2023 Resolution: Have More Fun

A new approach to reflecting & goal setting

“It is a fake crown that we wear. My message would be to take off the fake crown. It will cost you more to keep it than to let it go. It is not real. It is just a marker of your programming. You will be happier and freer without it. You will see all of humanity. You will find your true self.” Isabel Wilkerson, quoting an Indian Brahmin in Caste

Reflections

My goal for 2023: to have more fun.

In order to that, I know I need to get comfortable with just being myself.

As a goal driven person, I love the act of reflecting on the year that has passed and setting resolutions for the year ahead. I have always met any resolutions I set for myself (read 1 book/month, exercise >3x/week, quit my job, go on 5+ dates/month, invest, move, etc etc.).

But something always felt off. Sure, the goals have helped me (after all, I now workout regularly and enjoy it, plus it was on my ~49th first date of 2018 that I met my partner, the father to my precious baby💙💚). I always felt the pressure to add more to my life, when what I really needed to do was remove (as ambitious as one might be, wouldn’t we all benefit from fewer meetings and emails and distractions and yes, even fewer goals). As if I wasn’t enough as is. I needed to read more books, do more exercise, write more essays (instead of just making space to do what I felt like in the moment (which, surprise!, is often reading and writing being active 🏃‍♀️).

So this year, I’m only making one resolution: to stop hiding and be more myself.

I often pretend I don’t know something to help others save face. Or downplay my accomplishments, lest I risk intimidating someone.

And let me tell you: it’s not fun.

When I am not myself, I censor my ideas, even though bringing new ideas to life is a core pillar of fun.

When I am not myself, it’s harder to form genuine connections, which guess what, are a core pillar of fun.

Even in my mid-thirties, surrounded by intelligent and successful people, I still have to fight the urge to conceal my true colours. It’s more of an instinct than a coping mechanism at this point. I’m not sure the fear of rejection was ever founded, but I can’t imagine I was the only one who learned to make herself smaller and smaller, afraid of being the tallest poppy in a blue-collar city with such cold winters that you can’t expect to stand out and survive.

It didn’t help that I was *actually* the tallest poppy my whole childhood, the lone Mennonite with toned down opinions, watered down vocabulary and pared down dreams, towering over all the little French Canadian boys in my class.

I honestly cringe thinking about the colossal waste of human potential when I consider all the black sheep of the world pretending to be white.

While I find myself drawn to people who have the strength to resist the pressure to conform, I’m still afraid of standing out, making noise. But I’ll keep trying, to stop twisting and contorting myself into a box that doesn’t allow me to spread my wings.

Here’s to 2023 being more fun 🤩