I did a similar post to this last year, which is something Nicole does every year. I really enjoyed writing about these things last time, and it’s interesting to see what a year can bring, so here goes.

1. Something your body can do

Use the gym. What the heck. Here I was, many years ago, just a dancer (dancing is the thing I wrote last year, by the way), saying I hated the gym, I would never ever go to one, and I had self esteem and body image issues that just followed me everywhere I went. And the dumb thing was, I was willing to admit I was weak more than I was even willing to give the gym a better try. I didn’t even consider it.

This year, almost seemingly out of the blue, I thought I would give the gym a try. Sure, there was encouragement from work and a couple of people I knew, but I still tried. The first day, I ran on a treadmill, because I used to run every day and it was the only thing I was familiar with – and that was it.

From that day, I just got changed, walked myself there, and now I’m going there at least once a week (yeah, commitment gets a bit hard when you’re a busy girl), doing strength training and, well, getting strong. I’m grateful that I had it in me, because I seriously didn’t believe I would escape that mindset of just flat out hating the gym.

2. The people who help you without even knowing it

I had to think about this for a while. Last year, it was easy – I was grateful for the people who went out of their way to get me a media pass for all the shows I photograph. I am still very grateful for that. But for want of a different answer, I would have to say the baristas who make my coffee. I don’t really understand coffee, and it doesn’t wake me up at all – for me it’s more of a treat, a beverage, and something that does pick me up emotionally – it makes me perky and makes me smile if I am feeling down. But definitely not something I need to have every day.

But yeah, even if they spell my name wrong (Georgia, Jordie, Jordi, Jeorgy), I can’t thank them enough for helping me just that little bit to make my day just that tiny bit better.

3. Something that changed in the past year

I got a new job in February. Prior to that, I got dismissed from my previous job. I can honestly say that currently working for Freelancer.com has changed my life. In so many ways. I’ve not just gained a truckload of new friends and met such wonderful, wonderful people. I’m more social. I’m being adventurous. I’m just a tad more outgoing than I was before. I’m feeling a heck of a lot more independent. I’ve also changed the way I think about people, life, and things. Just everything. It’s not a change I can readily explain or detail, because it’s a mixture of those nuances that you get every day that tug on your heart and remind you that the now is just simply not the past.

I feel very different as a person. I feel so much happier, inside and out, and it’s pretty amazing.

4. A shitty experience that taught you something about yourself

So here’s a thing. It’s a website I created a while ago – arebuttonsdoneyet.com. It’s just got a giant green button that says “Yes” on it.

The backstory: I had to work one some front-end development at work, and it involved the painstaking task of cleaning up a lot of code and potentially breaking the user experience on many parts of our website. I spent long hours at work, just going at it, I spent a week re-doing my work because of an internal issue that got in the way, and I forced myself to get it finished. I wasn’t unlucky to be assigned this task. I didn’t hate it.

But the truth was, I was pretty unlucky, and I started to freaking hate it. It’s not a “shitty” experience, but let’s just say it’s a pretty crappy experience that happened in the past year, and I learned something from it.

I made that website to make myself laugh. I made that website because, deep down inside, I knew I could do it. That button initially said “No”. It said no, the buttons were not done.

But one day, it said yes. And looking back on all the time I spent on it, and having to deal with people asking that very question – are buttons done yet? – I actually knew that I could do it. And now, I’m proud of it. Sometimes, I know and believe that I can do it, but it never hits me until I do.

5. Something you have enough of

Love. I took it for granted. I have never appreciated or been grateful for love so much in my life as I have in the past year.

What are the little things you’re grateful for?