A year to review (2024)

This blog post is going to be a reflection and I guess a commentary on the year that was 2024. I think for a lot of people this year was crazy in so many ways.

Life is Live

• Timothée Chalamet

Change

I started my previous blog post talking about change, and I'm going to do it again. Every year I like to think I've changed, grown, developed whatever kind of adjective you want to throw in there. But this year in particular I think no word more accurately describes what's happened to me than change. I've made some changes in my environment (notably moving countries), who I hang out with and associate with, and my general mindset. And I've made moves that will lead into 2025 and put myself in a better position to succeed not just for next year but going forward (that said, only time will tell if the seeds I'm planting today will flourish in the future). Normally I find myself in situations where I'm oscillating between good years and bad years. I don't tend to view the year as a whole as a binary good or bad year, because obviously there would be some amazing moments and things I can't forget about in every year. Life is made out of moments and yes, there have been ups and downs and moments I'd rather not have experienced. But the sunshine always follows the rain (I'm not actually sure if it does, but I love the song by Yoko Miwa Trio, so I'll hope it does). If I were to look at me as a whole compared to the person I was at the start of the year, I'm almost unrecognisable. Appearance wise, I don't think that much has changed, lmao, but inside, I think I spent most of the year rebuilding myself from within.

Certain hobbies and activities I don’t engage in as much, while others have received a significant uptake in importance as well as time I spend. Unfortunately, for some reason, music listening is one of those that I just simply didn’t do as much. I had only 31,052 minutes, which, if you know me, is pretty insane given how much new music I listen to. It’s even more insane that Christopher Luxon, the PM of New Zealand, has more Spotify listening minutes. I think my only saving grace or counterargument is that I’ve listened to infinitely more podcasts/long-form videos on YouTube instead of just listening to music itself. Is that much of a saving grace, or does that just mean I’ve reached unc status?

Hopefully, I'm not jinxing myself, and I'm kinda praying I don’t, but I have a feeling 2025 is going to be a year to remember for me. I also want to say that change hasn't only just affected me; it's affected friends and family. I'm so happy and fortunate to see so many people I care about flourish in different ways. An example being my younger brother making a move to NYC. He's one of the hardest-working, knuckle-headed at times people I know. But throughout all his ups and downs and journeys in his life, he did it his own way, brick by brick. For that, there's nothing more than I can say than I'm so happy to follow his own path. To be honest, only a couple of years ago, I don’t think I would’ve been able to say that; maybe in the future, I’ll be able to talk about that more.

Goals in review for 2024

I wrote down my 2024 goals in a blog post that I published early in the year. I’m going to go through them; some will remain redacted just because I still feel at this time in my life that they are too personal to put out into the internet. This will likely contradict what I am going to say later on, but please cut me some slack; this is my first time living this thing we call life.

