I’ve always felt my life was a bit sporadic. I performed well at mostly everything but I’ve never mastered anything. I could never focus on one activity for more than two weeks before finding something else that piqued my interest. Since becoming more involved in the minimalist lifestyle, I realize I must focus on what makes me the happiest and what I value most…but what exactly is that? What do I want to focus on for the months and years to come? I lay down each night picturing what I wanted my life to be like and and I finally found my answers last night.
My main focuses will be creativity, music, activism, health, and my relationship with family and friends. Then I decided on three goals I would work toward in each different area.
Creativity: Write everyday, paint and draw frequently, and continue creating through needlework. Being a Journalism major who hopes to write for Rolling Stone, inform the public about climate change, and write a novel, I should work everyday to improve my craft. Painting and drawing is a creative outlet, stress reliever, and boosts creativity. When I was young my grandma taught me to crochet, knit, cross-stitch, and sew so I want to carry on what she taught me. Plus you get lovely pieces of work after that make great gifts. In a world where we constantly consume, it is a great feeling to contribute and create something beautiful.
Music: Keep attending live shows, practice my piano and ukulele, and constantly work on my music blog. I’m moving to Austin mainly for the music; nothing makes me feel more alive than attending concerts and meeting bands. I want my future career to involve music so I need to keep fueling my passion. I’ve always enjoyed making music and hope to be in a band one day so I’m bringing my instruments to college, jam with fellow musicians, and hopefully meet people who want to make music with me. Although my blog is in it’s infant stages I’m extremely proud of it. I want to continue being proud of it so I should update it constantly and hopefully it will look good on resumes and I’ll be able to cover bigger festivals and artists. Without music I feel empty, it has to be one of the main focuses on my life.
Activism: focus on improving the environment, homelessness, and feminism. “Be the change you wish to see in the world” is tattooed on my thigh because I feel we must all be active participants if we want to improve the lives of ourselves and everyone around us. This world is amazing and beautiful and we should treat it that way. Climate change is affecting us already but we can still prevent it from getting any worse. Poverty is man-made and there is certainly more than enough to go around for everyone (here’s the part where everyone calls me a socialist), but I don’t see how we can spend billion dollars on movies yet there are still people dying of starvation in the streets. I want every girl to know the gender norms and stereotypes are terrible and they can be and do whatever they want. I don’t want to hear “quit being a girl/you’re being such a girl/you ___ like a girl” ever again. I don’t want women or young girls hearing that simply being a female is an insult, I want to empower them. There are so many more causes I care about but if I dedicate my time to these, I’ll make more of an impact than if I focused on 20 different causes. Not everybody can do everything, but everyone can (and should) do something.
Health: eat better, be more active, take care of myself. Due to many allergies and anxieties I don’t eat fruits or vegetables or much healthy food for that matter but I need to get over my fears, see a dietician and allergist and broaden my food choices. I am not in shape whatsoever so my goal is 30 minutes of cardio daily until I feel I can add more time and intensity; I would like more energy and confidence. My mental health holds me back from doing many things whether it’s my panic disorder, anxieties, or depression. I can’t live life to the fullest if I’m not feeling well so I need to continue improving and getting better.
Family and Friends: talk to them everyday, spend time with them, and be comfortable around them. Ask any of my friends, I am the world’s worst person to text since I take hours or days to reply. Friends are important and i should work on keeping in touch and at least talking to one friend a day. I’m alone most of the time but that should probably change, I want to be out there hanging out and making memories with people. Whether it’s family or friends, I’m not really comfortable around anyone. Not sure if it’s my social anxiety or I just don’t trust anyone (my doctor said it was my depression distancing me from people), but I should try to be more relaxed around people. I want to feel normal and worry-free around people and the only way to do that is to expose myself and put myself in uncomfortable situations.
Education: study every weekday, read everyday, always improve. I’ll be going to the University of Texas which is ranked 29th in the world so I need to work hard to be an excellent student. Thankfully learning comes easy to me but I can’t slack off so I need to find time to study each weekday (I’ll take weekends off to relax to avoid burning or stressing out). As George R.R. Martin said in his Game of Thrones books ,”a mind needs books as a sword needs a whetstone if it is to keep its edge.” Reading improves the mind in many ways so I should read everyday and strive to finish a minimum of 3 books outside of class each month. My craving for learning and improving should never be satisfied, I need to constantly look for ways I can better myself in every aspect of my life and never feel like I am done.
Now that I have direction I feel like my life will have more focus and I’ll be able to spend more time, energy, and resources on each goal instead of stretching myself thin with hundreds of goals and dreams.
being belicia 
this is beautiful and lovely and i’m incredibly impressed by you!
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thank you so much! it definitely means a lot coming from you!
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