A look into how my 2023 is going so far.

I’m someone who likes to sit and think a lot. I tend to attribute a lot of my success to that fact, as I tend to like problems and how to solve them. It made reading other people in my life so much easier as well, which helps when trying to figure out other people’s intentions. Anyways, goal-setting is something I’ve done ever since I started my gap year in 2021, and I think that it has been a system that’s worked really well for me as a creative, professional, and a human being. Something I tend to do is that I set my goals so much higher than I actually expect to achieve, as I’ve learned to not be disappointed, as it makes me think about the possibilities of what I could do to achieve those goals even if they are grand. Like I said: problem solving.

Anyways, 2023 has been going really well for me. I’ve been thinking really hard about what I want to achieve as a creative human in an age of looming climate crisis, as well as what my role in the world is. Being in a master’s program where you utilize theory from a global and humane approach, avoiding the impacts of being a savior for the poor and not actually doing anything productive, means that I would be able to have these kinds of thought processes. It’s a difficult process, but a necessary one.

Here are some goals I have in the coming months to finish up the year.

I want to put away $5,000 dollars just for traveling.

When I graduate and am forced to get a big girl job, I am probably not going to have the flexibility I have these days for going up to New York or flying halfway across the country. I debated started a PhD to actually procrastinate on that, but kind of realized that it wouldn’t be the best idea for me to go straight into a PhD at this point. That being said, I want to start tucking away my money so that I can go away to South Korea for a month and revisit all my old haunts from when I lived abroad there. The idea of slow travel really appeals to me right now.

I want to start formally studying Korean again.

I’ve been saying this for awhile, but I recently became aware that my Korean skills aren’t the best anymore. I can understand my Korean drama that I watch for a great extent, but it doesn’t mean I can hold a conversation when placed in front of an actual Korean person. I was my dentist and the cleaner was speaking in Korean to me, but she was speaking fast, and I couldn’t catch everything she was saying even though I knew the words. That meant the conversation stilled and she gave up on speaking to me like that, even though I wanted her to. So in the fall when I have more time, I think I’m going to sit down on Fridays and study Korean for an hour.

Consume a wide variety of entertainment and art.

One of my greatest joys in my editorial career is that I get to talk to filmmakers and actors who aren’t mainstream. Being on the film festival circuits has made me realize that I want to engage in these discussions more, and being at the film festivals makes me release that I want to be in the world of cinema. I dabbled in making films and shorts on my own, but I’d rather be a writer. A screenwriter would fit my kind of interests more.

But despite that, I want to be able to watch a ton of things from all of the world. I want to be able to see stuff from indie filmmakers and established ones alike. Hell, I want to go to art museums and see what the different kinds of styles are happening in Nigeria or Bhutan. There’s so much to learn about the world and I’m realizing now I’m just at the beginning.

Watch more Asian dramas.

This ties to the previous points, but this summer break I’ve gotten back into watching Korean dramas and television as a whole. Not American television though, I can’t stand the multi-season approach the American shows take. But I realized when watching these dramas that I like watching scenarios, however fictional they are, that other people around the world can be in. The buildings, the food, the clothing. All of it is so fascinating to me. There’s a ton of nuance that I definitely miss, but I’d like to start immersing myself in these worlds.

Celebrate artistry.

I was reading a book by a Japanese author, which I wrote a review of, when it began to click why I write and publish for me. I think a lot of people get swept up in the making it part of art that I begin to see how they spiral. They haven’t had XYZ publication or a book come out at a certain press, so they start to despair when they see a teenager making it when they themselves have been unable to do so. When we do that, we forget the explicit reasons why we make art in the first place, why we have conversations about it or end up creating. It’s a medium where we express ourselves and go beyond the mundane. It’s not a competition. And I want to see things for how they are.

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