What is one way you have grown this year?
One way I have grown this year is that I removed myself completely from a toxic relationship that nearly destroyed me.
That sounds like one sentence, but it was not one sentence to live through.
This year I have followed the dream I had since I was a kid: to be free enough to write, travel, explore, and build a life that actually feels like mine.
Retiring at 55 was not about sitting still. Clearly. I seem to have retired directly into ruined castles, old churches, graveyards, strange little towns, long drives, history under my hands, and enough ideas to keep my brain busy for the next decade.
I’ve grown by doing things I used to imagine.
Seeing places I had only read about.
Touching history with my own hands.
Having experiences that feed my creative brain instead of draining the life out of it.
And being in places that are helping me heal without making a performance out of it.
That’s growth for me.
Not becoming a completely different person.
And definitely not suddenly becoming brave.
I’ve never really lived small. I’ve jumped out of planes, scuba dived, abseiled, zip-lined, parasailed, climbed glaciers, gone white-water rafting, been on TV, raised three sons, and started a petition during Covid that became one of the biggest on Change.org.
I’ve done a lot of things that sound mad when you put them in one paragraph.
And I did them in between the harder parts of my life too, which probably says more than the adventure list does.
So this year is not about finding courage for the first time.
It’s more like coming back to the version of myself that was always there — curious, stubborn, restless, ridiculous, careful when it matters, and still very much up for the next strange little adventure.
Only now, I’ve got my own life pointed in the right direction again.
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