You’re back! Welcome to my once-a-year blog in which I review the ups downs of my life, closing the door on the previous year to move onto the next.
Moving into the child raising portion of my life, I feel like we’re entering operation warp speed as I flick back through my journal and photos in disbelief at all that happened and at the pace at which things have changed.
So, let’s dive in and see what’s been knocking around this noggin of mine.
Physical and Mental
I start with the physical and mental as it’s what dictates my mood the majority of the year, but you’ll be happy to hear that I’m ending the year in far better place than I started. There are no straight lines when it comes to my physical and mental being anymore, but there is plenty of wisdom I’ve picked up along the way
Surgeries
If you can be “anti-surgery”, that would be me -- or at least it used to be. The idea of being cut open without a 100% guarantee that it is going to fix you has caused me more dread over the past couple years than nearly anything else. I came into the year with a surgery date picked out for February 20th to have a left hip labrum repair/reconstruction. This was my third time scheduling after cancelling the previous 2 surgeries due to fear and life circumstances (baby/moving state), however, this time I was dead set that I was going to go through with it.
My mindset with surgeries is that they should be used as an absolute last resort, believing the body and mind is powerful and by that committing to the correct PT and re-shaping your mindset, you’ll be able to overcome whatever is in front of you. This was the approach I took for 2 years, 2 years of trying and failing, trying and failing, chronic pain cascading through the body from one joint to the other, and as I’ve mentioned in last year’s blog, destroying my mind at the same time. This journey has without a doubt re-shaped how I live life.
So, 2 years later and I’m finally at the point where I’m just feeling out of options and stuck with the mindset that it surely cannot get worse. The reality is that it always can, but I needed to at least try a different option that was outside my comfort zone. My big issue with the surgery, is that I didn’t believe that it’s going to be the golden pill that will just fix everything and that I’ll be back to being super athlete Ryan (yes, let me be the old guy talking about how amazing he used to be). I had so many other injuries throughout my body, and injuries that pre-date the hips that limit me, however, the hips are the only diagnosis in which the 3 Drs and 4 surgeons I’ve seen all said the same thing from the symptoms and MRI presentations.
This may sound crazy, but many times I wish that my injuries we’re just caused by a major incident and that it was just cut and dry. Yes, your leg is hanging off your body, you need surgery. Instead, all my injuries follow the same pattern of nagging, still nagging, getting worse, never going away. Throughout all this time, I’m still learning about my body, still trying to rehab in new ways, still finding little nuggets of hope that this must be the new solution, but inevitably ending up back where I started.
With my hips, I had gotten to a point where I had learned to live with it. Through the PT, I was no longer in pain in my non-active life (sitting, short walking, chores around the house), but when the activities became moderate (longer walking, cycling) or intense, I would flare up and no matter what I would do, I couldn’t seem to overcome it. So, at this point the decision to have surgery comes down to what do I want to try and get out of life from my body’s perspective. I landed on that I need to at least try and get back to some form of athleticism, not so much for goal development and achievement anymore but to optimize my daily living through better movement and some form of consistent sport.
So, I’m mentally there. We’re three weeks out and I’m in the mindset of not thinking about it anymore, it’s happening. At the same time, Elijah is now 4 months old, and Alana is approaching the end of her maternity leave. She’s finally starting to feel strong again in her body and on the last day of her leave steps back out onto the pitch to play football again. 20 minutes in… the phone rings and with absolutely zero expression in her voice, “hey, can you pick me up? I think I’ve torn my ACL and can’t drive the Tacoma”.
And that’s life… one minute you’re going to get hip surgery, the next your wife bumps your spot to get knee surgery. Safe to say the following month was not fun, not because I wasn’t going to have surgery (I was actually slightly relieved there was a clear reason to push it), but because Alana was a weekend away from returning to work, in the middle of an inter-state hypothetical transition with work, that caused an insurance and potential financial ruin headache (I’m exaggerating, but understand that’s how I process all financial challenges – we’re never going to recover from this).
