— A Year-End Reflection by AJ Gabriel

When I look back on 2023, I don’t see a year draped in fireworks or filled with flawless victories. I see a tapestry—stitched with quiet courage, frayed in places, patched up with hope, and held together by the resilience I didn’t always know I had. It was a year that didn’t ask for perfection. It asked for presence. And so, I showed up.
Even on the days when everything felt heavier than my body could carry.
Even when my hands trembled while typing an email, or my voice quivered when speaking the truth.
Even when joy felt like something I had to borrow, not own.

I showed up.

Not to prove anything to the world.
But to remind myself that I am still here. Still learning. Still becoming.

A month of transition.
New role. New expectations. Same body—tired, hurting. Mind—stretched between responsibilities and lectures. I was physically unwell, mentally stretched thin, but somehow… I made it.

Despite the exhaustion, I showed up—for my job, for my studies, for myself.
I attended trainings, took on tasks I wasn’t sure I could handle, and even had the chance to join a forum I truly loved. That spark? It reminded me why I started.

Always a month of contrast—festive lights, but a heart that flickers.
Three years since Dad passed, and still, Christmas feels a little quieter. A little emptier.
Grief is like that—it changes shape, but never really leaves.

His absence changed me.
The way I see the world, the way I value time, the way I hold onto the people I love—it’s all different now.
And as I grow older, that shift becomes even clearer.

If I were to thank this year, I would not thank it for being easy—I would thank it for being honest. For stripping away the illusions I clung to and leaving behind only what is essential: my faith, my voice, my grit. It taught me that healing is not the absence of pain, but the presence of grace. That growth is not always visible, but often takes root in the unseen places—the private choices, the quiet endurance, the brave decision to keep believing in your own worth. I have learned the value of being misunderstood without losing myself. I have learned that boundaries are an act of self-respect, not cruelty. That sometimes, rest is the bravest thing we can do. And that softness—true softness—is not weakness, but wisdom tempered by fire.

I have learned the value of being misunderstood without losing myself. I have learned that boundaries are an act of self-respect, not cruelty. That sometimes, rest is the bravest thing we can do. And that softness—true softness—is not weakness, but wisdom tempered by fire.

A Filipino Christmas Away From Home

This year also reminded me that community carries us when life feels too heavy to walk alone. Our Filipino OCCU Christmas Party was one of those moments that stitched joy into December.

There was laughter echoing louder than the music, tables filled with lechon and dishes that tasted like home, and friends who turned an ordinary hall into a patch of belonging. We wore silly hats, oversized glasses, and Christmas jumpers—but beneath the costumes was something real: family found in the middle of foreign soil.

I looked around the room and saw resilience wrapped in joy. People who left their own families behind to work here, celebrating together as though the distance didn’t exist. And in that moment, I realised that sometimes, joy is not about what we lack—it’s about what we create, together, in the now.

So no, I will not enter 2024 armed with resolutions written in pressure and perfection. I will enter it with reverence. Reverence for rest. Reverence for the slow work of becoming. Reverence for the parts of me still tender, still uncertain, but still trying. I no longer need certainty to move forward. I just need willingness—to stay open, to begin again, to believe that something beautiful can still come from the pages not yet written. And if you, too, are carrying the weight of an imperfect year, I hope you know this: survival is not just enduring the storm. Sometimes, it is having the audacity to hope again, even when the skies are still gray.

Here’s to showing up. To softness with strength. To honoring the mess and the miracle of being human.

Here’s to 2024—unfolding not as a race, but as a rhythm.
And may we all find the courage to keep dancing to the beat of our own becoming.

—ANJ