2024 Recapped
I love seeing people grow and overcome challenges. And at this time of year, I’m eating up all the 2024 wrapped posts I can find! It’s fascinating seeing what people cared about throughout the year.
Without further ado, here’s my year recapped.
2024 Goals and Theme
I started off this year with a theme: Independence.
For context, the past couple of years have been a rollercoaster with work. I survived multiple layoffs at Shopify. Only to have the product, I was working on, sold to another company. Then I survived layoffs at that company. Only to find that the team I was working on being dissolved and moved offshore. Throughout this time, I felt like I had no power over my life.
I wanted to own my own destiny, so I created some goals inspired by the theme. I have a more detailed list, but here are the most important ones:
- Get a new job.
- Start earning money on the side - freelance, or some other side hustle.
- Create content again.
The most challenging part of this year was managing my energy. The first half was spent looking for a job. And in the second half, I had bursts of content (like my 30 day writing challenge), followed by a long lull.
But I was able to accomplish a lot this year. Much more than last year!
Achievements
Got a new job ✅
It was a slog of interviews for the first half of the year. But I landed a position on a Developer Experience (DevX) team. It’s been great so far, I love working with an audience I care deeply about!
Created content ✅
Here are my top three most popular blog posts:
- Setting up Rails Dev Containers
- Dynamic Nested Forms with Rails and Stimulus
- Writing blog posts with obsidian
I also started a newsletter, DX Dissected. It’s a forcing function to get deep into the DevX world. And even though I haven’t written as many newsletters as I wanted to, it’s a start.
Finally, I released my first YouTube video in a long while! Snuck it in right before the year-end. The video is about using Dev containers to prototype without needing to worry about managing dependencies! Check it out.
Start earning money on the side ❌
Big fat X for this goal. I have some ideas, but I also have a mental blocker. What value am I providing? And can I provide that value consistently? I haven’t proven to myself that I can be consistent this year. So I’m focusing my energy on answering those questions first.
New hobbies
I started journaling my side hustle journey on pen and paper. It’s a nice way to slow down and process my thoughts. I’ve also noticed my handwriting becoming more readable over the entries.
I also picked up pottery! I made a few pieces that are actually usable, which I’m happily surprised about. Here’s a pic of some pots I made.
What’s to come in 2025
After this year, I have more clarity with what I want my life to look like. Communities gave me a lot of energy this year. And I’m starting to find my place on Bluesky as well. Which brings me to my 2025 theme:
Connection
Building connection with people through communities. Both IRL and virtual. But also connection, in the form of building value for others. With this theme, I have some plans:
- Invest more time building and taking part of communities (IRL and virtual)
- Consume more content for ideas (not only for entertainment)
- Read technical books - 2 (baseline goal) to 4 (stretch goal).
- Build and release production-grade apps - 1 (baseline goal) to 3 (stretch goal).
- Create more content (as much as possible)
- I don’t know what amount is sustainable. I would like to create 12 videos and release 12 newsletters, but that seems high.
- Pie in the sky goal: Speak at a conference!
- Step one: figure out what to speak about.