Top 10 of 2020

When you can feel one year making room for another, I find myself in a place of reflection. My mind regularly meanders through memories made during the past year, mulling over all the ways life is different and the same. Maybe it’s something everyone does.

Sometimes, life at the end of a year looks pretty much the same as it did at the beginning. Those years are filled with adventures and everyday mundaneness too, the kind of moments that are always happening. So, some Decembers I feel like the same person from 12 months before. Someone no closer or further away from the life I imagine or the things I’d like to do.

Other years, it’s absolutely wild to think of everything that changed while only one calendar hung on the wall. This year has been one of these wild years. Almost wilder to me because I’m writing this in the same living room from last December. [Most of my past wild years involve moving.]

Some people call 2020 a dumpster fire and they can’t wait for it to end. To each their own. I call 2020 transformative. [And okay, definitely strange.] But I began this year believing that my life was going to be different by the end. I wanted to step forward from the safe, easy, comfortable choices that helped my days feel stagnant. I wanted to shake things up.

I’ll never know how much I would have leapt on my own. More than once, 2020 shoved me off those ledges. Forcing me to choose between trying to fly or letting myself free fall. Maybe most of the time I would have jumped anyway, even without the push. Maybe not though.

Either way, I felt like I repeatedly had only two choices this year. Embrace change and find the opportunity, or do nothing and complain about it. Life happens. And I don’t believe in dwelling on the what-ifs of past moments. Change happens. I’ve always found it best to embrace it.

With all that in mind, I’d like to share my top ten of 2020. It’s a mix of moments, goals, choices, and maybe even things that shaped my version of this past year. [In no particular order, except somewhat chronologically.]

1. Buying [and effectively using] a planner that includes a habit tracker and a training log.

In April of 2019, I bought the book Atomic Habits by James Clear. I have read it three times since, and I’m sure I’ll read it again soon enough. Without spoiling it for you, one of the key takeaways for me is having a better plan. Being able to easily combine my weekly life planner, training log, daily habit tracker, and so much more in one place was a game changer. Professional runner Grayson Murphy created the planner I use. [The 2021 version is amazing.]

2. Challenging myself to read one book per month that I have been meaning to read for at least a year.

I love books, and I try to read at least a little bit every day. The downside to my love of reading is that I usually buy 1-2 books a year that I never get to. Books that I still want to read, so I keep them on my shelf. This year, I decided to mix in those older books. The ones I’ve been meaning to read for a long time – more than a decade for some of them. It’s been a great way to add variety to what I’m reading. And it feels good to know that I’ve finally gotten around to reading most of my books. It’s a challenge I’ll continue into the new year.

3. Creating a writing habit. And deciding to share one thing I write each week.

For years now I’ve wanted to get back to writing. It was something I did long ago, and it was something I wanted to do again. Once I decided to stop making excuses and try, it took me six months to feel confident. Confident enough that I was writing something worth reading. And confident enough that I could stick to a consistent schedule of sharing my writing. That was in April. Since then, I’ve shared something consistently every Tuesday. [Okay, once I didn’t get to it until Wednesday.] I’ve also written a lot that I haven’t shared yet, working towards something I hope to share one day soon. Hopefully next year.

4. Running faster anyway.

When it comes to running, 2020 was going to be my year of getting faster again. I didn’t have any particular time goals – I just missed feeling like I was flying on runs. Racing more often has always been my failsafe way to force some faster miles. The first and only race I had signed up for this year was in April, and [like everything else] it was effectively cancelled. I started running faster anyway, not caring if I had anything to train for. And on those days I’m flying around my neighborhood, I can’t help but feel grateful that I dragged myself out the door for all those miles I didn’t feel like running. I know those are really the miles that got me back here.

5. Drinking more water and consistently getting enough sleep.

Maybe being home a lot more often is why these new habits felt more achievable. I’m always home early, and I’m always near a bathroom. So I really have no excuses to not go to bed earlier and drink plenty of water. Which is great for me, because I pretty much loathe sleeping in. But also, it’s amazing how much of a difference being hydrated and well-rested makes.

6. Planning day adventures instead of vacations.

One of my favorite activities is hiking. I love exploring the wilder places of the great outdoors, but most years I only hike once or twice close to home. The majority of my hiking happens when we travel – to destinations chosen mostly for the wild places nearby. This year though, staycations became the safest way to vacation. And through day trips, I’ve begun to appreciate how many beautiful hikes are less than an hour outside my door. 

7. Keeping up with routines.

Like so many other people, I spent time furloughed this year. When it happened at the beginning of April, I gave myself the weekend to be sad about it. On Monday though, drinking my morning coffee, I focused on planning my new schedule. Having consistency helps keep me from falling into a funk, so I chose keeping routines over feeling sorry for myself. My new “work day” looked considerably different. But I know that the things I’m most grateful for this year are almost all a direct result of the way I chose to spend my time off.

8. Trying craft non-alcoholic beer.

Early in 2020, I heard the term Dry January for the first time. I was intrigued by the idea of taking a month to reexamine your relationship with alcohol, so I chose April. It was a fun experiment, and I’m sure doing it helped me be more open-minded to the idea of non-alcoholic beer. So in July, when Athletic Brewing Company popped up on my Instagram feed, I decided to try their beer. Browsing their website that day and deciding to take a risk is easily one of the best decisions I made this past year. 

9. Choosing gratitude.

When everything about daily life drastically shifted in March, I was grateful to have a job. When I was furloughed a few weeks later, I chose to be grateful that I would have a job to come back to. That wasn’t the case for so many other people, and I reminded myself of that often. I chose to see my few months off as a chance to stop making excuses for why I wasn’t making time for things I said I wanted to do. Even when my furlough was extended, I felt grateful that my job was still there; that they still wanted me back. But that was also when I decided to see my time off as the nudge I’d been waiting for to find that new challenge I’d been wanting. 

This year was far from the year I imagined it would be. And yet, somehow I’m almost exactly where I pictured myself when I made my plans for 2020. I didn’t get here anywhere close to the way I thought I would, but that doesn’t matter. In the grand scheme of everything this year, I’m incredibly lucky. I don’t take that for granted.

And finally…

10. Deciding that life wasn’t on pause.

This one is probably more the cumulative mindset of every decision I’ve made since March. Even though it was the generally accepted phrase, I never believed that life was on pause. Life will always keep moving forward, one breathe at a time. And it’s always what we choose to do with our lives that matters. We can wait around for things to happen to us, or we can make the most of the situation each new day brings. 

Like it or not, this past year absolutely took place. It’s up to you to decide what you will do with that simple fact.