Reflections: 2023 Year of Me

Guess whose back? After a multi-year hiatus and far too many password recovery steps- ModernbossMama is back. The last few years have been a fog, a race on the hamster wheel, and can only be defined as chaotic, intense, and yet full of growth and increasing clarity. What more can you ask for?

While we shouldn’t compare our highlight reels- one of the most common pieces of advice I give to employees, friends, mentees is to acknowledge and celebrate your accomplishments. It’s so powerful and often times humbling in list format. So here’s my list of highlights from my 2023- “Year of Me” in no particular order. As you can see the scale is different for each of these, but that doesn’t make them any less important. Growth comes from reflection and intention.

  • Surviving the first semester of three kids in three different schools with different pick-up times. Thank you to the carpool friends and parent/grandparent tribe that have helped support.
  • Enjoying our first adult only international trip since kids . Our trip to the French countryside brings me to a place of calm, slowness, where people start the day with bubbly and savor their food.
  • Connecting and meeting people all over the globe in with my work- traveling to Mallorca, Bangkok, Mumbi, Pune, Rio de Janeiro, Sao Paulo. I love eating the local foods, understanding the cultures and getting to know people.
  • Accepting a position on the Caring for Cambodia board of directors and finding a way to continue to rebuild a country and a people that have been struggling since their education, economy, and country was decimated.
  • Honoring the life of my grandmother, bonding with family as we made funeral arrangements, and continuing to make memories with the kids and their grandparents and cousins.
  • Healing and rebuilding myself. Improved bloodwork, hitting bootcamps and achieving milestones I never thought I could (having a coach know your name at the gym, making gym friends, lifting weights), daily meditation, journaling, yoga, and intention setting. Yes, I’ve always been a little woo-ey and I’ve found my tribe for that too.
  • Letting go of perfection- ongoing and hard work. There’s probably a whole blog/book talk I could give on this one. It’s the toughest of all for us xennial, overachieving, TypeA, eldest child of immigrants, and survivors of trauma.
  • Raising children that are kind, witty, with just enough sass to make me feel good about their ability to survive ( positive reframe).

All in all- another great year for this modernbossfamily. But not because of the instagram stories, but because we’re just living our best, messy, loud lives and trying to make a difference in this world.