Dear, letter readers – welcome back to Letters From Liz!
It is surely the most wonderful time of the year, not only because it’s the holiday season, but because it’s the official start of the Twelve Letters of Lizmas!
If you are new here, the “Twelve Letters of Lizmas” is when I post blog content for the next 12 days leading up to Christmas. This has been a tradition for the blog since the early days of my blog when it used to be called a different name; any readers still around from that time? Anyway, if you’re interested to see just what type of content is posted in this series, you can read last year’s Lizmas posts here. 🙂
What makes these seasonal series so special is that it allows me some time to not only write about the various characters in my writing universe, but it also gives you guys some insight about me; the writer! Every Lizmas, we start off with a “re-introduction” of myself, so without further ado…
Hi! My name is Liz!
In 2024, I turned 30 years old and learned how to not only embrace adulthood, but to do so while maintain my youth. One major milestone I hit this year was that I turned 30 back in January. It was a big deal for me considering that turning 30 has always been this big, monumental change from being a young adult in your 20s and entering your 30s as an adult. It’s scary to think about when you are nearing the age; your 20s represent a time where it’s okay to still be youthful while still finding your place in society. There’s this misconception that you have to have everything figured out by the time you turn 30; you should be settling down and having kids with a steady career and all the things we grew up thinking about what people should be doing in their 30’s.
Being the youngest full-time worker in my current job position actually helped me learn to balance my youth and my adulthood pretty well. In a professional setting, I’ve learned that I am able to still maintain my professionalism in my work place while still making my space feel more colorful and bright and youthful. I now take that same ideology in every aspect of my life: one good thing I’ve witnessed in myself is that my adulthood doesn’t have all this necessary second guessing of what people may think of me. It was something that those older than me have told me years ago that the best part of being in their 30s was that they truly stopped caring about what other people thought about them because their adulthood helped solidified their identity. Being in this space where I didn’t care what people thought about me anymore, I found myself nurturing the little Liz in me, the girl that was too afraid to like different things or to wear things that she liked because of her anxiety or the fear of being bullied about it. I feel like while I’ve always been an advocate for always being your authentic self, I feel like I am now living the words I once told others to be. So yes, I am a 30-year-old woman that still likes colorful patterns and clothing, vivid hair colors and trinkets that symbolize what youth looks like to me. It’s something I honor very much being at my very big age, and in some way feels more rewarding than hitting societal milestones.
In 2024, I continued to challenge my social anxiety by putting myself in more social settings and learned what being in them looked like for me. Late last year, I was invited to my first social gathering (a party) in a really long time. I normally strayed away from going to these type of events because of my history being in them, but since being in therapy and working on myself, I didn’t have much opportunity to challenge my social anxiety and fear of social events until, well, last year. While I thought I mastered the art of being at a social setting, I didn’t. It really wasn’t until this year where I began to learn what it meant to be a person with SAD at a social event. This year, I went to a 90’s themed party during Spring Break, and a Halloween party back in October, and the two parties (although similar and thrown by the same person), were two completely different experiences for me. The first party I still felt this wave of awkwardness; I didn’t really know where to go or where to sit without feeling like I was leaning on my partner’s social skills to help me exist in the party. The second party, I had a better understanding of my role at this party and that truly, it was okay if partying looked different on me. It didn’t bother me as much to be by myself and vibing with the music, and if I did need to step out for air, I wasn’t completely anxious socializing with the people who were out there doing the same thing. I’ve come a long way as a person when it comes to being at social events, but I can honestly say that I am now a person that doesn’t shy away from going out to events; whether it’s on solo adventures to concerts, daytime show audience viewing, or parties!
