With the year officially in full swing, it’s hitting many of us that the changing of the calendar year might not actually change our current reality. Many of us have been managing (or trying our best to manage!) all the swaths of “free time” we now have.

Free time spent looking for jobs if we lost them, picking up a new side gig teaching our kids virtual school, and doing whatever we can to positively impact our mental health.

It’s tempting to decide that this is THE YEAR to set things straight, especially after what we all collectively and individually went through last year. It’s been so tumultuous that not only was the word of the year “pandemic,” but it was literally just one bad (but true) meme after another. To make a list of all the skills, activities, tasks, and goals we want to achieve…it feels so tangible, soothing.

However, it’s likely that this year, and even next, won’t be exactly “normal” either. The future holds a myriad of new possibilities and it’s likely that change will be a common theme throughout. So, making a list of goals we want to accomplish? It just might not be the most realistic expectation.

It's entirely possible to feel motivated for the positive things that this year can bring without making ambitious personal or professional plans that depend on things getting back to normal. As we’ve seen, this is simply out of our hands and no amount of pretending otherwise will conjure a different reality.

While I don’t knock having goals or aspirations (we need those…eventually), I’m choosing to look at this year with hope. I have no idea what’s going to happen in the coming months, but I’m hopeful we will all end up better than we are today, better than where we’ve been this year, and that a sense of normalcy that we are each individually comfortable with will indeed return.

I am hopeful that at some point, my hope will translate into action. But for today, and as we wrap up what was a truly unprecedented year, I’m simply hoping.