Happy New Year everyone!!!
It's officially 2025 here in New York and I just wanted to make a little post discussing how the year went for me/my thoughts on it all and possible plans for next year, as well as making some goals that can be looked back upon later, hopefully after succeeding them. I want to preface this by saying that the below text is pretty personal and somewhat lengthy, and was really just created for the sake of myself, so don't feel like you have to read through all of it ;)
If I am to be perfectly honest, 2024 as a whole wasn't a great year for me as a person. This isn't something I don't really like to talk about very often as it's hard for me to do so, but since New Years is a time of reflection, I've decided to make it known. I've been constantly battling mental health issues like anxiety and depression since well before 2024, and they've only really gotten worse over the years. My grades in school started taking a turn for the worst and I somehow managed to become even more reserved and introverted in person, spending the vast majority of my time alone and intentionally avoiding people who I care about. I've been finding it increasingly difficult to find reasons to be happy and hopeful, especially now that my childhood is basically over, and for a while, I was concerned that I was going to lose my desire to make music altogether as I found it increasingly difficult to make anything that I liked. I've been struggling for so long, and after everything I've tried to do for it has failed, it almost feels hopeless to think that it will ever come to an end and I've just been anxiously waiting until the day that I finally lose it. A lot of my close friends have been having a pretty rough time as well, one of them going so far as to attempt to do the unthinkable. Thankfully, at least one person including myself was able to catch them in the act all three times and they are thankfully still with us, but the whole thing really took a lot out of me as well. To make matters worse, however, they made some pretty poor choices after the fact that ended up splitting my friend group in half after a series of pretty serious fights, all of which I had to watch in agony as a bystander as I didn't want to take a side. In the end, I did thankfully manage to keep all of my friends, even if it is quite awkward at times, so it definitely could've been worse, but still, obviously not a great experience. For the rest of my year, I essentially just did nothing. Everything has been so mentally taxing that all I've really wanted to do is just lay in my bed and watch pointless videos during my free time whilst quietly trying not lose it. If I'm being so honest, it does not take me a month to make a new piece of music. It takes me a week at best, and most of that week isn't actually spent working on it. The rest of the time I'm just laying around doing nothing or suffering through the school day, trying to do as little as possible whilst secretly hoping to do anything at all. It really isn't fun at all :(
It would be unfair to say that 2024 was all bad however as there was still some good to come out of it. During the times that I was actually able to make music, I did see myself steadily improving. I personally think that I've improved a lot since the start of 2024 when it comes to making music and I'm super happy with the progress I've made. The vast majority of my favorite music from myself was made in 2024 with only a few exceptions and I feel like I've grown a lot as a musician. I've also improved a lot as a pianist through playing in school, both for events and simply in my free time. I saw way more improvement musically from myself this year than I ever could've expected, so even though it was mostly bad, I still have 2024 to thank for that. In terms of more personal improvement, I did actually still see some of that as well despite all of the shortcomings in this area. I've always struggled with self-confidence, constantly doubting myself every time I get the chance. In 2024 however, I did slowly become more confident as a person, even if I very much so am still struggling. I've also always been very unsure and anxious of the future, having little idea what I actually want to do with my life. This year however that changed a little bit as I forced myself to really think about what it is that I want to do. The more I thought about it, the more I realized how much I actually liked psychology and how it fit it with how I am as a person. I'm someone who always has everybody else's best interest in mind and seeks to help others wherever I can, even if I'm not the best at it. The current plan is to become some sort of counselor/therapist, possibly one who incorporates music therapy, so that is possibly something that you all can expect from me in the future. I already applied to and got accepted into the college if my choosing as a psychology major and music minor. Figuring all this out was genuinely very important for me and helped to take away a lot of my anxiety for the future, lessening the mental load for me as a whole, which was very much so needed.
I already gave a little bit of insight into the future above, but there is still more to be discussed. I want to try my very hardest going forward to put more time and effort into what I do as I do admittedly tend to be a rather lazy person who often settles for what they already have. In terms of music, this could look like actually practicing the piano everyday and trying to do a little bit of creating/learning every day as well, even if it ultimately leads to nothing. I also actually want to put everything I make here on Newgrounds, even if I don't necessarily love it in hopes that it will help me with my overall confidence both as a musician, but just as a person as well. I spend way too much time worrying about what others think about me, which leads to me constantly questioning myself and then often giving up on things that I shouldn't, so this year, I'm going to try to have faith in everything that I make and try my hardest to not worry about how well it is received by others. My confidence as a person is the one thing I really want to work on this year above all else and it has constantly been a problem for me for pretty much the entirety of my life thus far and I believe that things will start to become a lot easier for me if I just learn to be happy with myself for a change. This is of course no easy task for someone like myself, but it is a necessary change that I believe will genuinely make my life better, so I'm willing to do what it takes.
I am also excited to announce that I will be trying my best to participate in Jamuary this year, even though my January is going to be rather busy for me. This is actually something that I tried to do in the past before I was even on Newgrounds, of which I did find success, so I'm confident that I'll be able to do it again, hopefully even better this time. As I did before, I want to try exploring some areas of music that I'm maybe not so familiar with and overall just try to experiment and learn as much as possible. This may mean that my music sounds a little rough for a while, but that shouldn't really be what matters as long as I'm getting something out of it, including simply just having fun. In the event that I really can't manage to create something everyday, I want to have full transparency and say that I did actually create some music ahead of time, all of which was still made within a day that can be used to make up for it. I want to try my best not to use these pieces, but if it comes to it, and did allow myself to have that as an option. Overall though, I am very excited to be participating in this event and wish everyone else participating the best of luck!
If you are someone who actually just read through all of my yapping, first of all, thank you for doing that! It does mean a lot to me that someone does care enough to read all that, even if I don't know you personally or you don't have anything to say yourself. I also want to thank all those who had supported me during 2024 as it means more to me than I can express. I sincerely hope that you were able to enjoy at least one thing that I made during 2024, even if only for a moment. I share my music in the hopes that others may get something out of it as well, even if it simply means putting a smile on your face for a brief moment. Once again, thank you to all those who have shown me any sort of support for my musical journey thus far, and I hope that everyone has a great 2025! Bye for now :)