Timeline

I’m 30 now and I feel like I haven’t accomplished very much. I know I have a tendency to compare myself to other people, it’s not a fun practice, but I’m a work in progress so I’m learning to give myself a little grace. I like to measure the success of my life based on my quality of life. Currently the quality of my life is pretty good, but I’m not content to stay here. I mean, all of my bills get paid, I have food to eat, I live in a nice place, and I have almost everything I need on a regular basis, but I want to challenge myself to keep moving forward and to see if I can actually accomplish what I set out to do. So, here’s a timeline of my life by age and my major accomplishments so far.

Timeline By Age

0- I was born. Yep, that is an accomplishment for me. If I didn’t have a successful birth experience I wouldn’t be here. Thank you mom, dad, doctors, and the nurses who helped make it happen.

1 to 5- I learned to walk, talk, read, count, etc. All the basics of what children learn growing up. I won’t list everything I learned because that would take up way too much space.

8- I got baptized as a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. I also dabbled in entrepreneurship by having a Kool-Aid stand, it was a remarkable failure, but I had fun.

11- I started babysitting and earning a small amount of income doing so.

14- I started learning how to sew.

17- I got my first real job, unfortunately the place doesn’t exist anymore. The purpose of this job was so that I could get braces. My parent’s financial situation didn’t allow for this, so I decided to do it myself.

I went to my best friend’s birthday party in San Francisco where we did a bunch of touristy stuff that you don’t normally do if you’re native to the area. One of the things we did was Flying Trapeze at the Circus Center. I fell in love with circus training that day and have always wanted to do it regularly.

I graduated high school.

18- Moved out of my parent’s house. It was an emotionally intense time but I did it and I survived despite some trauma.

Right before I turned 19, I started working as a nanny which provided me with an apartment. I started college studying Kinesiology.

20- I got married and went on my first cruise.

21- I dropped out of college and moved to a new state.

22- I bought a house.

24- I got divorced and gave up my house and most of my things in the process.

25- I got married again, this time to a man who is my intellectual equal and who challenges my ways of thinking to find the real truth. My life has been amazing because of this decision.

26- I moved to a new state again and I had my daughter. I began true healing from years of mental and emotional abuse.

27- I started school again, this time to study Fashion Design. I didn’t have to start completely at the beginning because, transfer credits!

As of this writing, I’m almost done with school, my daughter is 3, and I haven’t had to move in 3 years (I moved 13 times in 10 years prior to this last move).

Now that you have a brief condensed version of my accomplishments/big moments over my life time, I’ll write about a few of the ones that are most important to me.

Important Accomplishments

Braces. I wanted braces for years and my parent’s financial situation did not allow for me to get them. So, after years of wanting and waiting for their situation to improve I decided to just do it myself. I found a job and then made an appointment with an orthodontist. I got braces. I paid on time each month and took such good care of them that I was able to get them taken off 6 months early! Now I have a normal bite, instead of an over bite which deemed me “Tooth-e-ses” as a kid. Thanks big brother…

Going on a cruise. I love cruises and travelling in general. I just love being on trains, planes, and boats. My first cruise was to the Caribbean. I got to stop in Nassau, Bahamas and that is the most memorable port from that trip. There’s a really cool market place, called Nassau Straw Market really close to the port and I love all the handmade things people sell there. My favorite item I bought was a painting of a beach. The lady I bought it from had at least 8 paintings in progress when I came by. It was so fun to watch her paint. My recent addiction has been looking up luxury cruises on Regent Seven Seas and dreaming about the day I’ll have the money to go on one.

Buying a house. I grew up in an apartment. Albeit my parents owned it, but it wasn’t a house. I dreamed of owning a house from a young age. I still have drawings and floor plans from my 8-year-old self. Proof that my drafting abilities started young. Anyway, I was 22, and working at a candy store when I bought my first house. It was such a huge accomplishment for me because I had to go to 7, yes, 7 banks before someone gave me the time of day to get a mortgage. I finally got someone to take me seriously to underwrite a mortgage and I was able to buy a house. I have a video I took of my beautiful house that I put unlisted on YouTube. I gave it up to get out of a bad marriage. I miss it a lot still, but I’m so glad I learned my own value and moved on with my life even though I had to start over.

Getting out of a bad marriage. Once I realized that I was more important than what anyone thought and more valuable than the stuff I had I was able to leave and move on with my life. It was an intense time of learning and growing and I’m grateful that I went through it, even though it sucked.

Things on my Master List I’ve accomplished so far

#31- Get speakers for my bedroom. This might sound like a silly thing to put on my Master List, but I wanted speakers for years. I just never let myself get them until 2017. I wanted them to be small and compact that I could easily move around my house. The main reason was so that I could listen to music in my bedroom. Now I think I listen to audiobooks (I use Audible) more often than music, although, listening to both music and audiobooks are a daily occurrence. One of my favorite things about this particular speaker is that I can stick them in the pocket of my apron and take them with me from room to room as I do daily household chores. It makes the work a bit more pleasant because I hate cleaning.

#55- I wanted to learn to knit but never tried until I had to for my first textiles class. The project we had to do was to knit a scarf and turn it in as part of our final. I asked my mom to teach me since she is an avid knitter. We had a few short lessons over Skype. I learned pretty quickly and, in that process, learned that knitting isn’t my thing. I just don’t like doing it. Honestly, I think I would rather buy a knitting machine that I can program and let the machine do all the work. I can appreciate something that was hand knitted though, so if you knit, that’s awesome! Knitting just isn’t for me.

I’d love to know:

What is something you’ve accomplished in your life so far? It can be anything big or small.