Will 2021 be my year?

My journey through 2020 was a complex one. I had started the year unemployed, which I had been since 2018, so there was nothing new there, but also I was facing debt and pulling my way out of crippling depression. I had no motivation, no goals, no ambition and no happiness I, was lost in life. I was trapped; a lifelong prison sentence or so it felt. Dealing with my borderline personality disorder breakdown between September 2019 - January 2020 left me exhausted. It was the biggest battle I had to face with my mental health in such a long time I thought I would never bounce back from it. When Covid-19 was announced and the Nation faced lockdown I was devastated. I had worked so hard to climb out of this hole only to be kicked right back into it again, I thought what is the point of my existence when it seems that everything that happens is to just knock me back down again.

I faced a debt of £4,000 on my credit card, food bills, personal bills, mortgage and household bills and my job seekers allowance was coming to an end, I didn't know how to face it all or even how to tell my partner about the credit card debt in which I had managed to rake up. I gave up with 2020, I went into the year as everyone does, it was going to be my year, but it was far from my year. As the year progressed I was lucky to get myself a job, I was working and earning money and things were going well. Sure, the lack of normality and routine was hard to deal with at times and having to cancel plans and holidays in which were the very things that were keeping me going and giving me something to focus on was devastating but I was one of the lucky ones compared to the hardship that others around me were having to face, unemployment, becoming ill, losing loved ones, it was tough to see.

Coming into 2021 I am still lost and feeling more confused than ever about who I am and what I want from life. I have so many ideas and plans but at the moment I am lacking in so much motivation to put them into action and achieve them, trying to see the light at the end of the tunnel right now is a struggle. I still have around £3100 of debt to pay which I am on target to reach for the end of the year. The two main factors in my life right now are my career and my health. At 30 years old I am starting to realise that I need to make my mind up with what I want to do in life, what career aspirations I want to head towards and to go for them, not to be indecisive all of my life and afraid of the what-ifs.

I need to find myself and even though I do not feel 2021 is the year I will achieve that I am going to put all of my strength and energy into paving the way for that change so I can head into 2022 with a clear mind and a clear path to my success and my place I want to be.

We all have had such a tough 2020 that I feel like we need to use 2021 to slowly gain some sort of normality back again. The world is changing around us and it is up to us to make the most out of lives whilst we have a chance, but sometimes it is ok to have downtime and just do nothing, to use the time to heal and find ourselves again. Let us use 2021 to find our meaning in life so we can pave the way for a brilliant and hopefully normal 2022.