2025: The Year I Stopped Pretending I Was Fine

2025 hasn’t been loud

It hasn’t been dramatic in the way movies promise or collapses warn us about.


It’s been quieter than that. Heavier. The kind of year that doesn’t knock you over — it slowly asks you to sit down.

If I had to name the dominant feeling of this year, it would be exhaustion.


Not the kind sleep fixes. The kind that comes from carrying hope and disappointment in the same suitcase.

Because alongside the tiredness, there is hope.


And alongside the hope, a sharp edge of disillusionment.


And underneath all of it, a frustrating, persistent thought I wish I didn’t have but do:

What if I never actually get the things in life I want?

That question has been humming in the background of 2025 like a faulty appliance — not loud enough to panic, but impossible to ignore.

The strange mix of healing and heartbreak.

One of the strangest contradictions of this year is how quickly my body healed.

A broken foot.


Constant digestive problems.


And a recovery that surprised even the professionals.

On paper, it’s a win. A miracle, even.

And yet, emotionally, this has been one of the harder years to navigate.

Because while my body was repairing itself efficiently and quietly, my inner world was wrestling with a much messier injury: self-disappointment.

The feeling that I’ve let people down.


That I haven’t shown up the way I intended to.


That my capacity didn’t match my standards.

There’s a particular kind of ache that comes from being deeply conscientious and deeply human at the same time. From caring — and still falling short.

No one really warns you about that part.

What I’m noticing in others too

This isn’t just personal.


You can feel it everywhere.

Burnt-out professionals quietly questioning lives that once looked “successful.”


Capable people losing motivation, not because they’re lazy, but because they’re tired of chasing versions of happiness that never quite land.


People doing all the “right things” and still feeling oddly unfulfilled.

There’s a collective sense that the old formulas don’t work anymore — but the new ones haven’t fully arrived.

So we hover.

Functional, but not inspired.


Grateful, but dissatisfied.


Holding it together, but wondering why it feels so heavy to do so.

The truth I’m slowly accepting

Here’s what 2025 is teaching me — reluctantly, gently, over time:

You can be healing and hurting simultaneously.


You can be hopeful and disillusioned in the same breath.


You can be doing your best and still feel like it’s not enough.

None of those things cancel each other out.

And maybe the problem isn’t that we’re failing.

Maybe the problem is that we’re still measuring ourselves by expectations that were never designed for the season we’re in now.

If this year feels hard for you too

If you’re reading this and quietly nodding —


If you’re successful on paper but tired in your bones —


If you’re questioning your direction without having the energy to reinvent everything —

You’re not behind.

You’re likely just standing at a threshold that doesn’t come with instructions.

One small, aligned step (nothing heroic)

Not a life overhaul.


Not a five-year plan.


Not another attempt to “fix yourself.”

Just this:

Pause long enough to ask, “What actually feels honest right now?”

Not impressive.


Not productive.


Honest.

Then take one small step in that direction — even if it doesn’t make sense yet.

2025 wasn't asking for grand transformations.


It was asking for quieter integrity.


For fewer performances.


For a little more truth, even when it’s uncomfortable.

And maybe that’s enough for now.

If nothing else, let this be a reminder:

You’re not the only one who found this last year complicated.


You’re not failing — you’re adjusting.


And you’re allowed to move forward gently.

Even slowly.

Especially slowly.