Morgane's 2023 Year-In-Review

2023 was certainly a year. That’s pretty much all I can say.

At the beginning of 2023, as I usually do, I outlined my goals as if 2023 would be my year. Those goals were described in the first post on this blog, which I swore I was going to update every single week during the year.

That didn’t happen, and a lot of those goals didn’t happen. But, before the year rolls over to 2024 (and I make goals that I sincerely do hope I can accomplish this time), I want to take this moment to focus on what I did accomplish (and highlight some of my posts while I’m at it).

My professional goals changed in March when I decided to switch my major from meteorology to sustainability, which I highlighted in a post. So far, this switch was probably the best choice I ever made, as I’ve managed to find a more sustainable balance to my life (which has allowed me to be more consistent on my posts here, among other things).

The spring also brought an amazing opportunity where I got to write for a short narrative podcast in one of my writing classes. The experience of writing for a different format taught me a lot about writing in general, but I also fell in love with narrative podcasts in general.

In fact, I began to write my own narrative podcast for NaNoWriMo in November. While I didn’t get as far as I wanted due to burnout, I solidified the project as something I would like to return to and produce once I have some more energy and time. 

Outside of writing, I did manage to consume more media, mostly in the form of books and video games. But, that’s a lot better than I did in 2022, so I’m taking the win. 

In addition, while not a specific goal of mine, I did make a lot of yummy food throughout the year, which I am taking a moment to show the photos of (at least, the photos I remembered to actually take of said food).

The biggest thing I wanted to highlight, though, was a special announcement I made a few weeks ago: my plan to publish Ghosts of the Steel Road next fall. This novel has had a special place in my heart for a long time, and for the first time, I feel confident that it is close to the vision I have for it. I hope to come up with a better timeline in the beginning of 2024, but I do still have to do a bit more research on the exact self-publishing route I’m going to take.

For my blog in general, I overall posted 16 blogs over this year (despite the setbacks in the first half of the year), and got over 60 views on the posts! I know that may not be the most impressive numbers for some, but for someone who is still learning marketing and how to run a blog, I'm proud of myself for writing anything that others want to read.

Overall, while I could certainly lament and wish some things went better, I did well in 2023. Definitely was more in the “surviving” camp rather than the “thriving” camp at times, but what I managed to accomplish (including some things which I won’t share on this blog) is impressive for just surviving.

So, I will take this last week of the year to both relax and prepare for the upcoming year, and hope it’ll be a bit more thriving than surviving.