2023 is roaring to a close. If you’re like me, you’re simultaneously trying to relax while also checking off everything on your to do list. (How’s that working out for you? :-))
I can barely wrap my head around what our community has accomplished this year. We have a new, permanent, dedicated museum. New records here, here, and here. We have recognition at the highest levels of government. New connections. New stories uncovered and new material to find more. There is so much cause for celebration I feel like the Grinch.
As I said, I’m having trouble processing it all.
Enter my brilliant friend Daria, whose holiday newsletter was so well timed and written I felt she was writing to me personally:
At this time of year, I encourage all of my clients to take some time to sit down, maybe for half an hour, with a cozy warm beverage to reflect on the year that’s winding down. Before you get too far into the season’s celebrations (and the spiced eggnog!), I invite you to consider these five questions…
Daria Malin, “Happy Holidays! Reflect on 2023 and Spark Your Vision for 2024,” Boost Coaching
What a great idea. Instead of getting overwhelmed by thinking about the entirety of 2023, I can do five questions. And maybe you’re like me, needing someone to ask you a short list to help get your head around all that’s happened.
Here are Daria’s five questions. Feel free to think about anything, from aspirational to personal, genealogical or professional:
- What was your biggest win this year?
- How did you make that win happen? (Think about the steps you took.)
- Was there a goal you wanted to meet, but didn’t quite reach? (It’s alright, that happens!)
- What obstacles stood in your way to achieving this goal?
- What are three goals that you are going to put some effort into achieving for 2024?
Over Christmas I’ll be making that cozy warm beverage and pulling out my journal. To reflect on the thousand connections made. To think about 2024. To dream of what I’d like to see happen for our community. To find more family history stories. To chat with family and curl on a couch with friends. To pop into my group and enjoy the conversations.
This is Linda Yip, wishing you a happy, festive, fun, peaceful, holiday.
Next time: A rare head tax refund – the story of Chan Sing Kai
Thank yous
My thank you list for 2023 is the length of Santa’s. I’m incredibly grateful to everyone who took the time to connect with me this year. Thank you, thank you, and ten thousand times more thank you.
To Daria, whose words of wisdom needed sharing.
And to my great-grandfather Yip Sang (生葉), who built a house that is truly everlasting.
