Full Circle with the Sun
Reflecting on This Wonky-Ass Orbit Called 2025
As the minutes fall off into another night sky and the universe gets ready for another scripted performance, somewhat similar to what we’ve experienced before, I hold my breath. The stars move into order, planets align in a way they have for billions of years, and we approach this thing humans named January—what better time than now to reflect on the past 12 months before we fall back into the same patterns as the stars?
I hardly think in numbers, though I recognize patterns. The way the sun sets behind the same trees, how people move around me, how my posture shifts when I feel uncomfortable. Those patterns often feel like predestined trails of stardust, merging to a known result and creating, well, the expected. I realize now that this constant need to improve yourself and grow has poisoned my understanding of self. Somewhere along the way, growth stopped being curiosity and turned into surveillance—me watching myself too closely, never allowing arrival. I’ve outgrown so many versions of myself this year that I am now left standing among the crumbs of the food I didn’t touch. They’re molding away at my feet and I am left with cleaning up the mess I’ve made—yet again. I’ve disappointed myself so often these past months, but also surprised myself in the best and worst ways possible. I endured, I crumbled, I adapted. And now I stand before an unfinished version of self, aware that 12 months can really change anything.
Twelve means being naive this year. Like running to the playground expecting everyone to join you when you didn’t bother inviting anyone. Letting go of versions of yourself, but mostly letting go of others has come with its own kind of heartbreak that not even faith could cradle. The nights have cooled and I have forgotten to put on a coat—again. And it’s exhausting. The world has spun so out of control and has gotten so loud that even alien life would turn around once they heard our indifference towards one another shouting in the distance. They’d let us succumb to the wars of our own making—wars with others, but also wars within ourselves. There’s nothing more frightening than knowing that half the time we were trying to cope with reality, and the other half letting our phones make us even sicker.
Grief is the only thing I have left now. For this year started full of light and ends in a pit of darkness. And weirdly enough, I’ve said it a million times this year: I feel almost schizophrenic. Like I am so happy when I portray the version of myself I’ve created for people online or publicly, but so shattered when reality calls and I draw inward. Pathetic, I think, though I know that’s the voice of exhaustion, not truth. I am so over staring at pixels to fill the void the universe has left me with. And I am so over pretending to be someone that I am not. But now, I’m just tired of pretending that this is the life I wanted to create for myself when I had all the options and choices laid out for me. I’ve bent myself into shapes I don’t understand anymore.
Danced, laughed, cried, yelled—shouted into my pillow when I couldn’t bear the weight. Smiled, endured, believed—that anything could make you happy and uncomfortable at the same time. And now really reflecting these past months I have realized that I have learned nothing that I didn’t know before. Not because the knowledge was missing, but because knowing something and living it are galaxies apart—and this year made me cross that distance the hard way.
But I also dared. I dared to speak my mind or stay silent when I felt like it. I dared to jump out of planes, to fall in love, to cry in rooms of people or dance by myself in my living room. There were no limits to the self. I just did it—and it was worthy of wasting my time. And while I write this, I suddenly feel a sense of calm. Because even in the darkness, it was really worth it. This is life. The messy bits as much as the tidied ones. And as much as metaphoric language has saved me this year, I feel the urge to put it very bluntly into a cringey lyric that is playing on repeat in my brain currently: ain’t no mountain high enough, and ain’t no river wide enough to keep me from getting to you (and no, not like the song suggests, but you as in my alter-ego, the version of myself I haven’t met yet. I will get to her. Sooner or later I’ll find myself anew).
I can’t help but cry in defeat, for this year has pushed me to my breaking point. But now I can dare to dream newer, bigger, fuller, and hope for time to be wasted all over again. Because that’s the beauty of life, isn’t it? While the earth follows its script, we just follow the callings of our own makings.
I dare you to shout into the night sky: I am becoming. Not because it feels good, but because it’s true. Another orbit doesn’t promise answers, only motion. And sometimes, movement is the only mercy.