Introduction

Yes – finally last working week of 2021 – what a relief! On Friday I will hang the boots for 2021 (back to work in 2022 though).

What a challenging year from a professional and personal perspective.

I changed jobs in the first semester and took an opportunity that I thought was the job of my dreams. It turns out that I am not deeply interested in the stuff that I am working on, and, obviously, I got frustrated.

This made me reflect a lot about the next steps in life. What should I do? Where should I go? A couple of questions are in my mind as I write this post.

I am still looking for the answers for some of them, but pretty sure that things will work out one way or another. I managed to take a long break this year, as I was planning to visit part of my family overseas.

Unfortunately, the Omicron variant made me change my plans (see my post about the Omicron) and I will stay in Australia. No dramas, though. I have a couple of friends here that I will visit and probably will write about my travels here.

Hopefully, the border between the States stays open. As of midnight yesterday, Queensland has finally opened its borders to New South Wales, which means we can travel north.

From a financial perspective, markets have behaved well and have shown some level of resilience. My FIRE savings suffered a bit at the end of this year, but are generating some level of passive income (see my post about my FIRE portfolio).

A quick review of 2021

The Challenges

COVID has poured some spicy herbs into the 2021 sauce. Not seeing friends or simply going to a pub to have a beer with your mates was tough.

For some time, I tried to tell myself that the whole situation was not bothering me, but the truth is that it has silently affected everyone, and I am not an exception.

The last two months have been challenging with insane workloads and multiple deadlines to be met. Unfortunately, there is also a high turnover rate in the company I am working for, which increases the pressure levels.

When everyone thought that we would just be bringing the “kids home” and count the days to finish the year, the Omicron variant hits Sydney and brings a lot of uncertainty and stress. The number of cases is spiking, and I will not be surprised if there are new lockdowns.

Another great challenge was the working from home arrangements and isolation. I am a big fan of WFH and feel much more productive working by myself. But I will not deny that some days I missed being in the same environment of your working colleagues to solve project issues.

Plus, being isolated for multiple weeks earlier in August and September was not fun. I am fortunate to have good friends that were always in touch and play a family role for me here in Australia.

Now, things are slightly getting back to normal. But it still feels a little bit different somehow. It looks like everything has changed, and there is always a certain level of tension in the air.

Upside and Lessons Learned

This year tested everyone in different ways, but mainly psychologically. The number of meltdowns that I have seen happening in the last months was worrying.

A clear example is the great resignation wave taking place worldwide (see my post about it). People are just tired of everything – I’ve seen from graduates to senior directors resigning fancy jobs and completely resetting their lives.

I acknowledge that it is difficult, but sometimes we need to change the way we see our problems. Attached to big challenges are great lessons and immense opportunities. Frustrations and difficult times are able to take the best of you – When life gives you lemons, make lemonade!

This year made me profoundly reflect on where I want to be in 5-10 years. A couple of dreams and actions that were “sleeping” in my mind were finally unleashed.

Even though I deep down always knew this, I finally decided that I don’t want to live the corporate lifestyle. That is just not for me. Some people were born with the gift to deal well with politics and the corporate world gymnastics. I was not.

After a lot of reflection and conversation, I set myself the challenge to start this blog. Project Exit 1095 was born in October 2021 (2 months ago – see my first post). A lot has happened since then.

I am still learning its tricks and stressing out with WordPress, but it has been a rewarding journey so far.

Triathlon was another gift from 2021 – it is such a cool sport and a great environment to be involved in. I highly recommend it if you have ever considered trying. My start in triathlon was only possible because of the lockdowns. Working from home saves me 2 hours per day, which now are occupied by my triathlon training sessions (when I am not lazy).

I haven’t been training as much as I should, but I intend to compete a race at some stage next year. I will keep you posted.

Final Weeks of 2021 and expectations for 2022.

Even though we just have a couple of days until 31/12/2021, there is still a lot to happen. The uncertainty around a pandemic teaches you to live day by day (another great lesson for me from this year).

I do not have a lot of expectations for 2022. I set up four significant goals (see my post about them) and will work hard to achieve each of them – I will report on their progress over the next coming posts.

Apart from these, I am also constantly monitoring my FIRE portfolio and investment opportunities. I believe that 2022 will be a good year, with economies rebounding globally.

However, the amount of money injected into markets is inducing inflation levels above the average, which might force Central Banks to raise interest rates. It will be interesting to watch what will happen next year on this front.

I will end this post with the lyrics from one of my preferred music from Frank Sinatra – That is life. While writing this post, I discovered that it is not originally his song but from Dean Kay and Kelly Gordon.

Sinatra released a version in 1966, which became the most famous one. It tells us about the “ups and downs” in our lives. Here my favorite part of its lyrics:

How was 2021 for you? What are your goals for 2022?

Speak (write) soon!