2023 – A Year of Learning
The time to reflect on 2023 is upon us. The year didn’t really give us too much to work with. Rain dominated the first half and interest rates didn’t make for a great year in real estate. In terms of world affairs, wars, gas prices, the health of the planet, and the Dodgers pitching staff, 2023 could have been much better. Despite the negativity in the world and often in our own lives, it is important to take comfort in the small victories and enjoy the beautiful little things in life that we might take for granted. That is something I have been learning to do in what would be a more challenging year professionally.
One of those small victories was having my two sons (now 6 and 9) finally become interested in sports. It took a while, but with the help of the Lakers spring playoff run and my alma mater, The University of Colorado, hiring a cool football coach, they are now hooked! Prior to this year, every time we visited my parents in Virginia, my kids would want to take home one of my childhood sports trophies from the early ‘90’s, although they never wanted to participate themselves. Now, we watch sports together all the time, to the dismay of my wife, who prefers Harry Potter and the like, and this year the boys have been actively involved in playing basketball, soccer, tee ball, and tennis. Sports have been a huge part of my life since I was a kid, so being able to share that and make memories with my kids is more than a small victory for me when I was starting to wonder if it was ever going to happen!
Another small victory for my mental health was adopting the mindset of “whatever is meant to be will happen” instead of getting frustrated when things that are beyond my control do not work out. Admittedly, this mindset doesn’t happen for me 100% the time, but I’m getting better. While it doesn’t stop me from constantly improving to be my best, to push to achieve the goals of those who hire me, or to help my kids to take steps to succeed, the resulting failure of many of these ambitious goals does not upset me like it once did. Every failure is one step closer to perfection, and I realize that I’m still on the path to that unattainable goal, but it has taken me a while to accept that sometimes not succeeding is part of the process. In a year like we just had for the real estate industry, it is important to not give up and trust the process to hopefully achieve delayed gratification, otherwise one could go mad.
In retrospect, I think I made the best of 2023. While not a banner year statistically, nor was there a personal milestone of any kind, it has been a pretty great year. I have shared my interests with my kids and seen them grow, made some special memories with my wife, talked openly about life with my aging parents, had some epic times with great friends, took some time to enjoy nature’s beauty, and hopefully met some of you. Here’s to 2024 also being unique and special, but with lower interest rates.