Fast forwarding, Feb 13th Alana had her ACL surgery and April 24th I had my hip surgery. Where I’m surgery shy, Alana is surgery fierce. I think because she’s a medical professional and performs surgeries, she always been about the new science and excited to try. Whereas, as I’ve told you before, I aspire to be a “woo woo” master by my 40s, sipping ayahuasca, letting the earth heal me…
Couple years ago, she had a new surgery on her eyeballs that’s supposed to be better than LASIK and went for it without hesitation. When she had a minor complication after the surgery and COULDN’T SEE PROPERLY for a few days, I went to bed fearing she would never see again, while Alana trusted it would get better as it of course did. Similarly, being on Duke’s doorstep now, Alana’s surgeon was one of few who could perform a new type of ACL repair surgery that Alana was all for. When she woke after the surgery to find it didn’t work and they just had to do it the standard way that was the thing she was most distraught about… It's been almost 11-months now and Alana is doing great. She’s just about ready to start playing football again, and continues to improve in her PT.
I ended up having a hip labrum reconstruction as opposed to labral repair, as per the surgeon “The labrum was shredded and there was nothing to repair”. The surgery itself was the easiest thing about this whole journey which was a surprise to me. You walk in, in the morning and put your gown on, next minute you wake up on the couch at home. Easy peasy.
The first month was relatively easy. Spent the first 2 weeks hooked up to a continuous passive motion machine that moved my hip for me, and the remainder of the month on the couch just trying to kill time. Month 2, I could actually start some proper PT, moving onto the stationary bike and at least feeling like I’m doing something to progress. Special shoutout to week 6 in which I had my biggest meltdown and blocked hip labrum sub-Reddit (still have not returned and would recommend). When you have all day just to worry about every single little pain and continue to read everyone’s reddit horror stories it will just send you straight into Vecna’s mindflair.
As not to get into every progression of my recovery, there have been many, many ups and downs. Anatomically, am I convinced I am better than I was prior to surgery? Not yet. Mentally, am I better, 100%. The physical action of taking the surgery leap, starting from ground zero with a great PT and working week by week continuously seeing small improvements has done wonders. Oh, and I forgot to mention that I ended up doing the right hip with the plan of doing the left 6-weeks later… However, with Alana only being close to 4-months at the point, me still on crutches, and a 7-month old to raise I think that would have been one step too far…
So, the cycle starts again. I’m scheduled to have the left hip done in 2026 and all the same fears I had before still exist and infiltrate my mind every time I think about it.
Pain & Lifestyle
I spoke on chronic pain last year and the beast that it is both physically and mentally. Defined as 3-months without resolve of an injury, I’ve managed to quite most of the severe pains and make real strives to strength in others. Beyond doing all the basics well – eating well, moving often, sleeping good, training smart (or at least trying to), my number 1 tool which has help me is my ‘bod log’. A simple pain tracker I created back in August 2024, when I was in the absolute pits of mental anguish and needed some physical proof as to what was going on with my body as I just couldn’t trust or understand what my body was telling me anymore.
Since then, I have tracked my pain daily, across 16 different body parts using a scale of 1-5. 1 – Conscious of it, 2 – half the day, 3 – consumes full day, 4 – nerve symptoms, 5 – Fucked. In my peak month of September 2024, I had a score of 298, this past December my score was 31 (lowest yet). Of course, these numbers and scales mean nothing to anyone else, but to me it’s proof I’m overcoming things, I’m improving, I’m getting better. That proof is essential every time I have a flare up, every time I’m mentally slipping, feeling like there is no hope, I go back to the last time I had that flare up, see any notes I wrote about what I was experiencing, and how long it took me to get back to 0 – Baseline. For every single body part, I have always got back to 0. Sometimes it’s a couple days, some couple weeks, some couple months, sometimes half a year, but I have returned to 0, and that, if nothing else grounds me that tomorrow will be better.
