Mid-Year (ish) 2021 Review

Mid-year has been and gone, but I’ve been busy with completing my thesis and defending it. Having finished feels like a good enough milestone for a mid-year (ish) review of 2021.

If I had to describe the year in a single word, that word would be precipice. The edge before big changes. For the first time in a long time, I don’t know what comes next. Thankfully, after being stuck inside for most of 2020, even being able to walk outside is a revelatory experience. So there’s not much of a bar to beat.

The year to August has been full of small changes, and some big ones:

• Completing my doctorate. After 4 year of research, I passed the final oral exam separating me from PhD status. Needless to say, this is the big milestone. A major lifegoal achieved.

• Ran my first 6k. I’m almost as pleased about this as the PhD. Just under two years ago, I was told I had a fissured meniscus in my knee from an injury around 4 years before. My knee had grown progressively worse, so that I couldn’t squat my own bodyweight or run at all. Even walking was getting hard. Doctors were telling me I would soon get arthritis and surgery might help, but probably not. However, some great physiotherapy and a simple piece of equipment banished it in under three months. Last week I ran 6k, which would have seemed totally unfeasible before. My aim is 10k by the end of the year.

• Restarted this blog. I’ve written in blogs on and off for about 16 years (nothing remains of them except backups on old hard drives). My last one dried up about six years ago, when my degree started to take over my life. Now that I’ve graduated, one of the best things about life is writing this blog — mostly for my future self.

• Ran a beta-reading club for a book. It’s a truly lucky thing to know people whom you trust to take the time to read a book you’ve written, and give some tough love in their feedback. Scary but rewarding. It’s totally different to a beta-reading group composed of strangers, because people who know you can infer more subtle things about what you’re trying to do.

• Developed a journaling habit. I spoke about this in an earlier post. I’m still finessing a system that works for me, but I’ve made good progress so far. I can’t overstate the value of having a habit that gets thoughts out of my head and into some physical format. I would have said it was a hobbyist’s thing before I tried it; now, I couldn’t go without it.

• Consistent meditation and yoga/stretching. I injured my back twice during lockdown, and even months later my muscles were like taut wires. I always thought, in an absent sort of way, that yoga was something that felt nice and technically counted as moving, but didn’t do much for your body. Obviously, I was hopelessly wrong. Twenty minutes of stretching or yoga every morning has totally changed my relationship with exercise — and it’s a similar story with meditation and mental flexibility/strength. Turns out the solution to almost everything is sitting quietly, breathing, stretching and recording thoughts.