Hello, bookish besties and festive friends! I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas and holidays!

So today, I’m here to wrap up 2025.
And before you say it: yes, I’m fully aware there are still six days left in the year. But those days are going to be spent being cozy, vibing, and intentionally forgetting the existence of calendars. Which means now is the perfect time to reflect before disappearing back into my blanket cocoon.

Let’s get into it.

WHAT I SURVIVED & LEARNED IN 2025

2025 didn’t play fair. It came at me with losses I never expected, endings I wasn’t prepared for, and moments that left me guessing. There were days I felt like I was just trying to stay upright in the middle of emotional aftershocks that kept showing up uninvited.

I won’t spell out every storyline. Some things belong to real life, not the internet. But if you know me IRL, you know there were heartbreaks, shifts, and fractures that changed the entire shape of my life…not just the year.

And still…here I am.

I learned that I’m resilient in ways I didn’t even know were possible. I learned how to keep moving even when everything felt heavy. I learned that at the end of the day, the one person you truly have – the one person you must have – is yourself.

Somewhere along the way, I met a new version of myself. Not the one who was trying to hold everything together, or the one who kept shrinking to make others comfortable, or the one who kept hoping people would stay. No. This version is steadier. Softer in the right places and harder in the necessary ones. She knows her worth. She knows her limits. She knows how to stand alone without feeling lonely.

She survived things I thought would destroy me. She didn’t. She adapted. She rose. She kept going.

She’s the strongest person I know.

PROUD MOMENTS

Let’s talk victories. Moments where I genuinely paused, looked at myself, and said, “Okay queen, I see you. Growth looks good on you.”

I chose myself and walked away from something I needed to.

There was a moment – a very loud, very clarifying moment – where I realized peace wasn’t going to magically appear in a situation that kept draining me. So I did the hard thing. I stepped back. I detached faster than I expected, which told me everything I needed to know about how ready I was to heal. Choosing myself wasn’t just empowering; it was necessary. I stopped watering a plant that wasn’t growing and started tending to my own garden instead.

I started protecting my peace like it was under the witness protection program.

This year became the one where I stopped negotiating with people who disrupted my spirit. I set boundaries. I said no. I said “this doesn’t work for me” without a dissertation-length explanation. And once I saw how quiet life could be without chaos? Yeah. I’ll never go back.

I got my permit.

Yes, I’m a late bloomer. Yes, I’m aware. Yes, you can fight me.
There’s something hilariously empowering about being in your grown era and still hitting milestones at your own pace. Getting that permit felt like meeting teenage me and saying, “Sorry it took a while, babe, but we got here.”

I read 13 books this year.

Not my usual 75, but listen – these 13 carried me through some heavy chapters. Quality over quantity.

I started this blog.

What started as “maybe I’ll just casually post things” turned into my cozy little corner of the internet. It reminds me that my voice still matters and it’s good to just get my thoughts out of my head. Hitting publish again and again is bringing me joy I didn’t realize I needed.

I did a ropes course.

Look. I am terrified of heights. Terrified. And yet there I was, willingly flying through the sky like I was Cynthia Erivo belting Defying Gravity (I almost did. Still might next year if I do this thing again.)

I shared my singing on Smule and TikTok.

You probably wouldn’t realize this, readers, but I’m actually a shy person in real life. Singing at the top of my lungs for people who aren’t my very annoyed family? Liberating. There’s something deeply vulnerable about letting people hear your actual voice – not the curated one, but the real one. And people actually liked some of my stuff?

I started writing The Book.

The one that’s lived in my mind since 8th grade. These characters have grown up with me (literally, they went through the education process with me and now have steady jobs). Finally putting them on the page felt like closing a loop my younger self opened.

HIGHLIGHT MOMENT OF 2025

I became 14 again for one glorious, feral, life-altering night.

It started simple enough: I went with some friends to see the Jonas Brothers and All-American Rejects – which alone was enough to resurrect Teen Me from the emotional graveyard she’s been lounging in since 2009. But then. THEN. As if God looked at me and said, “You know what? She deserves this” – Hoobastank, Jesse McCarney, and DEMI LOVATO came out as surprise performers.

When I tell you my soul left my body…
My inner teen didn’t just return – she busted into MetLife Stadium wearing sparkly lip gloss and a graphic tee from Wet Seal, screaming every single lyric like she was trying to summon the ghost of her MySpace profile.

It wasn’t just a concert. It was time travel! It was therapy disguised as a setlist!

It was one of the brightest, softest, wildest moments of my entire year. A reminder that I’m still capable of a joy that fills my lungs, lights up my face, and makes every version of me – past, present, future – feel alive.

OUTRO

And that’s a wrap on 2025. I survived, I grew, I learned a lot about myself.

Bring on 2026 – gently, please.