Wow. I can’t believe it’s already the end of this year. It feels like just yesterday I was at some random bar with my best friend bringing in the New Year for 2018. We drank champagne, through back shots, and danced the night away. I woke up the next morning a little hungover and met another friend for some pho and sprite (my age old hangover remedy from undergrad). Like most years, I had no idea what 2018 had in store for me when the countdown ended and the fireworks began.

The idea for this post came from a video I saw of Ariana Grande accepting the Woman of the Year Award at the Billboard Women In Music 2018 event. In her speech, Ariana said “I find it interesting that this has been one of the best years of my career and the worst of my life” and I felt that shit in my spirit. This year was one of the best and worst years of my life, ALL at once. Before I heard Ariana’s speech, I hadn’t really taken the time to reflect on how insane this year actually was.

This year had some great moments like me hiring a trainer and taking my health and fitness seriously, applying to law school, getting into law school, getting a full tuition scholarship for law school, turning 25, going to Coachella for the first time, going to the Dominican Republic with one of my closest sorority sisters, and was featured on my good friend Daniel’s podcast. All in all, some of best memories will come from this year.

However, this year also consisted of my Nana passing away less than a week after Coachella (which was enough on its own to make this this year the worst year of my life), falling off the health and fitness wagon when she passed away because I was sad and out of town for a while, starting law school and falling off the health and fitness wagon again, failing my first midterm, my anxiety coming back full force for the first time since undergrad, feelings of inadequacy throughout the semester, the worst finals season of my life, and a bunch of other shit I don’t feel like getting into.

Looking back at everything, I did have a great year but I would be lying if I said that I was always focused on the positive while I was living through it. There are still days when I get really down, especially when I wish I could call my nana and tell her just how much harder law school is than we expected. Some days I really do have to remind myself that the struggles I’m going through now are the things I used to pray for before they happened. While I’m happy for all 2018 taught me, I’m happy to kiss it goodbye, take the lessons I’ve learned, and hopefully* have a great 2019.

How was your year this year? Let me know in the comments