There I was, sitting alone in my room on New Year’s Eve, with nothing to do except sit in this eerie new feeling that started to creep in that night. Existential dread was something I wasn’t familiar with but was aware of. But nothing could have prepared me for this feeling. It was, I imagine, like you took the red pill in the matrix, you start thinking about everything and nothing, every decision you’ve made and every decision you’re going to, all at once. I hated it, I hated it so much. It might have been because I hadn’t left my house for a year and had no plans for new year’s because of covid, or because I was burnt out from playing games and had nothing else to do, or maybe it was something completely unrelated. All I knew was, I wanted that day to end.
That’s how my year started and as you might have guessed, I didn’t have much hope for this year. But to my surprise, that was actually my lowest point and things slowly picked up. As the days went by, I was looking for something to do and that’s when I weirdly got into movies and started obsessively binge-watching ever critically acclaimed movie. And when I say binge, I mean it. I was watching 3 movies on some days, and within a few months, I was sitting at 100 movies watched. And I wasn’t just watching movies for the fun of it, I was trying to see them in a critical point of view. The cinematography, sound design, art direction etc. are some of the things that, like most, I took for granted, but I’m now paying more attention to. As you can tell, I love movies and I would like to post more blogs related to movies next year. I’ve already posted one named “Why I Stopped Watching “Ending Explained” Videos” (read it HERE).
Video games made me love reading, is a phrase that you don’t hear often, but is one that’s true in my case. I was never a reader, and it’s something that I never thought I’d get into. But I hold The Witcher games dear to my heart and when I finished it, I wanted more Witcher. So I bought my first ever book, The Last Wish (and later Sword of Destiny). After reading these books, and a few others I borrowed from my cousin, I finally thought I’ll commit to this new-found hobby and bought a Kindle. I thought I would be addicted to fiction books, but to my surprise I found comfort in self-help books. I know that can be an unhealthy rabbit hole to fall into, where you, rather than being content with who you are, you get stuck in a perpetual state of feeling like you’re never enough. But I try to avoid that by keeping my currently reading books varied. But buying a Kindle was one of the best decisions I made this year, because, it made me read more, which in turn made me think, which I always appreciate.
As watching movies makes you want to be an actor and watching YouTube makes you want to do it full time, when I started reading I inevitably wanted to write. So I started blogging, and it’s been helping me lay out my thoughts. To know how it helped me, check out the post called “How Blogging Helped Me Make My Thoughts Clearer” (read it HERE). I’m not used to writing down how I feel for other people to see, so it’s definitely been an experience. Furthermore, I do feel like I’m being pretentious and redundant at times, but so far I like writing. But like every new hobby I’ve tried, I don’t know if this one is a phase or something I would commit to. But blogging has only helped me, and I would like to keep that going.
There were a lot of things that I didn’t mention which happened this year, like how I quit every social media (read it HERE) or how my Engineering exams were happening behind all this throughout the year which took a huge chunk of my time. But overall, this year had its ups and downs, but it ultimately taught me a lot about myself. This year was one filled with self-reflection and self-improvement, and I’ve changed a lot towards the end of the year, and I’m looking forward to the surprises that 2022 holds. And I hope this blog is there to see it
Happy new year’s everyone! And before you go, here’s a glimpse of my 2021.
Song used – Oscar Anton & Clementine – nuits d’été
