Although this post won’t go live until the 31st, I’m writing this on the afternoon of the 30th – approximately 8 hours before I have to pick mom up from the airport.

Before I sat down to compose this reflection post for 2023, I did so many things. Because of the mild winter, I broke my promise to myself of not starting seeding until mid-January by sowing some brassica seeds in a few 6-cell trays.

Next, I did multiple rounds of house cleaning – vacuuming the carpet and the hard floors, then cleaning the hard floors with a mop, before finally wiping every single chair clean with a cloth. While I was doing all of this, voices were invading my head, as usual.

Voice 1: Mom will be so impressed and happy that I cleaned the house. She had always said I’ve never vacuumed or cleaned the hard floors. Well, now I have.

Voice 2: (scoffs) Are you kidding me? She will be the opposite of impressed. Trust me on this, she won’t even see it. In fact, I’d bet you she will re-do it tomorrow. Tell me this, has she ever noticed anything good you’ve done?

Voice 3: You know what, I’m not doing it for her. It’s the new year, why not ring in the new year with a clean house?

Voice three has a point. Why does everything has to be revolved around anyone but myself? I haven’t done much cleaning in the past because, A, I’m busy, and B, mom has always gone behind my back and re-do everything. So, the point is…

This last month of being by myself has been eye-opening. This year, as a whole, has been eye-opening but not as much as the last month. Not only have I come to know myself as this person who craves independence more than anything but I’ve also come to know who I am to my mom and to the rest of the family.

Mom has always said this about her so-called friends, “These people don’t contact me unless they want something from me and that something is never a conversation.”

Guess what, that was how she viewed me while she was traveling. My comments about my day and travel go ignored. I’ve never heard her say anything about my photos nor the commentaries I wrote while I was traveling. It was always, “check my Gmail,” or “help me troubleshoot the VPN,” or “tell me how to get to the hotel.” Still, I’m always filled with this weird optimism whenever my phone buzzes with her incoming voice message, that mom would ask me about my trip or my day. I don’t know why even though I know she or the entire family had no interest of hearing about my day-to-day.

In 2023, I traveled to 2 island countries on 2 different continents - UK and Japan. I think my favorite trip of the year was, by a far margin, my Christmas road trip. The places were far more memorable and I’ve felt more relaxed on this trip than I’ve felt in a long time. I had music playing in the car the whole way, shuffling from my Amazon music playlist and many a times, I was belting along with the tunes. It would’ve certain been a different trip if mom were to come along.

In the last month, I’ve learned my anxiety is strictly environment-based. I believe it’s caused by the constant excessive bombardment of noises from mom’s YouTube playing. I’m also not the person mom leads everyone to believe – the kind of person who’s constantly in need to be taught life lessons and the type of person that’s incapable to take care of myself.

I actually discovered how to make moist and soft cakes, believe it or not, by accident but now I know how to do it. I made the most delicious banana bread earlier this month and pillowy soft Devil Food chocolate cupcakes yesterday. Shh… don’t tell anyone. 😉The secret is to follow recipe’s instruction, take it out of the oven promptly, and let it rest for a few hours.

I’m actually this person who’s completely capable of taking care of myself. Surprise, surprise.

For 2024, I think that’s what I’m going to do – take care of myself. I want to try to take more solo trips, see more places around me, and once again work on stop pleasing others and start pleasing myself.