Last month while journaling, I created a fascinating prompt to ponder upon. I was never someone who focused on the small things in life. This is why journaling always felt like a task to me. But what initially felt like a waste of time turned into one of the most fruitful 30 minutes of my day and probably one of the reasons why I decided to make journaling a habit in my life. 

The prompt was, “ Where was I 2 years ago vs. where am I now?”

I chose this prompt because it allowed me to introspect on basically every aspect of my life. We usually turn a blind eye towards progress in our life. Maybe because we are too busy obsessing over the finish line that we forget to embrace this path that we are marching on. Or maybe because our inner voice always forces us to believe that we are never enough. Instead of fighting these thoughts in my mind, I decided to bring the entire battlefield on a piece of paper. 

To my surprise, I felt like I was living under a rock all this time as this simple exercise was the easiest way for me to acknowledge progress in my life. It not only allowed me to understand how my efforts paved the way for advancement in my career, but I also realised how much I’ve grown in terms of finding comfort in what makes me ‘me’. 

2 years is a lot of time, but this simple exercise made me acknowledge that I make progress every day, even if it’s immensely small. I realise that the major improvements I see in my life right now did not occur in one night. These are an accumulation of small progress made each day. 

If you are in a season of life where you feel things are at a standstill and you haven’t progressed in long, pen down your thoughts on a piece of paper to understand how you feel about yourself and your progress in the last couple years of your life. I’m sure you’ll see that you’ve been resilient throughout. There were occasions when you decided to show up even when the future seemed uncertain. There were also occasions when things didn’t turn out the way you expected them to, but you took time to figure out where the new path led you. Through it all, you saw the beauty of being kind, brave and hopeful. And it is these little moments of courage that shaped you into who you are today.