It’s Thursday and I’m Crafting my Life! Today is the last day of 2009, which means that tomorrow will be a whole new decade. Today I am talking about what the last 10 years brought me, and looking forward to where I’d like to be when 2020 dawns.
(I know that technically decades start on the 1s, but the days when the odometer rolls from 9 to 0 are the big ones. 1999 to 2000 was far more exciting than 2000 to 2001, and so I choose to perpetuate the myth, with apologies to the more precise among us.)
I will admit, I frequently feel discouraged as I work to re-create my life. The progress feels slow, or possibly even non-existent. I declared that I wanted to write, and it took me months to submit two articles for publication. The first was rejected, as most are, and I still haven’t heard back on the second. I have ideas about what I want to do, but it’s difficult to carve out time while I care for a 4-year-old and a 1-year-old bent on self-destruction. It frequently feels like I’m drifting and directionless, and I worry that I made a terrible mistake in giving up daycare and trying to chart a new course instead of just hunting down the first engineering job I could find.
But then I stopped for a minute, and remembered where I was 10 years ago. On this day in 1999 I was a single university student, working on my thesis. I had been dating my high school boyfriend for 8 1/2 years, and I was way, way more than ready to get married. I lived alone and had no car, opting for a more frugal lifestyle so that I could live within the salary I earned in my practicum jobs. I was not, in any way, unhappy, and my life was pretty good all things considered, but my existence was geared very much towards the future. Finishing school, getting married, embarking on ‘real life’.
That very New Year’s Eve Jon proposed to me. If the world ended due to Y2K, he said, he wanted to be with me. It was cheesy but cute. In the next decade I finished my thesis and graduated, we got married and got our first apartment, and I got a ‘real job’ and bought a brand-spanking-new Honda. We moved further out to the suburbs and bought a house. We adopted our cat, Dorothy, and had a couple of babies. I remained in my real job for 9 years, until I got notice of my lay-off. With money in the bank and a severance package, I decided to take some time away from that career and see if I could create a new one.
This is where I am now. When I look back on my life this way, things look much better to me. I set out to create something, and I succeeded. Now I’m starting again, but not from square zero. I have experience that will stand me in good stead. I have resources that I’ve accumulated, and a family that is cheering me on. Of course things are slow-moving, I am doing something totally new and I am doing it at home with my kids. If you had told me in 1999 that this is where I would be in 10 years, I would not have been sad. I would have looked forward gladly, knowing what lay in store.
This raises the question for me of where I want to be in another 10 years. What do I hope my life will look like on New Year’s Eve, 2019? It’s a good question, and I’m not sure I have a concrete picture. But I do hope for a few things. I hope that I am making a living income as a writer and maybe a workshop leader. I would like to help others to craft their own lives, having successfully crafted my own. I want a house on the water with chickens in the back yard, and I want to belong to a choir and do yoga. And I would like my adolescent children to go easy on me.
We all feel lost sometimes, unsure of what to do next or what we even really want out of our lives. That’s probably OK. As I’ve found, at times like this it can really help to take stock of what you’ve accomplished. It’s renewed my sense of perspective, and reminded me that I am maybe not so bad at achieving my goals after all.
Speaking of goals and life-crafting, I have an idea for the Crafting my Life series that I will try out starting in January. Over the course of the month I will follow a particular theme each Thursday – January’s will be ‘What do I want, and how can I get it?’ Then, on the last Thursday of the month I will include a widget so that you can link up any posts you’ve written on the theme. It’s a way that we can join forces as we all work to create our lives together, build community and cheer each other on. What do you think? Does this sound like something you’d be interested in? Let me know!
Great idea, I’d be interested!
Happy New Years Amber…and to Jon, Hannah and Jacob! I am really looking forward to watch as you unfold your life.
.-= Heather´s last post ..2009 Recap =-.
“Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans” – John Lennon.
It’s good to plan, but make sure you’re actually living in, and enjoying, the momment while you’re doing it.
