The year is gone… good riddance.

Confession time: I'm wasn't really that excited for New Years Eve. Or New Years Day. I had to work. No parties to go to. There was a Single Adult Dance a half hour away, but ha ha ha NO!

I've been struggling not to get in a slump. The week before Christmas I had a day off in the middle of the week. I was excited. I was going to go to the temple, workout, clean, etc. Instead, that morning I checked my email and, well, a path I was hoping would open up, turned out to be blocked rather heavily. It's not impossible, but at the time, the news deflated me. And I'm still not sure if it will open up. This is hard because I had prayed and felt this path was right, but now I doubted. It was one way to get back to the UK and it hurt that way seemed closed.

The email brought back doubts and fears. So instead of doing what I planned, I went for a walk and talked to Heavenly Father and listened to Christmas music, then I decided to read a book. And that's how I spent the rest of the day. Turns out it was a very triggery book too. WHY do we have to have descriptions, people? Just say "they kissed."

So I skipped over those parts, but when it came 6 o'clock, I felt guilty.

I deliberately wasted time to escape.

Since then, it's been a struggle. With triggers, with depression, with life. Missing meetings and sacrament meetings does not go over well with my addict. Life seems harder when I haven't had a chance to make those covenants with the sacrament and feeling the spirit of recovery in PASG meetings.

They help me deal with the struggle of life.

I try not to show it on social networks. Because I don't really see the point of trying to get sympathy for how I'm feeling.

Plus, trying to be positive helps me, well, stay positive. I want to set a good example for the people I teach. So, instead of posting how sad I am, I tend to post uplifting quotes on the hard days.


As 2014 loomed, I didn't feel a lot of hope. I think it's because the last couple years I've felt very hopeful as a new year came. Surely this would be the year things would change, I'd get work that actually uses one of my degrees. I'd move. I'd start feeling less stuck and more purposeful.

But it hasn't happened. I'm stuck on Step 10. I'm stuck at a job. I'm stuck living at home.

So I'm thrilled 2013 is over, it was a very hard year, but I'm not enthusiastic about 2014. More of a wait-and-see.

I'm setting some small goals for the new year. Dealing with scripture study, bedtime, exercise (like Step 10, trying to take care of the basic physical, emotional and spiritual aspects of my day).

Then I burned my finger on the first day of 2014. It hurt like the dickens and then it blistered. Plus I've been fighting off an illness for a week. Ugh. I'm really hoping this is not a portent for the year to come…

I meant to work on Step 10 today, but our church time changed and I've been sick all weekend. Plus I stayed up way late, hence the new goal on bedtime, so I slept in and it did not get done. I'm not young anymore. ha ha ha.

But there's always tomorrow. I mean that in a non-procrastination way. Each day is a new beginning and a new start.

And if I fail one day, I can try again the next.

One of my goals is to read the Ensign every month before the month is up.

I was reading President Uchtdorf's message in January's Ensign.

This was definitely a tender mercy for me as dear Pres. Uchtdorf's words touched my heart and mind.

I do fear and procrastinate. I have been waiting to be chosen.

"With every new day, a new dawn comes—not only for the earth but also for us. And with a new day comes a new start—a chance to begin again."

Now.

I'm going to try. Especially in regards to Step 10. I really, really want to be done with it soon. However, I know that the Lord may want me to take longer.

Last week in PASG we read Step 3. And I was supposed to read it. Every single word, almost, I needed to hear and read at that time. I needed to remember to trust in God. I needed to remember to work on that trust. Because I still take away trust and then give it back and then take it away again.

But I keep giving it back.

And then we read "It requires us to rededicate ourselves to His will at the start of each day and some- times every hour or even from moment to moment."

That still applies to me! I still have to work on giving Heavenly Father my trust daily and sometimes hourly and sometimes moment to moment.

Because I struggle with trusting Him. I struggle to understand how being here (in a literal and figurative sense) is helping or teaching me. I struggle with wanting more and trying to be patient that it will come.

I struggle to believe that it will get better.

So that might need to be added to my goals for 2014. Work on trusting in God.

As President Uchtdorf says, "Now is the best time to start becoming the person we eventually want to be."