1. This was getting a job in the US. - I didn’t achieve it, but I’ve made some progress towards it. Plus, I made a move to Melbourne.
2. This was a fitness-related goal. - I’m not going to explicitly elaborate on it, but I definitely made a lot of progress towards it.
3. Cut down on useless spending and keep my investments and savings growing. I have specific numbers I want to hit but will keep them on the down low. - I achieved those numbers; I did cut down on a lot of useless spending in some areas but made some dumb purchases and unfortunately added a bit of lifestyle creep. In 2025, I want to fully lock in with this.
4. Have more consistent wake-up and bedtimes. Aim for 7-8 hours of sleep. - I think I achieved this; I swapped back from the Whoop to Apple Watch (maybe I’ll explain this in a future blog post), but at least for the past 6 months, I’ve been averaging about 9 hours (8 hours 57 mins).
5. Stop using devices, be it my phone or computer, in bed. - I started off strong and changed that. I don’t actively scroll social media, but I still queue up a video and fall asleep to some random shit.
6. Get my RHR (resting heart rate) to 55. - I didn’t achieve this. I got close for a couple of months, but then life and its various factors took over. Not really a valid excuse, I know, but something I will also be focusing on in the year ahead.
7. This was a personal/family goal. - I barely made progress on it, mostly because I wasn’t trying on it. My focus at this point in time doesn’t really lend itself well to this goal, unfortunately.
8. Get back to uploading YouTube videos after completing personal goal #1 and aim to get 1000 subscribers. - I didn’t really accomplish this because I made a move to Melbourne instead. At the time of writing, I have 208 subscribers. But hopefully, in the new year, I’ll get to uploading consistently. I filmed a lot of cool stuff while I was in Asia.
9. Keep a regular habit of journaling either via computer-based apps or ideally offline with pen and paper. - I’ve done this quite regularly. I wouldn’t say it’s a habit, but I moved towards a hybrid solution which I think has worked well for me. And I’ll carry this on into 2025.
10. Make meditating a habit. - I’ve honestly struggled with this. If anyone who reads this has any suggestions, let me know. I’m trying out a few recommendations in terms of schedules, apps, and the like at the moment. Hopefully, one of them sticks.
11. Add to my tech repertoire. - I’d like to think I have again. This goal was poorly defined, but as the year has gone on, I’ve been able to be engaged in a wide variety of work… .NET, GHA, AI (Playing around with different models and services), Lambdas, Workers, Terraform, Typescript, More debugging and code reviews, and hella test and architectural writing, and just random shit throughout the year.
12. Travel to more places and try different things. - I’ll address this later on, but yes, I achieved this. I’d say almost too well lol.
13. Say yes to more stuff (within reasons). - I think this goal at the time was focused on being more spontaneous and just not letting myself become a hermit drowning in my sorrows at home alone. In a way, I’d say I’m more out there, but at the same time, instead of avoiding the world, I actively look forward to being a recluse. I’m choosing to be alone, and I enjoy my solitude rather than that being forced upon me as a punishment, if that makes sense?

I think I did a decent job at least attempting my goals. Some in hindsight needed more thought and I guess should’ve been more aligned with the general focus I had going into the year. But idk I’m pretty with what I achieved and have some good learnings for the year ahead.

Travel

I travelled the most in my life to date. Shoutout the Flighty app. I only came across it late in the year, and I wish I either thought of it myself or came across it earlier. It’s really nicely designed and just for someone like me who likes to stat track for something as relatively mundane as flights. It’s perfect and also serves as a good reminder of the things I’ve done. With that said here is some of my stats:

• I flew 19 times (8 domestic, 11 international, 4 long haul)
• I flew most frequently on a Friday and didn’t fly at all on a Sunday.
• Total distance covered 60,758km
• 14 total airports
• 9 total airlines
• 8 countries
• 3d 11hr of flight time

I think most notably, which aligned with one of my goals, was that besides the trip I had planned with my brother to the States, I took a relatively spontaneous trip with a good friend George to Asia (Taiwan, Hong Kong, Vietnam, Thailand, Singapore). More specifically, I visited Taipei, Hanoi, Bangkok, and Phuket. With Hong Kong and Singapore, I guess because of their size, I was able to inherently get a pretty big chunk of the country. It’d be impossible to visit all of either, but I think I did a decent job of at least getting a feel for both of them, and for the cities of the other countries, I definitely think I achieved the same.

The Future

I’m excited for 2025. In the words of Katt Williams - “All lies will be exposed”. I’d argue that it wasn’t just lies that were exposed in 2024. There were a lot of things that were outed or just made sense in 2024. I think in terms of the tech world, look how far things have changed in terms of AI, Crypto, and the general consumer tech market. A lot can be said of the current state of movies and television. The role of social media and even the political landscape or climate has changed. I think a lot of these things, if not all, will come to a head in 2025 and whether it becomes a year to marvel or a year of meltdowns. I can’t say, but I can say that I am excited to live through it and experience it. Thanks to 2024 and all the people, places, and experiences I encountered this year, let’s bring on 2025.

Naveen