That s an excellent idea
I was awake with the Poptart last night and was toying with a similar idea 
Great minds think alike. Fools seldom differ. Whatever
.-= Nicole´s last post ..From our family to yours… =-.
Go for it!
I am like you in that I am a planner. I have a fairly good idea of what I want my life to hold and work at setting myself in situation that help make those things reality. When I don’t have a broad plan I get depressed, so I know not to let that happen anymore. With the marriage stage running smoothly (as a 50 year + plan) and reproduction stage overwith (no more babies for me) and the home buying stage secured some time ago, I have focussed on the child rearing stage, personal development stage (now that the kids are in school) and planning for a more secure long term savings for eventual retirement — that includes trying to be mortgage-free by the end of the next decade at the latest.
People don’t plan to fail, they fail to plan. I beleive that, and that luck is what you make it, and that there is opportunity in any situation… but I agree with Mike too, enjoying the moment is important and being PRESENT where you are.
.-= *pol´s last post ..Something to Aspire to =-.
Oh goodness… I’ve been so consumed with thinking about the last 10 years and the coming of 2010 and what it will bring, I’d hadn’t thought as far ahead as the NEXT TEN YEARS. In 2019 my son will turn 18. That is unreal.
.-= Jasie VanGesen´s last post ..The Aughts: a retrospective =-.
If it helps at all, your kids are younger than mine and you’re further ahead in the life-plan department than I am. I don’t mean this as an annoying self-bashing thing either. I admire your drive and organization. I still get tossed about on the sea that is my disordered brain-chemicals, but my kids are alive and quite happy and I think I am moving forward, albeit at a glacial pace. So you’re okay, I’m okay. I’m glad I virtually met you — I mean met you virtually — in 2009.
.-= Allison´s last post ..*************A Year that is New =-.
Count me in! I tend to take on too much and never really look at how I’m going to accomplish it all. This will be a great exercise in fore thought & planning for me. Thanks for the invitation!
I think it sounds like a fabulous idea! But it certainly won’t take you 10 years to craft a new life working from home. I give you one year to have that one all tied up!
Happy 2010 to you!
Thanks so much for this perspective! In 1990, I wrote myself a letter to open in 2000. When 2000 arrived, I was a little nervous to open it, wondering what my past self had expected my future self to have accomplished in ten years, because I felt so very unaccomplished at age 23. But it turns out my 13-year-old self had been very gracious and excited for my 23-year-old self, wishing only the best and not laying on any guilt trips from out of the past. So I will be kind to my 33-year-old self, too.
I think the link-up idea is fabulous. I love direction in my writing, so I will try to participate.
.-= Lauren @ Hobo Mama´s last post ..Carnival of Natural Parenting =-.
Hey, can we craft our lives together? I was just lying on my bed thinking MOTHERFUCKER MY LIFE HAS TO CHANGE.
Happy new year to be!
Kate
That phrase you wrote – if I knew 10 years ago that I would be where I am, I wouldn’t be unhappy with it – yes, yes, yes. Sometimes while we’re mixed up in the current little crisis, it’s hard to see how the big picture is working out well.
Happy New Year!
.-= Lady M´s last post ..A Study in Contrasts =-.
I like this way of looking at the past and at the future, in a 10 year perspective. I think that while navigating through the difficult times of the last decade, I’ve taken the “one day at a time” a little too literally, and lacked prospective and goals etc. I’m very interested in your community idea, though I’m not sure I understand how it’s going to work. Happy New Year!
.-= Francesca´s last post ..Popping a cork =-.
Happy New Years! Gosh, 10 years in perspective is ambitious. I liked your approach though. That you’ve got all the experience of the past 10 years to build on for the coming decade.
I can’t wait to see where the next decade brings you and yours. Again, happy new year!
That’s a terrific idea! I’ll definitely participate
I love your Crafting My Life series. Maybe by having a monthly link up it’ll be just the motivation I need to focus on writing some of my own instead of just constant reflection 
.-= Jessica – This is Worthwhile´s last post ..Bite-sized thoughts & cold coffee =-.