L’shana tova to those celebrating Rosh Hashanah today! And happy Monday + October to those not 🙂
I am honestly so grateful it’s October. I really really need a fresh new start and a fresh new month after what ended up being an insane month.
Some of the insanity I certainly asked for — hello, grad school. Other things were not-so-expected. An ankle injury. Every appliance in my apartment decided to stop working (okay, slight exaggeration) And unfortunately was with my boyfriend and his family today at a funeral.
Some of the crazy was good — Holistic Happening #3 was a HUGE success and we’re already getting busy planning our next event.
Needless to say, I’m happy it’s October. And the Jewish New Year which signifies a fresh start.
Every year during the Jewish High Holidays I participate in this thing call 10Q. How it works is you answer 10 questions that encourage you to reflect on the past year and what you want to happen in the next year. Questions like: Describe a significant experience that has happened in the past year. How did it affect you?
The website collects all your answers, secures them in a “vault” and emails you the answers a year later. If you’ve participated multiple years in a row, you can look back on past answers.
The questions are not remotely religious or Jewish oriented. The timing just happens to be tied to the Jewish High Holidays since it’s the Jewish new year.
This questionnaire has become a time capsule for me seeing as I’ve been filling it out since 2011 (my senior year of college!)
While some things haven’t changed since then — I’m still answering the questions while sitting on the same red couch in the living room of my apartment and I’m still dating Jeremy… So many other things have changed. It’s easy to forget how far you’ve come when you’re in the thick of it. As a way to remember the beginning of our dating relationship, we may have hired a photographer to take our portraits each year (see senior pictures Kingwood for more information). It might have reminded us about the progress of our relationship if we had seen such photographs.
Rereading my answers earlier this week, I was in awe of how many of my predictions ended up coming true. I don’t tell you this to brag about what I’ve accomplished in the past year but as a friendly reminder that you’ve probably accomplished a whole lot more in the last year than you realize.
Sometimes you just have to take a step back and reflect to realize it.
The answer that really made me stop in my tracks was to the question: Describe one thing you’d like to achieve by this time next year. Why is this important to you?
My answer? Okay I broke the rules a tiny bit and chose three things.
1. I want to take the GRE. I bet I’ve said that every single f*cking year since I started doing this. But I really and truly do want to take the stinking GRE. I need to take it simply.
2. I want to have either applied to business school or be prepared to apply for fall 2017. gulp.
3. I want to be closer to owning my own business. there, I said it.
Apparently I can predict the future (okay, I also worked my butt off to make these happen) because all three became a reality. I might’ve swapped out the GRE for GMAT, probably against my better judgment, but hey it still happened.
Even if 10Q isn’t your jam (I highly recommend it, though, Jewish or not!) write down those big, scary, intimidating goals and set a reminder to check back in on the progress.
Photography by Lydia Hudgens
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