And just like that, the 2010s have come and gone.

The decade has been a roller-coaster ride to say the least. And a little over 12 hours into 2020 and a fresh 10 years ahead, the phrase that keeps sticking out in my head about what I feel coming into this chapter in life is: “guarded optimism.” 

The past decade I would say, has redefined my outlook in life. While some things and traits remain the same for me (outspoken being one of them), the past 10 years had a tremendous impact and effect on me that it shook some of my beliefs and principles to the core that I literally had to step away from social media during the second half of the decade to re-evaluate everything. And as many of you know and have seen, I use–or have used–social media as a playground; especially for a Gemini person such as myself. And the ironic thing is, I stopped using Twitter about the same time as I started to post on Facebook more and more; and when I withdrew from Facebook in 2016, I started to see Twitter as a more simpler alternative and slowly started to use that again until my account is active again.

Cliche as it may sound, as 2019 slowly drew to a close, I thought of using the new year–and decade at that–to re-establish my online presence. I’m still going back and forth on returning to Facebook, but I thought, why not go back to where it all started for me: blogging? I know I have written several entries in years past about being an active blogger again (or at least write or talk about everyday stuff here) and not following through with it, but after going through what I experienced, maybe that can help in creating some new material. Additionally, my good and dear friend Liz and I have been having discussions for close to a year now about doing a podcast since we’ve had lots and lots of conversations about different topics that we thought, “why not share these conversations and what’s on our minds to the world? Who knows, other people might be going through the same things we are and our perspectives might be helpful to them.” But we will draw the line on being so-called “influencers.” For one, I don’t like that term, and I’m not the kind of person to tell people what to do with their lives. We can share what we have done or what we experienced, but in no certain way would we endorse, prod, coerce, or even suggest a course of action. People can use our experiences as guides, but we won’t be held accountable for their decisions. We’ll probably explain more of that when we finally get that podcast going. Hopefully.

Yeah, so it’s back to basics for now. Writing has been my outlet, and I would want to rediscover and reinvigorate that passion this year. And with a fresh past decade of experience in the vault, it should help fuel the fire, so to speak.

Reset.

Reboot.

Let’s do this. I’m back. Hopefully. Happy new year, everyone.