Personal Essay: The Year That Was

 

Graphic Design by Jacqueline Davis Moranti

This past year, 2025, didn’t just happen to me, it dismantled me. I entered it with plans, goals, bright ideas and a sense of momentum. By the end, I discovered that life doesn’t unfold along tidy lines. It bends you, twists you, splits you open, and in those fissures you find the truth you’d been running from.

In January I walked in with energy, hopeful, confident, convinced I knew who I was and WHERE I was going. I believed that tenacity and grit were the currencies of transformation. I believed that if I worked hard enough, I could sculpt the life I wanted with precision: just enough intention, just enough effort. That notion was lovely in theory, but it didn’t prepare me for the surrender this year demanded.

Creative Burnout is Real! Here’s How I Reset Without Losing My Spark

 

There’s a certain kind of pressure that comes with being a creative, especially in the digital space. It’s the expectation to constantly create, post, engage, and evolve all at once. But what happens when your creativity flatlines? When the spark that once lit up your world feels more like a flicker barely holding on?

I’ve been there. More than once. 

Burnout doesn’t always look like lying on the floor in total defeat (though it can). Sometimes, it looks like scrolling through inspiration boards for hours and feeling nothing. Or staring at a camera, a blank screen, a planner and feeling like a fraud because you have no ideas left to give. 

Here’s the truth I had to learn the hard way: burnout is not a flaw in your creativity, it’s a sign that your creativity needs rest.

Personal Essay #14

Illustrated By Jacqueline Davis Moranti

Change is hard. It doesn't matter how adventurous you are or how "ready" you think you are for it. It's always challenging especially once you notice it begin to happen. I truly believe we all desperately want change and then when it happens we freak TF out and start to back pedal because maybe somewhere deep down inside, we didn't think it was actually ever going to happen. Or maybe we just like to complain all the time and blame external forces for the situations we have become complacent in.

Hello 2019

Illustrated by Jacqueline Davis Moranti

Here we are, smack dab into the new year of 2019. I couldn't be much happier that it's a new year, I have a lot of high expectations but only because 2018 was an interesting year. There were some lows, there were some highs, but after getting through the deeply emotional stuff, i'm much stronger now. I feel much more free with my feelings and mind coming into this new year, even though I got here with a few struggles and tears in tow because of reasons too personal to speak about in detail here. I'm happy to have gotten through them by being focused and in control of my own pursuit of happiness. My own happiness. The most important strength I have gained this year, is having control over what influences me from the outside. Not everyone around you is going to be a positive influence, thats just reality. There is anxiety, stress, frustrations, and judgements all within us all the time, unconsciously. Difference is in how we reflect these things on the outside, how we interpret them, and how we work to turn them around. This past year, I learned the hard way. It was difficult but it was also the best way for me, controlling my emotions through the tough situations. And if I couldn't control a situation coming at me from the outside, then it was is best for me to walk away or move on from the things that felt negative for me. Maturing is learning when drama is not needed in ones life, harping on negativity is never worth mulling over. 

Personal Essay #8

Illustrated by Jacqueline Davis Moranti

Ever look back on a breakup and think to yourself that some of it might have been your fault? Yeah, me neither! It's actually really common for people in relationships and marriages to suffer from passion fueled miscommunications, and in the heat of the moment, it's hard to understand anyone's perspective but your own. Fortunately, relationship experts have decoded a primary theory of communication, a "Love Language."

Personal Essay #6

Image captured by Jaz Shahid

I want to take care of you, it has nothing to do with moving away from Philadelphia and dropping roots in suburbia, getting a dog together, and figuring out what we're going to eat for dinner that night, by way by of Epicurious (dot com) on our shared tablet.....