My 2022 in Review: New Beginnings
2022 was a year of massive changes for me including my career, health, and life outlook. The years prior through this pandemic had been full of change, moving, and instability in my personal life that I wanted to prioritize some improvements. Making changes to improve the stability of my personal life meant shifting my stable career to a more “wild west” style one where I had more autonomy and responsibility in the decisions of my actual life.
I spent my 20s focused on someone else’s vision, always moving for the job, staying long hours, making big impact on a product but always just being a worker or a cog and having little say. This impacted my physical health, mental health, love life, and gave me tunnel vision into the actual options life has to offer.
I Made Some Changes
I had moved to Texas in 2020 but was beckoned back to SF in 2021. I was back and forth between the states for about 6 months and my personal life was essentially on hold.
But in 2022, I bought a house in TX, decorated it with the things I really wanted, and made a commitment to myself to settle down, stay home, and focus on the things I enjoy spending my time on.
These things included yoga, figuring out how to start my own game studio, and strengthening my personal relationships.
- Yoga: I have been practicing yoga for many years, but committed to focusing on it in 2022. I practiced 3–5 times a week most weeks at an amazing studio. Doing this has given me strength, intention, balance, and friends/community with other yogis.
- Bodeville: I spent part of the year figuring out how to start a game studio. I calculated my finances and other incomes to figure out a runway and started organizing what I would do, who I would do it with, and how to accomplish it. Then ArtCenter approached me with a part time professor position due to my game design blog here, and things fell into place. It was the small recurring income, community, and break from development I needed to make things happen. I also started consulting to make some extra income. So I quit my job in corporate games, I found the perfect business partner, and we actually started a studio. We’ve got two games in progress now.
- Friends: I spent a lot more time with friends. I got to go to lunch during the day, have a few beers at lunch, chat with people online, go to yoga at all hours with my friends, and focus on the small community I’ve got at home. Staying in one place had led to more serious romantic relationships, I’m able to dog sit for fosters and friends, and go out in my VW bug more.
What I Learned
Anything goes. This year I learned that what society has told us as a “truth” is not actually truth. Nothing is truth and you can make your own. Systems are there to constrain you. It’s fine if you want to be a part of them, but sometimes you have to make your own and go against popular opinion.
A lot of people will support you if you want to do that. They may not want to do it themselves, but it’s fun to watch.
Goals
I have a ton of goals for Bodeville next year, including shipping the two games we have in production. Going on this adventure has been an amazing experience where I can learn what I want, ship what I want, and monetize how I want. I hope in 2022 we’re able to make new games to ship in 2024 and continue this endeavor
As for my personal goals:
- Publish a book… and write more.
- Stay home and cook more.
- Teach more classes. Teaching has been super fun, inspirational, and I love learning from students about what’s exciting for them.
- Do more yoga. I’m working on a basket headstand, and want to be able to balance it on my own.
This was a more personal post than usual. If you need advice about venturing out on your own, please hit me up! I am happy to share my experience.
I used ChatGPT to create an outline for this reflection article, and I filled all of it in with personal information.