I’m a completely different person to who I was before all these injuries. It’s not a bad thing, it’s not a good thing, it just is what it is. When I have a few days or weeks with a low pain score, I start to dream of being able to climb a 14er, run a marathon, cycle a 100-miles, play competitive football again, play golf every day. I used to then push in the gym or in my rehab promptly jumping my pain score back-up.
Now, I’ve got better at this. I still dream, lightly. But more so, I appreciate and enjoy what I’m doing that current day. If you follow me on Instagram, you should have seen every inch of my daily walk routes photographed in my stories by now. I love them. I cycle to work every day and go to the gym M-F. Mind you, no one’s gym sessions look like mine, I can guarantee that. I go to the local YMCA where the average age is 60, and I can tell you I’m at home. Many comments of envy have been shared by the patrons on my workout cause they know I’m pushing that deluxe ‘keep it moving you old fart, work with what you got special’. Ain’t no looking back in that gym, and no need for crazy machines or weights, we’re keeping these meat machines moving in here.
All that to say, my every day is good. I enjoy showing up again, and again, and again, doing the same things that make me feel better and as if I’m striving in the right direction. My training philosophy now is lifestyle optimization – Am I strong enough to walk every day, cycle wherever I want around town, pick-up Elijah x45 a day, take care of the house, work on small building projects, and most importantly, be pain free. If yes, then life is pretty good that day. The dreams will remain dreams. I keep dreaming, and when they come, amazing! But it’s no longer an identity thing.
Work
Headline: I changed jobs this year and returned to the office. Last year, I wrote this section as a corporate robot, glossing over my frustration, and counting down the days to paternity leave. This year we’ll take a little closer look at what caused me to leave, thoughts on returning to the office and my general work mentality. You know the trend over the years is that I long to call this section something else, but we’re still here… working.
Picture you’ve just moved into a new house, you have boxes all over the place and are finding new homes for everything to live. To the right of the door, you see a piece artwork that you’ve had for a while, you like it and decide to put it up in front of the entrance to get it off the floor. I’m that piece of Artwork.
In reality, I’m a living room piece. Either placed on the gallery wall or in between a couple windows. But, my owners walk pass me every day without a glance. Occasionally a guest will stop by and comment on its interest and every 6 months or so, one of my owners will say “we really should move this into the living room” with the other replying “yeah, we’ll get to it”…
So, I hang. Watching the coming and goings of daily life, watching the change of the house and the growth of those who live in it while I stay the same, collecting dust. Once a year, I’m lucky enough to get a freshen up from the cleaner giving me an “4-exceeds expectations” for how well my canvas is keeping in this climate. And for a moment, I believe. Today could be the day, they mentioned it’s going to happen, I’m going to get to that living room!
So, it’s been three years now. They had a new door installed with a window, and the morning light shines on my face as it passes by the house. While I’m grateful for the new view, the sun is harsh and is starting to damage the surface. Furthermore, my annual spring clean is coming up and it feels like now or never. For a few more months I hold strong, put my best angle forward and wait for the feedback… 4-exceeds expectations but not yet living room ready…
But, but, but... you said it was time. Yes, but we’re selling the house and there’s going to be new owners now and they would like to keep you exactly where you are because they really like you there. And so, it was time, I waited till everyone was out the house, mustered up the energy for one big jump off the hook and then took the leap.
Dramatic? Nah. I had become part of the furniture and while I did feel comfortable in my position and ready for the next step, I just couldn’t see it happening anymore. I had been one of those grandfathered into my remote position and one of the only ones still remote while everyone had moved back, which I think played a contributing role. But, mainly out of self-respect, wanting to return to the office, and longing for something new, I made the move. Still in the same industry, doing the same job, just at a new agency.
