Dearest Emma,
2024 was a year. It’s a short sentiment, a minuscule remark, but it’s more full than anyone can ever realize. You should be proud of yourself for all that you accomplished. You should be proud of yourself for all that you discovered. You should be proud of yourself for all the moments you embraced laughter as much as you embraced tears. Most of all, you should be proud of yourself for your mistakes. We tend to elevate the conceptual blank slate when we leave a year behind. We covet a fresh start, for anything that is a blunder makes us cringe more than necessary. When we are on the precipice of exiting an old year, entering a new one is a welcomed sight, for year after year, we search for the perfect 365 days, during which we do nothing regrettable. It is a utopian year where regret concludes, and thus, self-scrutinization secedes. We hardly ever desire a year to be full of missteps and mistakes. We hardly ever leap out of mistakes only to want to leap into new ones. Perhaps this will be the year for that Emma. Perhaps 2025 will finally be 365 days of embracing the awkward and living carefree in the imperfect and accidental. I want to give you, dearest Emma, some words of wisdom to carry with you as you dive into the potential of a clean calendar. If you carry these words and treat these words with weight, perhaps you will also carry mistakes in your heart with as much weight as those words.Â
May you embrace that regret is unchangeable. You have spent too many years cringing, and now it is time to view what is cringe-worthy as actually living life to the fullest. Your mistakes are the distinguishable brushstrokes on the canvas that is you. Take pride in that, for if you had brushstrokes that were like any other’s, you would not be you. If you attempt to eradicate the act of making mistakes, you are eradicating yourself. Everyone’s mistakes emblemize them as their own selves. Don’t erase the blunders, for you are erasing the beauty.Â
When you stumble, revel in all that your imperfect moments have to offer. Chuckle about men who kiss like chickens pecking for food on a dusty Kansas dirt road. Giggle about how you kissed the boy’s cheek for a few seconds too long. Guffaw about your social miscues. Hold nothing against yourself. Alternatively, retrieve your mistakes with all the lovability that you can muster, and the new year will not be one that leaves you craving, in a constant state of desire; the new year will be one that offers you unlimited potential, and you will be compelled to use it to your advantage as best you can. You will live in the hustle and bustle of 2025 feeling fulfilled, for you no longer wish to escape into a blank-slated utopia. You will not wish to perfect your life. If you embrace the fantastically flawed, there will no longer be the destructive compulsion to micromanage moments.Â
Remember to love yourself as we leave this year behind and head into one that is new. It has not been easy to love yourself. I know this, Emma, and I know you also know this. You have wasted time wanting to be beautiful by escaping into a distant appearance of lovability for others. You never rid yourself of distance and have loved yourself in a truly compelling way. Let this be the year that you feel less susceptible to only finding love through others. Let yourself simply sit, acknowledging that it is ok to be scared to find sustenance in yourself. You’re never scared of writing essays and never daunted by research, so why not think of yourself as the primary source of love and fulfillment! This year, remember to love the parts of yourself that you despise the most. Find unparalleled beauty in your stomach eczema. Revel in the little dark hairs you pluck with a tweezer above your lip. Be enthusiastic about the in-betweenness of your wavy hair and its occasionally frizzy frenzy. Cheer for the jiggle of your thighs and for the hazel that is in your eyes. Please adore the way your stomach isn’t perfectly flat, and find joy when it pours a little bit over your faded snugged wasted ripped jeans. Remember to glance down in the shower and smile at the dents and stretches in your legs. Be grateful you aren’t plastic. You can move. You can be who you want to be. Loving yourself is more difficult than falling out of love with someone. You can always remind yourself and know that the person you once loved is now gone, out of your life, but you, you are never out of the picture—you are the picture. You are the frame, the subject, the smile, and the image. Stop trying to tear the picture into pieces. Stop contemplating a retake. This image, you, is more remarkable than any reconstructed image. Stop trying to redo to revamp. This is the year that the revamped you is the you without revamping or redoing. I always want you to know that you hold so much beauty inside and out, from the way you quirkily twist the end of your hair amidst a worry or obsessive thought, to the way you lock yourself away in bed till you finish a compelling novel. You are a star that stands out from the rest of the constellations, and you shine as bright as can be when you Lindy Hop to Frank Sinatra, use your hands as a faux saxophone to croon the infamous notes of Careless Whisper, and use words as your greatest weapon, to speak rather than to hurt. Your clothing hugs your body, making you appear a beautiful, quintessential librarian, and don’t you ever stop shelving the different books that manifest from the occurrences of your life. Your green eyes shine and your smile is infectious. Love yourself in 2025 to amplify your infectiousness, not to hinder it. Love the way that your bathing suit shows off the curves you criticize and the marks you believe misbehave. In 2025, learn to be ok with all that is you. Learn to let go and love your form, figure, soul, and style without ever feeling the need to manage it or change to be a better version of yourself.Â
Embrace the unknown. Embrace the infinite possibilities that 2025 holds. Instead of considering what needs to happen, settle into the notion of what could happen. Dreams will unfold that you never dreamed about. Laughs will abound that never were thought to be laughed. The vastness of the world and the incomprehensible ambiguity of the universe are both accepted facts, so why do we need to know everything that comes our way? Why do we need to wish or pray in such harshness that it transforms into energetic fruition? Find joy in knowing that you don’t know what the inevitable something is that is coming for you. Dance with your arms spread wide open, throwing your head, face, and smile up to the vague. When you love the unknown, you immerse yourself in unparalleled gratitude. Even when you do not know what comes your way, have fun not knowing. Enjoy the present moment rather than solely your future. Worry about yourself now, not in ten years. Things will play out, and rather than control that, accept it. While you might feel that the great unknown will swallow you up and will ambiguously torture you, think of what could be in what will be. The great unknown is the greatest fear. All you can do is open the door and let the light in, whatever that light may bring. Find happiness in that. Life is the greatest spit take, so laugh always when possible Emma, I know this may seem overwhelming and may be hard to always believe. I want you to hold onto these words, re-read them from time to time, to see that you have believed these sentiments, and thus you can go into the new year always believing.
With Heartfelt Affection,Â
Emma