In 2024, I learned the best way to keep yourself motivated is to know when you need to take breaks; traveling is the way I did so this year. This year was my first in my current position, which meant that more responsibilities and tasks were now on my desk for my 9 to 5. I felt myself needing time off to refocus my body and mind once again, and one way that I was able to successfully do that was go away and travel. For my 30th birthday, I went to California with my partner, and then this past summer, I went to Atlantic City for the first time. In addition to those two trips, my partner and I did another weekend getaway back to AC during a time that we both needed some relaxation and time away from our demanding jobs in education. In all of these trips, I was able to come back to the city with experiences I didn’t have before, as well as this feeling of having a new head on my shoulders when returning back to work. Of course, I hope to travel more next year and see more places I haven’t gotten to see yet, but this year made me realize just how important it is to give yourself the earned and deserved time to take it easy and relax. I’m also very grateful that I have someone that is willing to go on these trips with me with these same intentions in mind: come back feeling inspired and motivated to tackle whatever we have on our plates back at home.
In 2024, I’ve learned a lot about self-control, and struggled with it in the process. I’ve mentioned this on the blog before in the past, but for the last couple of years, I’ve struggled with learning how to balance my need to be in control of situations. Last year taught me that I can only control my own thoughts, feelings, reactions, and behavior. In the past, I had a hard time telling myself that, especially if the thing I was trying to control involved me in a way that made me anxious or stressed. While yes, I can only control myself and what I do in these situations, I found myself obsessing over my own self-control this year. I am still trying to master the art of not self-sabotaging when things get too stressful around me or if I’m not able to successfully have some control in a setting (i.e a busy time of year at my job, poor time management that involves other people, etc.)
I tend to try to get in control by changing something up with myself or engaging in compulsive behaviors that leave me feeling bad about myself. This year, my biggest challenge has been trying to control my self-control; in other words, talking myself out of doing something that is only emotionally driven. This is going to sound stupid, but this year I found myself relying on things to help ease my stress and anxiety, like eating nearly 4 packs of Tic Tacs a day within 20 minutes of each other and associating feeling good with that newfound addiction, or cutting and dyeing my hair nearly every week to regain some sort of control back into my life. I am now back to where I always end up being: trying my hardest to set boundaries with my compulsiveness and finding other ways to successfully release some stress and anxiety. I am realizing that a lot of my compulsive behavior I end up regretting once I look back and see the progress I made before hindering it, like growing out my hair to only damage it and cut it short again because that’s what I wanted in that moment. It’s a very weird thing to explain, but this year has shown me that new tactics and techniques must be made in order to not allow my need of control get the best of me and act out in ways that sabotages my progress. I’m glad I’ve become self-aware, and I hope that within the next year I successfully learn the practice on what to do when you are aware of doing something and how to stop it before it’s too late. It’s just a bad day, not a bad life, nor am I spiraling down due to a bad week or month.
Some other fun facts about me that are on the more light-hearted side:
- I am still a boy cat mom with a 5-year old turtle named Squirtle that is very sassy.
- I still live in NYC and still do not see myself leaving anytime soon.
- I am still very much into fashion as I live to dress myself the way I wish I could when I was younger.
- I do not consider myself a “k-pop stan” anymore as I removed myself from the online community completely late last year.
- I do not even consider myself a true penpal writer anymore; I still casually keep in touch with the 3 pen pals I’ve kept and really only write letters periodically.
- I spend a lot of my free time hanging out (big step for your social anxiety girly) with people, whether it’s to the neighborhood park or to the studio with my partner, or getting celebratory drinks at the local Mexican restaurant and bar.
- My interests change frequently, and while back in the day that would bother me for not being able to like one thing for a long period of time, I now view it as a learning experience and just go with the flow. (for example, in the time I am writing this, I’ve gained interest in the Pokemon trading card world; I know I wouldn’t ever commit myself to collecting cards since collecting ANY type of photocard as traumatized me, but it’s fun to see people who are in the community pull cards and see what they get in the grading process if the card is worth something).
And I think that’s pretty much it! I hope I am able to have some more interesting stuff to talk about in 2025, but just like my 2024 re-introduction, this year has been a year of learning who I am in this time of life and what adulthood looks like for me and I guess it’s just been simple.
I hope you guys enjoy the rest of the content coming for “Twelve Letters of Lizmas”! Thanks for reading!
Letters From Liz. 