I’m in the dining room now. This new house is a little smaller, but the artwork around me is a lot higher quality. I still am a living room piece, but we’re a step closer and according to my new owners, there’s a place on the living room gallery wall waiting for me in 2026 if I continue to shine in the dining room…
Remote work
Remote work has its place. It’s been incredibly beneficial to me over the last 5 years allowing me to live in 2 countries and 5 different cities, moving only for lifestyle and not dictated by a job. I’d also argue from a purely efficiency standpoint, your whole life is more efficient (if that’s your personality type). There is no wasted time, you can do 5x more in a day from a work perspective and set-up your life to fill the gaps otherwise wasted in commuting, downtime, or just general socializing.
However, I am a social being. I’ve known for a while I’m really meant to be in an office in some capacity but didn’t plan on forcing the issue if the right fit wasn’t there. Luckily (if you believe in luck),I found the right fit at the right time. Now, in Durham, where I plan to stay stationary for the foreseeable future, it felt right to look for an in-office option. And even better, an office that is 2-miles from my house, on a hybrid schedule -- a rare agency find not in a major hub, that focusses on the specific industry I work in. Tick, tick, tick.
So, I’m back in the office 3-days a week and I really enjoy it. Mainly from a social standpoint, because as we’ll discuss later, I optimize for lifestyle and community, and having that daily connection in a nice environment, around people creating good work, adds to that. I’m 6 months in at this new gig and it’s going well, enjoying what it has to offer and what I’m offering it and hoping for big things in 2026.
A note for the youngens, on remote work. I feel very blessed that I had a few years of in-office work post-college before COVID. I couldn’t imagine going through my entire 20s completely remote and what that must do to your understanding of work culture, teams, personal development, etc. You really do get better holistically in an in-person environment. However, simply being in any office or working for anyone won’t do that for you. And there will come a point in time where remote work does make complete sense, but for starting out, some kind of in-person environment is where you need to be in my opinion.
Work Mentality
Adding this little sub-section here as over the years I’ve touched on my views on finding ‘what you’re supposed to do’ with your life, as before the chronic pain stuff, this was my number cause of angst, the reason I created EAZYLIVING, and a topic I will forever be interested in on Ryan’s search for meaning.
Where I’m at today, is that I’ve accepted my career. My career in no way shape or form defines who I am as a human being, but it’s something that I know, it’s something that I’m good at, it’s something that I can grow in, and it’s something that allows me to facilitate a nice lifestyle and I think that’s ok. I view my job in many ways like I’m playing football again, you’ve given me the starting position and now it’s my responsibility to make sure that I show up and help my team win, and if you’re around me long enough, make sure we win with a little bit of flare too.
I would say it took me a good 4-5 years to come the conclusion of accepting my career. Who knows if it’s my forever career, but it is my right now career and we are focused on getting into that living room.
Family Life
Family life, what a thing. The most important thing. This has come into focus for me watching Elijah grow this year, seeing me and Alana grow with him, and our families’ interactions around him. It’s wonderful to witness and to live. Here we’ll talk a little about what being a dad means to me and what we’ve been through as a family this year.
Being a Dad
I was born to be a Dad. No two-ways about it. I enjoy nearly everything about it. I’m not going to claim every single thing is great, because trust me, it’s exhausting, and it will wear you down. But nothing has come close to how rewarding it can be and how Alana and I most nights end the day in awe at how lucky we’ve got it and how amazing our boy is.
He’s nearly 15-months now and it’s incredible how each stage so far has been more amazing than the one before as he continues to learn and grow, develop more of a personality, and pick up on all these small naissances you never thought about. He started out this year at barely 3-months old, the change from then to now you can’t even put into words. There is nothing I’ve witnessed in life yet that comes close to that transformation and I’m here for every minute of it and can’t wait to watch it continue into toddlerhood.
