2026 has been one heck of a year, for sure. Personally, professionally, even with my own football team – I’ve been tested a lot this year. But I’m still not going to let that affect me. I’m still going to have a great rest of my year and have a reset for 2027.
Plus, it wouldn’t be a true election kind of year without some adversity.
First of all, them Eagles
Let’s just address the midnight green (or Kelly Green) elephant in the room – the Eagles are facing a lot of problems that aren’t just on the field type things. Jalen Hurts’ blood clot issue, mixed with some resentment towards the higher ups, and throwing in a devastating losing streak can make anyone frustrated.
Being an Eagles fan (especially when you’re finally in a relationship where your partner loves football) it’s hard to watch these games nowadays. Luckily, LeBron and the Sixers are keeping the city of Philadelphia afloat in the sports world for now.
Somehow, every Sunday I’m convinced the Eagles will pull out a win. They nearly pulled a win over the Cowboys last week – though it genuinely pains me that they didn’t.
Personally, it was a transformation year
Obviously, I’m not about to have a therapy session in the article. If you know me personally, you know the year I had. I will forever be grateful that sure, 2021 might’ve been hard. 2022 might’ve not been the kindest. 2023-2025 had their own stretch, but 2026 saw a completely different Jenn in January than it does now. Who I was in January was straight up insecure, sad, practically jobless, and no direction. Nine months later, I completely 180º my life.
My tip? Putting your head down and work. Do it sad. Do it happy. Do it mad. Do it when you don’t feel like it. Odds are, the first three seconds of starting something is always the hardest.
But no, the Eagles losing right now doesn’t help that either.
Why am I still showing up?
Rising up looks exactly like what I just mentioned: working consistently towards your goals no matter what the day gives you. It’s not a movie montage where you’re going through a big transition through a series of scene cuts and 30 seconds of magic later, it’s the real hard work. Like I said, it took nine full months to turn it around and keep it like that.
You also have to stop being a people pleaser. You have to work towards your goals and not care about anyone else. Seriously, it just is that simple. No one is paying attention to you as much as you think they are. That could be a blessing or a curse, but everyone is literally in their own head so much that they don’t care what you’re doing as long as you’re not hurting yourself or others.
The part that might hurt
I’m going to hold your hand when I say this, but you are probably going to be doing this alone. I barely had help getting out of the rut I was in. Partially this was my own doing by not choosing to open up, but I genuinely lost friends. I lost friends when I started healing. They were there when I was struggling, not there to help, but were in my life. Once I had a better job and a great relationship, they vanished. I’m no stranger to losing friends to jealousy, but this definitely stung a little longer than some of the other situations.
My advice for you
If you’re in October and you feel like this year beat you and that you did nothing, odds are you probably did a lot more than you think. Just showing up everyday, even if for right now it’s for a reason externally to yourself, you still showed up.
Also, you don’t have to be “on” all the time nor “earn” rest. You need to get good at listening to your body so you can know when to rest versus when you can be productive.
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