It’s the end of the year, and as such I thought it might be a good idea to reflect on how the year went, and what, if any, personal progress I have made throughout the year. Let’s start at the top.

Resolutions

At the beginning of the year I made two resolutions:

1. I was going to blog at least once a month – oops.
2. I was going to journal everyday – also oops, but I did do more journaling than I ever have before, so that’s a win in my book.

I think making New Year Resolutions puts an undue amount of stress on myself, which causes me to want to not do them as a “screw you” to past me. What does he know? I’m older, wiser, and handsomer than he is. Phooey on him.

With this in mind, I think I’m going to transition from resolutions to short term goals. Like, individual goals for each month. That way, I can focus on what is important to me, and am able to adjust as the year progresses to accommodate for shifting priorities.

I’m also hoping that I can start blogging at least once a month to make future retrospectives easier on myself, but who knows what Future Eli is going to think of that.

Professional Life

This year has been absolutely crazy professionally. I took over and then subsequently closed a business in Tennessee; led my team at the store to have another double-digit growth year; got a promotion at my other job; and somehow became a subject matter expert in the lab area I tend to work in. All of these things are great, but I’m sure you’re asking yourself, “Eli, when did you have any time for yourself?” Well, dear reader, that’s the secret, I largely did not. One of my goals for 2026 is to work on work-life-balance.

Personal Life

As mentioned above, work-life-balance has not been much of a thing the last few years for me. I have found myself becoming more and more of a workaholic, and did not have much going on in my life outside of my professional processes and lifestyle. That changed about half way through the year when I met my new significant other.

Since May, I have been seeing someone, and things are going really really well. She is absolutely fantastic. She is caring, smart, funny, and she pushes me to get out of my comfort zone and do things I’m not accustomed to doing (going on hikes and eating better, for example). We met in late May, and after a month or so of seeing each other casually, decided to make things official. She has been my main motivation to taking time away from the store, both for myself and for her, and I feel like I’m getting a piece of my life back and can breathe easier. I’m very hopeful for the future and looking forward to things to come.

Health

Overall, I have strived to be healthier in 2025. After losing time and being out after a brief stint in the hospital in late 2024 due to back issues, I have been going to the chiropractor and trying to do regular stretches at work to help strengthen my back and get myself adjusted properly. Both of these things seem to be working, as I’ve gotten most of the feeling back in my left leg and foot, which has taken most of the year to accomplish.

I still need to work on eating better and losing weight, as I am just under the diabetic line, and I do not want to cross that barrier and have to deal with that. I think this is totally doable, I just need to buckle down and actually care about myself. Especially now that I have another person who assumedly wants me to stick around for a while.

Hobbies

Gaming is still pretty big in my life, with the game store and all. I still play Magic and various RPGs multiple times a week (although, I’m trying to give myself time to get that passion and fun back that has been a little lost). I got a Legion Go S to replace my desktop computer that died in 2022, and plan to play some games with friends back home more often to help with the work-life-balance thing.

I’ve gotten really into the every day carry (EDC) world this year, and have been on a search to find the perfect loadout for myself. This has resulted in purchasing several bags and backpacks, notebook systems, pens, knives, etc. While my bank account and wallet have not been super pleased with me, I think I am near a point where I have the system I need taken care of. I might do a future post covering what I carry with me in my various EDC capacities.

This year I have attempted to get back into reading! I used to love to do that, and would regularly read several dozen books in a year. While I’m not at that level again, I have read more this year than last year. My original plan was to post about the books I read this year, but that didn’t happen. Maybe 2026 will be the year of the book blog!!!

Summary

Overall, I think 2025 was a pretty good year for me. There were things in the world that happened that were not good. Things in my personal life that were not good. And things that could have gone better. With that being said, I’m hoping 2026 is better. Not just for me, but for everyone. The world needs more stability, love, kindness, and empathy, and I am going to strive to be that in my community.

Happy New Year everyone! Let’s make 2026 amazing.