The part of being a Dad that I’ve enjoyed the most and has also been the most challenging, is caring for him on my own. As mentioned above, I had my hip surgery when Elijah was 6-months old, Alana was then just returning to work after paternity leave and surgery recovery and here I am, my hip just cut open and essentially immobile for the next 6 weeks. That initial period was rough from a pain standpoint, but also from a mental manhood standpoint of not being able to take care of my son and feeling useless. Luckily, we had amazing help around us with my mum staying for 6 weeks to help and us hiring a nanny through the summer which was invaluable in allowing me to recover properly while having Elijah cared for.
To anyone who is married to or in a relationship with someone who is a 12-hour day/night shift worker, good on you. I see you and feel you. Now, the job is tough for them, Alana works 12 shifts a month, 12 hours (always 14-15 hours), day, nights, weekends. ER schedule. When she goes into work for 3 shifts in a row, you don’t see her till the end of those shifts. Before baby, yeah it sucked she was gone every other weekend and a lot of nights. But with baby, new ball game.
OK boo hoo, Ryan. No, hear me out. What it means is that I get the opportunity to fully care for Elijah uninterrupted for 72 hours at a time, sometimes 48, sometimes 24, but you get it. For those who have babies, you’ll know, mother is the center of existence for this bean cake and when mother is around, there is always a better option a scream away. But, when she is at work, I am the only option. “I’m all you got buddy.”
The good is that when you both figure that out, and you will do, fast, there is nothing better than ending the day and knowing from the moment he woke up to the moment he’s gone back to sleep, you’ve got everything this baby needs. And that feeling just doubles, triples the longer you do it. This is speculation and I have no clue, but I imagine it’s a small portion of what a mother feels when raising a kid.
At 6 months, if we’re being honest, they’re still a potato. They just sleep, lie on their back, eat, and sleep again. Still rewarding. But when they start becoming alive to the world, smiling, crawling, standing, babbling, walking, that reward transitions from ‘you did a great job keeping him alive today’ to ‘we had the most fun today’. And now that’s he moving into toddler phase, becoming a little boy with a cheeky personality who loves to be on the bike, play with his golf balls and kick a football, it’s just getting better.
The bad is when you work a full week and then go straight into full time duty on the weekend. Do that 2-3x a month and you’re a real champion if the lack of time is not going to start to irk you and wear you down. I’m sure some women reading this are saying ‘try that 24/7 for 18 years’.. hands up ok. Just sharing how I’m feeling. And maybe it’s training for when we have more kids and time really is just a figment of the imagination.
Childcare
Why is childcare a military mission to sort out? Seems the only way to get the daycare you want is to put yourself on the waitlist every year before you even know a baby is coming into the world… Admittedly, we were late to the game. Having moved from Colorado the previous year and the whole purchasing a house thing, sorting out childcare was not flashing up on our radar. However, we did get on some waitlists with the hope that we would get a spot available 10 months later when he turns 1 (we didn’t).
With Alana and I both getting 4 months paternity leave, the goal was to push back childcare to as close to his first birthday as we could. With Alana having the 12-shift schedule, it meant once we finished our paternity leaves, we began to plan her schedule where she would work the nights and weekends, so I’d be available and vice versa. As mentioned above, not ideal.
Paternity leave for both of us was an incredible time. It allows you to shrink your world and just focus in on the one thing that truly matters. Alana really thrived during this time, taking on the first-time mum role completely in her stride. It also got us thinking about different childcare options and the potential of nanny/nanny share if we could swing it as we didn’t need the full-time childcare schedule.
So, Alana set to work, scouring the local nanny forums, websites, and Facebook groups. It is a whole full-time job thing. Especially with a nanny share as you also need to find another family who fits yours and your schedule. But Alana did it, after a couple months and approaching Eli’s first birthday we had it all set up ready to go. We were to go on vacation and then come back and finally get a break in the week from a care perspective. And then, they stole our nanny…
No long metaphor for this one. Just straight to the point, Alana had put in countless hours organizing everything, finding the nanny, finding the family, setting up the systems, doing the due diligence, all for it to fall apart at the first hurdle. The first time Eli went, they had a tough morning because he’s never left us before. That evening, we received a text that they don’t think it’s going to work, and are just going to keep the nanny as they’ve already started a couple weeks before us…
I just want to state here that I was very proud of myself. Where maybe in the past I would of shared a piece of my mind in a colorful way, seeing Alana’s exhaustion and disappointment, I simply chose the ‘Fuck Em, wasn’t meant to be anyway!’ route. It really wasn’t.
