Opportunity and Discernment, or Ponderings on New Year's Eve

As I've been thinking about "end of year, beginning of year" changes, I've dubbed 2009 The Year of Opportunity.  There's certainly been a great deal of it available to me!  I've had a grand time moving to New York.  It's certainly been more than I expected and imagined in some ways. Some things have been harder, like the loneliness of building an ordinary life from scratch in a new place. But most everything else has been easier or better or more rewarding.

A quick list of highlights:

• Realizing that the defining arm of my new community is hand crafting; making friends, joining teams, developing my talents, and finding the beauty and personality of craftivism as a way of giving back.  Between my Ravelry  groups (Fort Greene Knit & Crochet amd Queer Stitch 'n Bitch), the Etsy Labs, and having my office located in the heart of the garment district with easy access to a zillion notions shops, my hands have been full of fibers and textiles from the moment I arrived.
  
• Immersing myself in music and dance, and taking every opportunity to attend literary and historical lectures.  Between seeing a dozen concerts and shows with Clay, singing along at Irish Seisiuns with Meetup, meeting Marc Gunn and Cady Finlayson at Ceol, taking ballet and Baroque dance classes at Mark Morris, being introduced to contra dancing at the Center (and making plans to participate in the Dance Flurry in February), listening to a half-dozen Story Slam competitions, and attending lectures at the library, museum, and in the streets, I've had more fun in the last nine months than in the past three years.
• Discovering the trials and tribulations of trying to make green things grow in the city. (Okay, so not *everything* has been easy and fun!) Between the bizarrely-not-kept hours and cliquishness and immersion-and-responsibility-as-introduction in the community gardens, the randomness and disorganization of most environmental volunteerism groups, the death and destruction of my kitchen-window-herb-garden, and a growing season spent battling pigeon poop in my container garden, I have to count the Green Thumb projects as abysmal failures and exercises in frustration. My Master Gardener friend Pattie has offered some cool suggestions for me, though, and I'm marshaling my powers of persuasion to convince my landlord that creating a back garden is in the best of interest of the property -- hopefully 2010 will be a little more fortunate on the gardening front.
• Taking immediate advantage of more than a dozen new opportunities for professional development. My primary reason for moving to NYC was for work -- to be in a space where nonprofit tech professionals are easier to find than a needle in a haystack, to be available for in-person collaboration with the people I most often work with, to cut down on wasted resources (time, mainly, but also money) for commuting to the city every week, to be in the thick of action and innovation and drive.  And now that I'm here, it feels absolutely amazing to go to work every day in a place -- an entire city, and not just a single organization -- where work ethic and drive and high standards and subsequent success are valued as the best of human traits. Where winning actually matters, rather than being something that's expected but not spoken of or rewarded.
  
• I feel like I have learned more, in terms of both subject matter expertise for my field and general non-profit/business acumen, in the last nine months than in the previous two years. I've read more, listened more, collaborated more, and developed more than I'd dreamed possible in a nine-month span.
• I have not turned down a single opportunity.  If I can find the time to make it happen (and there's nothing I haven't been willing to sacrifice to that end), I've participated.  Lectures, conferences, strike forces, advisory teams, strategy groups, steering committees, programs and the odd meeting -- I've said 'yes' to them all.  I've learned a great deal about what makes a team successful, the importance of setting goals and expectations early, the difficulty of learning when an opportunity is a drain rather than a benefit (although I've abjectly failed at learning to say 'I'm sorry but no," gracefully).
• I've just embarked on an amazing training program that will last for the next two years, which should magnify the work that I've done solo for the past however long and put me on an accelerated track for personal growth and development.  It's requiring an amazing amount of focused effort at discernment, asking the tough questions, consciously choosing "where" I want to go next, and making every effort to fall in line with those choices.

And that last point is helping me move forward into 2010 with intention and purpose, perhaps more than any other.  If 2009 was The Year of Opportunity, 2010 will be The Year of Discernment.  I've going to break my habit of saying "yes," without thinking it through.  My habit of cramming into a day everything that sounds promising or hopeful. Of spending time and energy with people who haven't earned my interest or respect.

There are many things that I want to do in 2010.  Publicly work-related things like grow my program by another four million dollars, and lead a diverse team of people in building a sustainable, integrated (marketing and relationship management) retention strategy. Quietly personal things like deepen friendships with a few kindred spirits, trust enough to build a meaningful relationship rather than consider romance and partnerships only with cynicism and disguised bitterness, and rediscover how to write passionately and with fervor rather than merely rant for laughs (e.g. write more blog posts, like this one, and fewer Facebook/Twitter updates about ultimately meaningless daily frustrations). Random bits of joyful things, like learn to use my bicycle for spring and summer transportation (rather than only entertainment and exercise), finally read Virgil and Dostoevsky and D.H. Lawrence, find a non-church choir to sing with, and watch a half-dozen Yankee games with the Bleacher Creatures. And a few dozen things that haven't crossed my radar yet but will at some point in the next twelve months, I'm sure. The key will be considering them and choosing yay or nay consciously and intentionally and with purpose.

And so, here's a fond farewell to 2009 and a joyous, hopeful toast to 2010. Slainte!