As a person who grew up mostly in the early 2000s, I, like many, was a huge fan of Linkin Park. They were one of the bands that seemed to always release an album that seemed to be directly written for me at that moment in my life. I must have listened to “Meteora” and “Minutes to Midnight” for hours each. “A Thousand Suns” and “Living Things: released during my college years, and I would play them on rotation while studying for tests and doing assignments. All that to say, Linkin Park was a massive influence on my life for a long time.

When Chester Bennington passed away, I remember revisiting all of the albums from Linkin Park, and catching up on the ones that I had missed since graduating and having life get in the way of listening to new music. I watched the concert on YouTube that the band put on in his memory, and found myself getting extremely emotional.

An era was over. A part of my childhood had ended.

And for a long time, I thought that that would be it. I mean, how could you have Linkin Park without Chester? That would be like having a PB&J without the J! Unthinkable!!!

Then, in 2024, I found out the band was releasing a new album with a new lead singer. Someone I had not heard of before, but that did not really matter. It felt wrong at first. Like listening to the new album would be a betrayal of what Chester had done and what the band was before.

So I avoided the new project for a while. I couldn’t bring myself to listen, partially because what if I liked it?

I inadvertently listened to the first single about a month after the album released. I was using the DJ option on Spotify (an AI-generated radio station based off of the user’s listening trend), and The Emptiness Machine came on, and there they were. Linkin Park was back. Sure, they were different, but the pieces were there. So, I decided I would give the full thing a go. Listen from start to finish and see how I felt when it was all done.

Giving the New Kid a Chance

I considered, when coming up with ideas for this post, to include a discussion of the background of From Zero, and what happened with the band between Chester’s passing in 2017 and the new release in 2024, but decided that it would be easier just to link to the Wikipedia article for those interested. So, here it is. It’s a pretty interesting read.

There has been a bit of controversy over “From Zero”, with the son of Chester Bennington being very outspoken on his disdain for the fact that the new singer for the band, Emily Armstrong, replaced his late father, and I can understand where he is coming from. I, too, would be worried if I felt my father’s legacy was in jeopardy of being erased.

However, I wanted to approach my listening experience with as little bias as I could. I wanted to, essentially, approach the album as if it were from a new group, and see how it would stack up on it’s own merit, divorced from the emotional baggage I had with the band. I think I was able to accomplish this very well, but I’m only human. So, sue me.

The album begins with a few tracks where Mike Shinoda takes the forefront and Emily Armstrong acts as more of a background player. I think this was a solid choice, as it allows fans to grasp onto what is familiar and safe. It’s what I imagine going to a high school reunion is like, in a person’s mind (I skipped my ten year reunion for a litany of reasons, chief among them that I now live across the country from where I grew up).

About half way through the album, Emily Armstrong takes on a more front-man-style presence within the group. And boy howdy, does it hit just right with me. Her vocals fit well with the rest of the band, and it teleported me back to when I first found Linkin Park, albeit, in a different sense. The album, as a whole, hits just right for where I am at this point in my life as a thirty-something year old who is constantly targeted by ads preying on my nostalgia. It’s new and nostalgic. It’s newstalgic!

Closing Thoughts

Chester Bennington was and still is one of my favorite musicians. His passion and emotive abilities in the music he produced were such an influential part of my life for so long. He gave voice to the feelings I couldn’t quite process as a teenager.

No one can replace him.

But I don’t think that Linkin Park is trying to do that in “From Zero”. To me, the new album is a way for the remaining band members to continue forward with each other, while honoring what came before. Emily Armstrong is a strong addition to an already stellar ensemble. And, while the feel of the tracks, and the vibe of the album are still very much Linkin Park, it’s a new chapter to an ongoing epic.

By continuing the project that is Linkin Park, the band allows and invites new people to explore what came before. To listen to Chester Bennington’s legacy and appreciate what an amazing artist he was. “From Zero” feels like a gateway, both to the future of what the band can be, but also to the history of the group. There’s so much of the DNA of what Linkin Park was still present in this album, but so much new energy that it gives me hope for what lies ahead.