It was at this point in the year Alana was hitting her low point. Maternity leave had ended, she was filling in at another hospital while she waited for a new practice to open that would be her permeant gig, childcare was sucking the life out of her, she only had one good knee, and the weight of the world felt like it was bearing down on her. But everything happens for a reason!
A few weeks later, through the nanny network, a neighbors family offered us to join their share and honestly, we could not have found a better situation if we tried. I think it really kicked started the turnaround for Alana’s year as after that was sorted, all the other things quickly began to resolve and she’s really thrived since.
Defining us
I always think we’re lucky because Alana and I have grown up together, being together for 10 years now. In growing up it means you change a lot, you have to keep re-defining what you mean to each other and the new goals and priorities you have. As mentioned last year, we’re rough plan people, and our plan had always kind of got us to this stage in life.
That’s where we are now, defining our next 10 years and what we want to get out of it and what we would like life to look like. It would be nice if that was just a sit down one weekend process, but it’s not. At least not for us. But we’re getting there, and as our lives are changing, we’re seeing new priorities that we never knew existed.
Finances
New section alert. I’m 30 now, so I think I’m finally mature enough to start speaking about finances. Personal finance is something that I’ve always been interested in since the day I was doing 3 paper rounds a week (yeah, I’m going to be that dad). But, understanding money and knowing what to do with it is something we are wildly uneducated on as a society, but yet is core foundation to an EAZYLIVING life. So here, I’ll briefly touch on our approach to personal finance and how we approached it throughout the year.
You could say I’m Dave Ramsey-ish. Rice and beans, beans and rice! If you know, you know. All that means is, all our finances are joint, we avoid debt aside from the house, we track our finances monthly, we invest in our retirement, live below are means (just), try not to overcomplicate the rest. We’re ‘-ish’ because we’ve never had an issue with debt and are travel points collectors on the credit cards, which has been valuable. All in all, it’s a get rich slow mentality.
Alana and I grew up with different financial approaches. Me being more on the scarce side, Alana on the abundant, in terms of mindset. It’s taken time for us to find that middle ground. She showed me you’re able to spend more on the experience and it’s going to be worth it, I’ve shown her, having a plan and working it simplifies the whole game. Whether it’s Dave Ramsey, The Money Guys, Financial Tortoise, Scott Galloway, whoever it is, they all generally say the same thing. I believe the most important thing is that you just pick a strategy or someone to follow and automate it, so the emotion is removed.
I always say America is the best place to live if you can afford it, and the worst if you can’t. No one is coming to save you here and you’re always two bad decisions away from financial ruin, or at least that’s how I feel. Luckily, we’re on the front end of the equation, but I mention ‘just’ above because we came in at 2k positive variance for = Income – (Spent/Saved/Invested). Closest to date. A new house, a new baby will do it to you.
It just shows the power of tracking (are you seeing a theme?). Now that our lives are becoming more expensive with our family growing, it’s more important than ever that we know what every dollar is doing and that it’s allocated. Before baby, we were privileged enough to outpace any spend, so although we tracked and worked the plan, we still had surplus. Now, that it has tightened up, achieving a small positive variance just tells me we have every dollar working for us and allocated which provides a great peace of mind.
EAZYLIVING
I mentioned the end of EAZYLIVING last year, and apart from the EAZY OPEN, that has been true. I haven’t thought about it or created anything for it. Yet it still lives in me and would argue it’s more alive than ever now that we’re finally settled in Durham.
