#marking progress

[tomfleton]

I’m 17 years old. I just took my last AP exam ever. Graduation is a few weeks away. I bask in all my free time to read fanfics. It’s 2015.

I’m 27 years old. I just finished my last law school exam ever. Graduation is a few weeks away. I bask in all my free time to read fanfics. It’s 2025.

[tomfleton]

1/2/23

After years of assuming they were destroyed in a flood, I recovered a treasure trove of memories I had been holding on to since elementary school: report cards, yearbook photos, awards, and assignments spanning my K-12 education, piles of handwritten notes with the most precise, tidy and color-coded (with gel pen!) notes, a few knick knacks and collectibles, and importantly, a few “self reflections” I completed throughout my adolescence.

At 25 years old and after some of the most challenging years of my life and a full year of weekly therapy sessions, I’ve come to terms with a few things. I have low self esteem and self worth, I’m afraid to put my dreams into words because I don’t think I deserve them, and I lie to myself. A major lie I’ve been telling myself for years unraveled today. For years, a mental narrative I’ve created is that in order to be the person I am today - someone who is easily liked, a charming, witty, ambitious, loved person - I had to change myself. That who I am is so different than my younger self, and that my younger self is someone who deserves to be shamed and ridiculed and judged. That my social anxiety in high school was a personal flaw that deserves an eye roll, that my obsession with tumblr and fanfiction and pop culture and the sims and reading love stories and everything else should be revealed only as an embarrassing story about the old me, a moral failure.

But today, looking at how I talked about my hopes and dreams in high school, the perspective I held about the world around me - the girl I am today also existed 10 years ago. She also existed 15 and 20 years ago. Everything great and lovely about me has always been in me and was never something I had to destroy the old parts of myself to gain. My values, how much I care, my dreams to be something more, my hopes for happiness, how much I love my family, how much I love to learn - all of this is unchanged and somehow I have the audacity to judge and shame my younger self who HONESTLY and truly NEVER did anything wrong.

My therapist spent months telling me that maybe I should give myself more grace and it’s easy to hear that and think that makes sense in a logical, distant way. But to see the evidence was groundbreaking. Of course, I have changed in good, important ways. But at my core - I am me at every age 0-25 that I’ve been alive and every single version was a lovely, kind girl who deserves my utmost empathy and care. Because if not me, then who else will love her forever?

[tomfleton]

Omg I can’t believe I missed the 10 year anniversary of reading fanfiction for the first time!! But it was Nov 2012 so close enough right? Thanksgiving 2012 was the first time I read Isolation too life is crazy

[tomfleton]

stepping stone goals

some thoughts:

I really struggle with consistency. I understand the way to become consistent, of course, i’ve set so many intentions, so many goals, and planned out how i’ll achieve them. But truly I will not do something unless I fear punishment is what i’ve realized about myself. 

For example, the only hint of consistency in my life is my multi step morning and nighttime skincare routine because I FEAR acne and worsening my many blemishes. I’ve stuck with that for over 10 years at this point, but honestly, i have my off days with that too, and that may be why I still don’t have clear skin lol.

I envy people who can make a plan and follow through. Yet, in many ways, my inability to stick to something has led me on many different paths I never would have ever envisioned or planned for myself anyway. College, various college experiences and friendships, internships, the city I live in, the career I currently have. All of these things feel like they happened serendipitously. And honestly and TRULY i love that. I love being able to look back and track the journey I’ve taken, and I’m glad I allowed myself that openness while in my late teens and early 20s. I’ve always found it hard to set long-term goals bc of the uncertainty i feel about most things in life - some things out of my control as well. Beyond ongoing uncertainties that have existed in my life for decades - we’re in a pretty shitty time to say the least. 

i had finally thought i’d achieved the dream state of consistency in feb 2020. After months of work related angst, low self esteem due to a 15 lb weight gain, and general unease with my lot in life mixed with the loneliness that coms from moving somewhere new, i had finally made a plan and stuck to it. I worked out HARD 4-5 times a week and I loved it. I hate to be that person but spin class is the shit and i miss it everyday. I was actually cooking for myself and enjoying what i made. I was getting used to the 9-5 and finally feeling like i belonged on my project and had value to offer, like i wasn’t a burden. I was putting myself out there, reaching out to new and old friends, going on a million dates (not really but it felt like it). I was embracing my business casual fashion and also adopting a new natural wavy hair look. I was tailoring my style and honestly life kind of felt like how i thought it would feel watching those tv shows about the young ingenue learning her way in the big city and transforming into the eclectic yet bad ass 20-something hbic. But then i literally got covid-19, the country shut down, every external thing that was adding value to my life disappeared, and i was back in my childhood home for 4 months.

now we’re at the end of august 2020. I’m back in dc and trying to rebuild the progress i made and be consistent in achieving those skills again, but it’s hard. I don’t think we talk enough about the intense level of burnout from this prolonged remote work. i feel like i work or think about work for 16 hours a day. There is no reprieve and no outlet outside of grinding at the lowest level for my corporate overlord. literally. I’m planning on moving out of the city and back home permanently now. i feel like the fledgling friendships i had with coworkers are already gone or well on their way out (which hurts the most because it feels like so many people in a similar life situation have made meaningful friendships :/ including some of my closest friends with new post grad friends :/). i barely have time to take care of myself, so i’m trying not to be so hard on myself in such a chaotic phase of life. but it’s hard when you’re overly self reflective and critical.

i went to this pretty basic goal setting event at work on thursday not expecting to get much from it, and while the content was extremely basic (think “annotate the screen if you’ve ever had a goal”) something really resonated me: splitting things up between stepping stone goals, short term goals, and long term goals. As I said previously, I really struggle with long term goal setting because everything is uncertain and then i overthink and make it even more uncertain. I love the idea of stepping stone goals because that leaves so much room for an opportunity for more, for serendipity to hit. in the past, i’ve been successful by setting a vague personal guideline of doing the best i can at everything i do, but that is NOT sustainable in a 9-5 corporate world. They take advantage of us for it! the harder i work the more that will be added to my plate, and while i took that as a compliment and testament to my value as a human (yikes much to unpack there), the other thing that really resonated for me was setting goals is how you learn how to say no. setting goals lets you set boundaries for yourself. you should always be thinking: does this opportunity, action, hobby, etc big me closer to my self-defined goals? I think my biggest realization of August is how intentionality actually does matter A TON. In college, i heard countless times about the importance of saying no, mindfulness, self care, work life balance etc, and while i struggled with being over committed in college i had the support of friends and received a lot of recognition for my actions. For the first time in my life, i’m actually experiencing that feeling of being a small fish in a big pond and it’s a debilitating feeling. 

So, I need to learn how to set boundaries at work. To do that i need to set goals. But because I suck at consistency with those bigger goals, I need to leverage and internalize the idea of these stepping stone goals. More to come on actually listing out these goals for tracking purposes :)

[tomfleton]

These selfies are very 2014 chic but I was feeling myself

[tomfleton]

I got my full time job offer a year ago, graduated from college 5 months ago, signed the lease for my first apartment today, will get my first personal credit card tomorrow, and I’m moving half way across the country in 2 weeks to start on the track my life will be on for at least the next 2 years

[tomfleton]

this is the only place I’ll say this bc I have to,

I don’t know about you

.....(but I’m feelin 22)

[tomfleton]

Picture 1 is senior year of high school. Picture 2 is junior year of college - same outfit same expression but diff angle and better skin makeup hair and earrings lol