At the beginning of this school year, I wrote myself a letter to read at the end of the year. It outlined some of the goals and hopes that I had in mind for myself at that time. Since my semester is pretty much over now, I decided it was a good time to look back at that letter.

Needless to say, this year ended up being nowhere near what I expected it to be. So many things happened that I didn't think would, and it changed the course of what my year looked like, and because of that, I didn't stick to my "plan."

I did accomplish my goal of getting mostly As in all of my classes. I did get better at stage management skills. I feel like I am a better theatre artist overall.

I did push myself slightly out of my comfort zone, but nowhere near as far as I wanted to.

My doubt in my career choice didn't become clearer, though. In fact, because of things that happened this year, I am more confused than I was before.

I still haven't learned to put myself first. I'm getting better, but for someone like me, it is a very difficult skill to learn. I am trying.

I also didn't find the love I was looking for, especially in myself. As I have realized more clearly this year, the journey to self-love is a very slow and difficult one. I know it takes time and that I'll find it someday.

My point in sharing this is not to complain about not doing or finding the things that I wanted to. My hope is that you can see that life doesn't always go the way we plan, and sometimes we have to shift gears. Even though I didn't accomplish some of the things I wanted to, I still found a lot of good and accomplished other great things.

Especially during this time, it can be hard to see the good in things, but I hope that you can at least find something to hold onto. The most important thing to remember is that you tried best that you could, and sometimes that is all that matters.