Obviously I've been busy and this has not been a priority but I am hoping to change that because honestly I loved the stress relief writing about everything brought to me.

So life update? I guess that is what one does after a year of allowing this blog to just float out into the abyss that is the internet. I graduated from BYU with a degree in Family History and Genealogy in December of 2019! Hooray! So much hard work, blood, sweat, and tears went into that degree and I learned so much about myself. For example, I am definitely a perfectionist through and through. 

Can perfectionism be passed down in families? Because if so I definitely know which parent I got it from. It's something I am going to have to struggle through throughout my life because it is a mentality shift. I have to look at things and say it is okay if this paper isn't perfect, or if I get eight hours of sleep instead of editing a paper for another three hours. Now that I am graduated I have to apply this process of changing my mentality to different things in my life outside of academia. 

So besides graduating what else is happening in my life? The short answer is nothing really. I have an internship at the FamilySearch department in Salt Lake City, and I work there full time. How is working in an office going you might ask. Well, my answer is I don't really know. Due to COVID-19, I worked in an office environment for a grand total of four days before I, as well as most of the rest of the Church's workforce, was asked to work from home. So that is where I have been for almost four months. This year has just been all sorts of weird so far. 

In away I think that is what has inspired me to come back to blogging. Nothing I thought would happen in my life this year has happened, and I really think that is true for everyone. It's been a lot of depression and anxiety, more so than usual, as I've tried to understand this new world we are living in. As a student of history, I have studied the 1918 Spanish Flu and the first person accounts. However, I like many was under the impression that these pandemics and epidemics were things that happened in the past due to lack of modern understanding about the importance of hygiene and lack of future breakthroughs in science. This thought was wrong. 

The fact that we live in 2020 and enjoy incredible technological advancements has not made us invincible. The epidemics of the past (think the Black Plague, Yellow Fever, Spanish Flu) were not just things that happened to people back then. 2020 has taught us just how vulnerable we are. It is incredible that a virus that you can not even see without a microscope both united and isolated us so quickly. Borders were shut down, planes grounded, travel banned, businesses closed, and the busy world that surrounded each of us just . . . stopped. 

As someone with anxiety, I have seemingly prepared for the worst case scenario my entire life, but this has not made things easier. Sorry for the long rambling about COVID, but as a student of history I feel like I am living in a textbook and honestly I sometimes wish I could jump off the pages and hide. But hiding has never really worked well for anybody, and I have to face these challenges head on. Being more patient with myself and my depression is definitely something I have been struggling with. I often catch myself thinking, "okay, you did x y and z earlier this year, why can't you do it now?" 

Again, perfectionism. I see past versions of myself, as well as other people in my life, and think because they can do it I can to. Mental illness is frustrating like that because trying to find the differences between the urge to have a  lazy moment/my brain telling me to slow down or we might sleep for three days can sometimes be hard to discern. 

So, probably not the life update you were hoping for, but hey this whole year has been full of disappointments so what's one more? I'll write more about my journey with mental health this year as I deal with a bit more setbacks in my perceived ability levels. 

How has this year been for you? Hope you all are doing okay.