The goal with it has always been centered around some form of community, and creating the life you want to live, albeit virtually given I’ve not been still in a city or country throughout my 20s. I think that was the struggle, the constant moving on my part, the want to create community, but never understanding the virtual platform in which to make it. In reality, I always wanted it to be physical but was working with what I had.
Now in Durham, a town I love, a neighborhood I love, with roots in the ground and the foreseeable future here in front of us, I feel I can start creating it. When choosing where we wanted to live, we were very intentional in ensuring that we chose a place that was optimized for lifestyle – walkable to groceries and coffee, bikeable to town, access to nature, nice neighborhood, a garage (wildly underestimated lifestyle asset). You never really know if you’re going to get that when moving to a new city, but we did. In America, this is especially hard due to every city being designed to optimize the American dream of owning a house with a yard and a driveway. Every city is designed for cars, with suburbs and HOAs being the ticket for most Americans.
Now that we have it, it’s time to use it and create it. And we are! Most weeks I’m able to not step foot in my car, I bike to work every day, I walk the trails every day, we know all the neighbors and get along great, I have my favorite bar in town I watch all the football, my gym is walkable, date night is bikeable. This is EAZYLIVING. It’s one thing to say you want a certain lifestyle, it’s another to put in the effort to live it. And by effort, I mean being a friend, trying to make new friends, showing up every week, saying hello every day, helping a neighbor, creating a community. It’s an intentional act, not a given because you live somewhere that is optimized for it.
Creativity
I think because I work in an industry where people’s job title is ‘creative’ I have a weird association with calling myself one. I’m getting to the point where I’m allowing myself to do it, as I know everyone is creative, it’s simply about finding your medium in which to share it. My medium is still undefined but more so a way of living as I view it. This year I got to explore new creative channels in working on the house, bikes, and woodworking.
My Dad can build or fix anything. I’m 100% confident he could re-build Nottingham on his own in 12-months if anything ever happened. That to say, I’ve always seen it, been around it, and knew it’s in me. Honestly, I’ve always thought I’m more suited to a career using my hands and body. Which really is no surprise considering I was never good at school and always excelled at sports and design/technology.
But, working with my dad when I was young and seeing how physically demanding it was, I always thought there must be easier ways to making money and not have to kill your body at the same time. Given the current state of my body, I can’t help but feel I was completely wrong and often think that maybe the desk has killed me.
Anyway, the owning of our house has opened a new avenue for me to be creative. This year we’ve re-done multiple rooms, re-landscaped around the house, started woodworking, creating a cloffice (closet office & shelves) and making a bar in the garage. During my surgery recovery I turned my bike obsession into restoring and converting old 90s mountain bikes into city cruisers. Currently have 10 bikes in the garage, 5 active, 5 future projects. My top YouTube wrapped category this year was interior design. I really enjoy it.
End
A bloody book this year, ay. 7th year writing these and the longest one yet. I guess it’s to be expected that the more you live and grow the more story there is to tell. As I close this out my brain is starting to feel clean, last year is out of my mind and I can put my focus and planning onto the next. As I did last year, I won’t be doing goals again but intentions. Those intentions are to be thought of once I hit publish on this.
You may notice in this review or my review over the years, or in your own life that you can never have it all. That’s obvious right. But is it? As humans we strive for so much, constant evolution and improvement. Society/social media is constantly shoving in our faces what we think success looks like in terms of a job, money, location, etc.… but you know even those people have something in their life that is not clicking.
For me it’s been my job or my body, leading to depression. But, when you write something like this and see it all laid out in front of you, you can see how the scale is tipped. My scale this year is tipped pretty heavily to the good side. I have an amazing family, I live somewhere I love, I have a nice community, my pain is low, I’m financially low-stress, I have creative outlets, and a free-thinking brain. I’m living it! And I’m happy I’m able to recognize it.
If you’ve made it this far, thanks for reading. I write this because it’s deeply therapeutic. I share it because I’m a sharer and hope that you feel comfortable to share something with me in the future.
Keep it EAZY.
Ryan