OBSERVATIONS & OTHER ACCIDENTS

Spoiler: you change — or you don’t.

The year is almost coming to an end, and with it comes the moment to review what has been learned. As has probably become clear in this space, I have little patience for new age philosophies, which, to me, are little more than romanticised versions of what has always been obvious to us as human beings. We have always reviewed the years that passed. We have always kept diaries — which, incidentally, is my preferred kind of reading. Every great writer kept a diary. Journaling is simply the name we now give to a practice that is far from new.

Writing is, in itself, an act that helps us put our thoughts in order. Perhaps that is why I have always written — or at least whenever my availability, mental included, allowed it — on a daily basis. As I have written here before, putting my feelings into words is, for me, a way of releasing what no longer fits inside. During a very particular phase of my life, this practice became both daily and essential. I did it consistently for a good two or three years. Today, when I read what I wrote back then, I feel grateful for how much I have evolved as a human being — for how much work I have done on a mind that was never particularly calm (and which, according to my psychiatrist, will never be completely so — “and that’s a good thing”, he says).

When I look at who I was and who I am becoming, a sense of hope emerges: the hope that I will learn to inhabit this planet better — one that is far from being for the faint of heart. I see myself becoming someone who is no longer a prisoner of herself, something many people never manage to achieve. It takes courage to look at who we truly are. It takes effort, and very often, it is not something we feel like doing. And that’s the thing about writing. Documenting our worst moments gives us the ability to confront our darker side — and, just as importantly, the parts of ourselves that require the most work. Not “work” in the most holistic sense of the word; whether we like it or not, we are always learning, sometimes by force.

I am, in fact, irritated by the statement “I’m working on myself”, as if this were a deliberate project one decides to undertake. Growth is not something we choose to start; it is something that happens. What we can choose is whether or not we internalise what life teaches us. Some time ago, I wrote a piece for Vogue about the idea that wisdom comes with age. The angle was meant as a statement, but I turned it into a question. Age can indeed bring wisdom. Experience can offer us countless lessons — but only if we are willing to learn.

That is why, when I revisit words I once wrote, I feel a certain comfort in realising that I am no longer in the same place. That I did, in fact, choose to learn from life’s lessons. I chose to transform the worst moments into learning experiences. I could have remained there, in victimhood — a theme I have also written about here before. But I chose not to.

As 2025 comes to an end, I find myself in a significantly better place. I would go so far as to say that my life has taken a 180-degree turn for the better — and this did not happen because I sat down to meditate in a cloud of incense, waiting for a miracle to occur. I see a world turned upside down. Online, complaints are abundant. For half the world, horror is a very real reality — circumstances imposed on people who never chose to live through wars they did not ask for, or to face illnesses that arrived without warning. But for the other half, immaturity and the comfort zone — which so often means refusing to grow — lie at the root of so many complaints and laments. Growing up takes effort. It is not something that happens lightly.

Evolution is part of life. And, as I have written here before, it does not need to become an obsession — quite the opposite. We are human, we make mistakes, and that is a good thing. But at this particular time of year, rather than making predictions about what we want from the year ahead, perhaps we should look back instead. Perhaps we should review who we were a year ago — and who we are today.

A change of digits, on its own, promises nothing. It is simply life giving us, once again, the chance to revisit our passage through it — who we were, who we are, and who we hope to become. But without miracles. No list of resolutions will save us if we do not first make peace with the chaos we carry inside — or at least grant it some leniency. And so I read myself back, I revise myself, and sometimes I give myself a gentle kiss on the shoulder — other times, a couple of slaps for being so human and, therefore, occasionally so foolish. That is life. And what matters is what we choose to do with it — in joy and in sorrow. So let us not blame the number that changed, but rather the selves we continued to be, year after year after year after year.