responsibilities restore our well-being and work our creative mind. Those hours, minutes, seconds spent painting or discovering a new artist you didn’t know you liked worked a part of your brain that may have remained untouched for awhile — and that’s a beautiful thing.

• No one has everything figured out, even if it may seem otherwise.

This is a pretty familiar quote we know, especially when you’re in your twenties, like myself. There has always been a part of me that figures at a certain age, I must have A, B, and C figured out, or I have failed. Somehow, this year, I realized that absolutely no one has it figured it out. They just have a well-shaped social media profile and only post the highlights. I mean, we all post the highlights, because why would we want to post anything else? It’s so easy to get caught up in seeing what someone else is doing or not doing with their lives, seeing their accomplishments and immediately comparing them to your own — and another big one, comparing looks/appearance. That has been a major struggle for myself this year, which is something I wouldn’t wish on anyone, it’s such an awful feeling to doubt yourself and the person you are, based on how you look as a human being. This year, I found myself constantly comparing my appearance to other people, people who seemed to look perfect in my eyes, which immediately made me start to not like parts of myself. But, while in this process, I realized that almost everyone has had that feeling (and if you haven’t, I commend you, that’s amazing and please teach me your ways). This year has taught me to be easier on myself. I’m truly doing the best I can. We’re all doing the best we can. I think it’s hard to realize or remember this fact, but we are in a global pandemic. Something that we never, ever thought we would endure, yet we are. So, I’ve taken a step back and said to myself, “How about we be a little nicer to ourselves?” Instead of adding extra pressure from myself, which I’m apparently very good at, I’m working more and more to just be easy on myself and let my best be my best, and at the end of the day, try and be okay with that. It can be hard, but we’re all learning. Being 23 is confusing. Being a human is confusing. I feel like I have to have absolutely everything figured out, or I have ultimately failed — but now, I am learning that’s not the case whatsoever. I try to take it day by day as much as possible and focus on the task at hand, and not negatively drown every aspect of myself and my life into what is only a thought, and not the whole truth. Also, every victory, no matter how big or small, is important, and if you feel good about something you did, allow yourself to bask in that accomplishment as long as possible. We all owe that to ourselves.

I could continue writing forevermore about all I’ve learned. We’ve all learned something new, like we do every year, yet this year was just designed a little differently than the rest we’ve experienced thus far.

I don’t know what the next year is going to consist of, but I can say with confidence that I am going in with low expectations — and that’s okay. That can be looked at as a positive. Maybe it’ll give me a chance to be surprised. Time will only tell.

Until then, I hope the last few days of 2020 treat you better than the rest of them, and that 2021 brings you happiness within yourself and the world around you.