The One Where I’ve Still Got a Lot of Fight Left In Me

Dear 2015 Molli,

This time last year, you did Susannah Conway’s Unraveling the Year Ahead for 2015. You had amazingly high hopes. You decided your year of the word would be “indomitable,” and that you’d live it. And live it you did, in some unexpected ways. 

There are going to be times this year when you’ll want to walk away from writing, when you can’t force, cajole, or bargain the words out of your heart or head no matter what you do. Keep trying. Eventually, the block will clear on its own and you’ll write a book you are so fucking proud of. Every day won’t be easy from then on, but you’ll make words, then sentences, then pages, then a book. You’ll edit that book and work with an amazing designer to create something you love with all your heart.

There are going to be moments this year when you will find out what you’re made of, moments you wouldn’t have been ready for in the past. You’ll be scared and you’ll wish this wasn’t happening. Keep your chin up and stand your ground. In the end, you’ll come out stronger, with a clearer idea of who you are.

There are going to be moments when, in a heartbeat, the suffocating friendships you were afraid to lose will shatter, and the fear and pain you’ve been inflicting on yourself for months will be gone. You’ll be afraid to take that step, to sever those bonds because you aren’t sure who you are without them. Do it anyway. You’ll be healthier, happier, and everyone involved will be better off in the end.

You’ll learn who your friends truly are, and you’ll immediately feel lighter, more free. Afterward, it’s like someone turned on a light, and you’ll finally give yourself permission to start protecting your spaces, to speak your mind, to cultivate only healthy relationships, and to take care of yourself, no matter what that looks like to other people. You’ll wonder why you didn’t do all of this sooner.

There will be ticktock seconds where all you can feel is the certainty that you have made the wrong decision, that you should go back and try to make nice, to fall into the head-down pattern you have lived for too long— Stop, right there. You are a goddamn warrior and you are breaking that pattern. Now.

There are going to be times this year when you will miss your girl so much that you won’t be able to breathe, moments when the idea of moving from Tennessee to California feels like climbing into the sky and collecting a pocketful of stars. But then there’s your hours-long weekly FaceTime dates and the week at the beach and “I-love-you’s” over audio messages and small presents and promise rings with the ocean singing in the background. Hold on. Hold on. Hold on.

You will get there. It is okay to miss Katie. It’s okay to feel halved without her. Soon, sooner then it seems, you will be with her again.

There will be days when you’ll look at your books and someone else’s and wonder what you are doing so wrong and if you should be doing this and you aren’t making an impact anyway and— Don’t. Don’t. Don’t. Everyone struggles and has those doubts. The only answer is to put your fingers on the keyboard and tell the stories that are infiltrating your blood and bones, the stories that need out into the world.

There will be times this year when you are so deeply unhappy, when you are panicking because of the anxiety you have almost normalized. There will be moments when, as much as you love your family, you realize you have to put distance between yourself and them. There will be moments you listen to its poisonous whispers, moments when you almost believe it. Anxiety lies. You are remnants of stardust and you are the infinite pieces of hope you have learned to patiently stitch back together.

You will leave this place. You will find a toehold and a finger hold and you will fucking climb up up up up up until you can see the sun and breathe the air and you will make it out.

There will be moments this year when you will stand and stare in the mirror and not recognize the body you see there. You will see the skin you’re so uncomfortable in, and then slowly, you will see the skin that has gotten you this far and held you together when you have felt as if your soul is splintering. Love yourself for the first time.

There will be moments this year when you will falter. In the backseat of a car, speeding through Alabama toward the hills of Tennessee, and home. Surrounded by your friends. You will fall and they will carry you. You will let them see you at your worst and they will let you borrow strength from them and love you no less.

Tell you a secret? You’re stronger, staring at the last handful of sunsets of 2015. You’re wiser. Yes, your heart is broken in a few more places, and those tender places are fragile, still healing, new skin covering the hurts. Yes, you’ve lost some people you thought you never would. Yes, you’ve been knocked to your knees more times this year than you ever could have imagined. But you got back up.

Every

Single

Time.

And that is your takeaway. That is what matters. You didn’t stay down. You got back up and you kept going and you found ways around the obstacles in your path. So 2015 wasn’t a loss. It was a win, because 2015 is the year you found your strength.

2015 is the year you found out who you really are.

Hello.

Let 2016 be the year you live *for you*. Let 2016 be the first year go after your dreams with the certainty you’ll finally achieve them all.

Love,

Molli