A Decade of Growth and Change

Welcome back and Happy 2020! I hope you enjoyed your holiday(s). My last post, My Four Lessons of the Last Decade, was about the life lessons I learned. This post looks back at accomplishments and change. Now it’s the new year and a new decade. Time for new intentions. But before we make or discuss plans for the new year and new decade, let’s review the old year and decade. For me, it was a decade of Growth and Learning.

Image of gold 2020 against a brown background with Happy New Year message while we look back at a decade of growth and change.

The Beginning of the 2010s

In 2009, my husband and I celebrated our 15th wedding anniversary. My son was 30 years old and married for the second time. I had five grandchildren (two 9-year-olds, a seven years old, a six-year-old, and one one month old) and three dogs (8-year-old miniature schnauzer, a 7-year-old mixed breed, and a 4-year-old Yorkshire Terrier). a registered nurse at the local children’s hospital, I worked forty plus hours each week.

Writing was my weekend passion. I had been writing stories since 1980. Three stories for children and two science fiction novellas written in collaboration appeared in magazines.

I had written three novels and had begun the fourth. But it wasn’t right. By right I don’t mean perfect, I mean it was missing something. 

Perfectionism is not the same thing as striving to be our best. Perfectionism is not about healthy achievement and growth; it’s a shield.

Brene Brown

The novels didn’t work. They were missing an ingredient or two. I didn’t understand story engines or story structure or pacing. I wanted my passion to be more than a passion, but I had a dreamer’s idea of how to be a writer. The business of writing? No clue what that entailed. I had no tracking system or any system for improvement or progress. No author brand, scant social media presence, and no website. I began the decade with a burning desire to learn and grow as a writer.

He who would learn to fly one day must first learn to stand and walk and run and climb and dance; one cannot fly into flying.

Friedrich Nietzsche

Last Year

In 2019, my husband and I celebrated our 25th wedding anniversary. Our three-bedroom ranch home is now seventy-years-old. Remodeling projects have made it more suitable for a wheelchair-bound individual. 

My son turned 40 and is married to the woman of his dreams. I have eight grandchildren (a 24-year-old, two 19-year-olds, a seventeen-year-old, a sixteen-year-old, two eleven-year-olds, and a four-month-old). Some of you may have realized the ages don’t line up with 2009—Your right, they don’t. I include precious grandchildren-by-marriage. 

I have three Yorkshire Terriers (a 14-year-old, a 9-year-old, and a 2-year-old). 

And I retired from my nursing job two years ago. Writing full-time is a joy.

Image of a girl reading a book with stars and light streaming out of the book--much like me looking at my past decade of growth and change.

Growth and Change

One of my (our) challenges has been the many medical issues my husband has had over the past ten years. Those challenges are compounding. I sit in his room at a rehabilitation facility as I write this.

Over the past decade I learned about plot, story engines, story structure, pacing, and so much more. I learned to create systems for tracking progress, improvements, learning, and goals. I know that I’ve written more than one million words during the decade (no records for the first three years). 

I’ve refined my writing process and learned about self-publishing and marketing. I’m having moderate success with my two published books. The outline for book two of the My Soul to Keep series and I’ve written about 30,000 words of the first draft.

I have a social media presence, an author brand, and I blog regularly on my website. Blessed, I even have followers both on social media platforms and on my blog. *Yup, that’s you! Thank you.*

A Change of Perspective

Prior to completing my decade review, I had a poor opinion of what I had accomplished in the past. Tracking and reviewing has erased that opinion. Sure, I wanted to accomplish a ton more, but look at where I started. Without tracking systems, I would not know how much I achieved despite the many challenges I had. Knowing allows me to analyze what allowed me to accomplish things and what held me back Now I can see what areas I would like to improve for the next decade. And I’ve already started working toward another decade of growth and change.

There are no great limits to growth because there are no limits of human intelligence, imagination, and wonder.

Ronald Reagan

The two-word description for my past decade is Growth and Change. Have you done a decade review? What would be a two word description of your 2010s?

A Peek at Amazing Discoveries of the Past Decade

I’ve posed many questions regarding the ethics of research being done. Today, I want to talk about the good science has done. Let’s take a tiny peak at the amazing discoveries of the past decade. 

The Human Genome

The year 2000 saw a rough draft of the human genome released. The final draft published in 2003 received updates in 2007. 

They believed this research would help alleviate diseases and advance medical break throughs. Sadly, that is slow in coming. The National Human Genome Research Institute estimates that it takes about seventeen years to advance from new research information to something useful for patients. But much is being done. Check out their website for detailed information about research on cystic fibrosis, infectious disease outbreaks, pharmacogenomics, and much more.

Archeology

The 2010s brought extraordinary discoveries in the field of Archeology. British researchers found the body of King Richard III

Airborne lasers led scientists to discover more than 60,000 ancient Maya buildings in Guatemala.

image of facial reconstruction of Homo Naledi one of the amazing discoveries of the past decade

The discovery of Homo Naledi, a new species with a mix of human and primate features, suggests they may have been a hybrid.

Radar detection and lasers and photographs from space have aided archeologists in their search. The number of discoveries made in archeology is impossible to cover in this short blog. 

Space

Oh, my. So many discoveries and adventures during the past decade. They finally, 100 years later, confirmed Einstein’s idea and heard or felt the first gravitational waves.

NASA’s Kepler Telescope (and others) found thousands of new exoplanets.

By Event Horizon Telescope , CC BY 4.0,

They captured the first image of a black hole. 

NASA’s probes, Voyager I and Voyager II, crossed the outer boundary of the heliosphere.

The first commercial spacecraft delivered supplies to the International Space Station. 

The Good News Goes On

This is a tiny peak at the amazing discoveries of the past decade. If you’d like to read more,, check out this Cool Blend of Science and Technology post. During the next decade we will explore and study this information (and more), and we will learn more about ourselves, our planet, and the universe.

Are there discoveries you thought were amazing, and I didn’t mention them? Please tell us about them in the comments below.