2023 in Review: Celebrating Successes, Embracing Challenges, and Looking Ahead

I know it’s already been a week but Happy New Year!🎇 As we welcome a new year, I thought I would reflect on the year gone by and share it with you. 2023 was an interesting year, filled with ups and downs. In this blog post, I want to share my experiences from the past year both professionally and personally, and also discuss my goals for the future. Make sure to read till the end for an announcement that might make you some 💰.

Positive Highlights of 2023

Professional Achievements:

Interbrand: Working for Interbrand was definitely the highlight of the year. From intern to now analyst, I have learned in 9 months more than I could ever have imagined.📈

Academic Highlights: I clearly improved my studying habits and mentality, having so many other things to do has helped me optimize all my studying time which has been reflected on my results. My favorite Maths class was Abstract Algebra, our python project that was able to concretize such an abstract module was very interesting. Between all my Computer Science modules I would have to choose our current group project that focuses on data visualization. Although this semester hasn’t been the best for our team, I've learned a lot just preparing for the module. 👨‍🎓

BYG:Participating in the 2023 BYG program was the start of a change of mindset. I was able to surround myself with some great people with whom we fought to make an idea come to life. There isn’t a blog post for this yet but it’s on the list! 👏🏻

Onnit.org: Stepping up to the challenge was a great decision, I can now help a startup create a positive impact in the world, what else could I ask for? Go checkout my Onnit.org blog post! 💪🏻

Internship Applications: I am writing this down as a highlight because it has helped push my personal brand to the extreme and realize how important it is to be able to communicate who you are, not only as a professional but also as an individual. 🗓️

Growth of the Spanish Society: Although the Spanish society was only founded in 2022 we have proven that it is an active community that helps EVERY St Andrews Student learn and experience spanish culture without having to be in Spain. I will be posting a blog post soon showing what we’ve done so far and what our plans are in the future. 🇪🇸

Skills development: Through my work at Interbrand, BYG and my Computer Science classes I’ve had to learn a lot of new skills. I’ve really enjoyed learning about Salesforce, I absolutely loved  the platform and I can’t wait to dominate every aspect of it. ❤️

Personal Growth:

New Home: At the start of the academic year I moved out of the student halls and into a flat with E who I can basically call my brother now. 🏡

Health and Fitness: This year has been the healthiest year of my life, I’ve managed to do things I never thought I could, remember my impromptu half marathon? 🏃

Meeting Inspirational People: This year was filled with meeting incredible individuals who continue to inspire me. I have realized there is a lot of very smart people out there and that the best thing to do is learn from them. 😎

Blogging: Starting my blog has helped me stay motivated and improve my writing skills. 📝

Podcast and reading: The discovery of podcasts and rediscovery of reading has helped me learn and stay up to date with the latest tech updates and gglobal news. I will be posting a short blog post about what I read and listen to very soon. 🎧

Social Media: Deleting my personal instagram was one of the best decisions I made this year. Having an app show me infinite, tailored 30 second videos, was definitely not helping. I encourage all of you to quit instagram for a week and see how your productivity shoots up.📱

Challenges and Defeats of 2023

Despite the highlights, the year also brought its share of challenges, and there were quite a few….

Professional Setbacks:

BYG - A Learning Curve: Digit(allies) crashed quite hard showing us how hard it is to build something that ends up working. 📉

Balancing Act at Interbrand: While I love my job, balancing it with other responsibilities has been challenging. On top of that since I am still learning, not everything I do ends up working out which can sometimes be frustrating.  Thankfully everyone there is extremely supportive and I have a very flexible work schedule. ⚖️

Startup Limitations: Working at a startup with limited resources is never easy, that said success feels better the harder you work for it. 🚫

Internship Frustrations: The struggle to find attractive internship offers has been and still is  real. I am going to have a whole blog post talking about this really soon.😖

Managing the Spanish Society: Juggling the growing demands of the society was tough, as mentioned previously it is hard to do a lot with limited resources and not all investments have paid off. 🤺

Personal Struggles:

Adjusting to New Living Situations: Moving into a flat has been great but it carries new responsibilities and costs that we have to take care of. 🏚️

Unmet Fitness Goals: While I made a lot of progress, I failed at reaching some of my goals.🏋️

Inconsistent Blogging: Striving for consistency in blogging has been a challenge. Stay till the end you’ll see how I’m going to change this. ⏳

Limited skill learning: I didn’t manage to finish a lot of courses and certifications I wanted to.📚

Balancing Time: Sacrificing leisure time was necessary but challenging, even when you try to tackle so many things at once, family and friends have to be a priority. ⏰

Goals for the Upcoming Year

Looking ahead, I have set clear goals for myself:

Academic Excellence: I’m aiming to excel in my studies and find an intriguing topic for my final project, that joins both of my majors. 📖

Professional Development: I plan to secure an internship for next summer, excel at Interbrand, and double Onnit.org’s user base. 👨‍💻

Supporting my friends: 2 of my closest friends will be turning pro next year and my goal is to help them secure the best sponsorships before they start Q-School. 🛫

Physical and Mental Challenges: Completing the 75 hard challenge, running a full marathon, 180kg on hex bar deadlift, 110+ on squat and 90 kg on bench press before october.💪🏻

Community Engagement: I’m looking to secure sponsorship for the Spanish society.💷

Personal Projects: I have a couple of projects in the works, and I’m exploring ways of building passive income opportunities. 🕵️‍♀️

Blogging: If I don’t post 4 blogs every month I will give away 50£!! to someone that is subscribed to my blog.🤑

Golfing: I want to bring back the Spanish golfer and get back to competing.🏌🏼⛳️

Conclusion

2023 was a year of significant growth, learning, and challenges. As I step into the new year, I’m excited to build on these experiences and achieve my goals. I invite you to join me on this journey and stay tuned for more stories and insights on my blog, it's going to be a great year!

🔥🔥Keep grinding🔥🔥,

Fer.

"Great things come from hard work and perseverance. No excuses." -Kobe Bryant