Welcome to my first coffee post of 2017! My birthday was this weekend so I figured it’d only be fitting to use a coffee cake image for this post. I hope you all are enjoying 2017 so far. 

If we were having coffee, I’d tell you I officially started back to work this past week. So far, it’s been okay. It’s actually been pretty slow there so most of our hours are being cut. I don’t mind too much though because I’ll be working from 8:30 to 5:30 instead of my usual 10:30 to 7:00. So I’ll actually be getting done earlier, exactly like I wanted. I also haven’t been stressing out too much about the problems at work since I’ve been back, which has probably helped me significantly. It’s almost as if the storm has already passed and we are simply just drifting out to sea. I know having Monday off will definitely help. 

I think what’s helped though was I had time off away from work. Speaking of which (if I haven’t already), Christmas break went well. My grandmother was down through all of it so I spent my days with her doing whatever she wanted, whether it be baking cookies or decorating the Christmas tree. It was nice seeing her, even when she was getting on my nerves like she sometimes tends to do. The only disappointment with Christmas break has been my laptop. First my Internet connection wasn’t fully functional, now my charger doesn’t work anymore. So that’ll need to be taken care of at some point. Hopefully, I’ll just need to get a new charger and not have to replace it completely. But for now, I’ve been using my tablet for all my Internet needs, including my blog posts. And it’ll continue to be that way until the laptop situation is handled. 

Speaking of writing, I have some news for the new year. The platform I’ve been using for some of my video game posts and other posts, Creators is creating another platform. It’s going to be for Indie gaming and is going to be a great way for gamers and developers to interact with each other. If you want to know what I’m talking about, here you go. Anyway, I received an email after I signed up about that they are looking for writers and people to interact in the community, to email back if your interested. So I emailed back letting them know I’m definitely interested. So I’ll be doing that now too, which is really cool and exciting to me. This platform is supposed to launch this month so I can’t wait to see how this’ll work out for me. I think it’ll be an amazing opportunity to be able to write about one of my passions and hopefully make good connections within the video gaming industry. If you want to see some of my posts already on the Creators platform (some of which aren’t on my blog because I’m taking their Creators Academy course to become a Verified Creator), here is the link. 

If we were having coffee, I’d tell you I feel like I’m doing well with writing more this year. I’ve already written so much and we’ve just gotten halfway through January. And this is just the beginning. I saw a Flash Fiction Challenge the other day I’m very interested in doing. I’m not going to spoil you with the details because I want you to read it. All I’ll say is it’s probably going to be super personal. Either way, expect that to come as soon as I publish this coffee post because that’s what I want to write about next. Hopefully, I’ll be able to continue writing at this magnitude, but only time will tell. 

I’d like to also tell you that I think I’ll reach my reading goal for this year. Already, I’ve finished reading Lair of Dreams and The Book Jumper and am getting started with Crown of Midnight, the second book in the Throne of Glass series. I’ve also recently been playing The World Ends With You and just recently finished watching A Series of Unfortunate Events on Netflix. I plan on continuing to play this game and watch Criminal Minds whenever the mood sets me. 

I know I’ve already mentioned my birthday, but with getting older, I usually like to quickly reflect on what I think I’ve learned. What I can currently say about being 23 is that there were quite a bit of ups and downs. I know a part of my problem was that I was stressing out about work too much. To the point where it affected me emotionally both on and off the job. I also had a new friendship begin to form that’s continuing to grow in completely unexpected ways. At the age of 23, I was also struggling to continue to let my broken heart heal, to let go of the past and embrace the future and just not worry about things too much. In essence, I was somewhat emotionally unbalanced and reaching to my breaking point. 

But after some much needed thinking, I’ve been looking at things with a different perspective. And I’ve come to realize that there are only so many things that I can control. What other people do or say is beyond my control. How I react to situations is what matters. So what I’m hoping to do now that I’m 24 is not let things easily get to me. To try and stop the unneeded drama at work from  causing me stress and continue to realize I can’t please everybody. 

I’ve also come to realize I’m much stronger than I think. That I’m going to be alright even when things seem dark in the world. That my dreams are possible as long as I continue working towards them. I know I’m already healing and am proud of what I’ve accomplished this year alone, both with my writing on my blog and taking care of myself. I hope that with turning 24, life will continue to bless me in unexpected ways and I’ll be able to accomplish my dreams to the fullest. 

With this in mind, I wish you all a good weekend. I hope 2017 hasn’t been too bad for you so far and hope you have a wonderful weekend!