Take the band aid off.  We cover the wound to let it heal.  I remember being afraid to remove the band-aid as a child because it would hurt.  But the truth is, if we don’t remove the band-aid the wound will never heal completely.  It needs to be exposed after a time.  I spent a lot of my life thinking that the people who hurt me would come back and fix the wound.  I kept it covered long enough so it hurt and reminded me that someone owed me.  Not that that was my direct purpose, but I didn’t think I could move on without that apology—so I kept it fresh and wore it on my sleeve hoping someone would say how sorry they were that happened or that they did that.  Instead of it being a reminder, it became a festering sore that spread throughout my body, my body carried the anger of it even when I didn’t try to overtly express it—but the anger would pour out at the slightest provocation.  That isn’t healing.

What I’ve learned over time is that exposing that wound creates healing even if we have to deal with the pain of it at first.  The pain of keeping it open long enough to heal, the pain that there are people who hurt us that will never apologize.  And the truth is, no one will ever come along to heal us.  That is our responsibility even if we didn’t inflict the wound.  Yes, that other person may have made the cut, but we are the ones who continue to cut ourselves thinking they will regret it someday.  We only hurt ourselves in that scenario.  Allow the process to complete.  Allow healing to take place.  That way the wound only hurts for a little bit and we can reconcile within ourselves what we need to move on.  We don’t need those who hurt us to save us—they wouldn’t be capable of that anyway.  Why would we entrust those people with our healing?  Stop expecting the hurt to heal us.  Stop expecting the hurt people to recognize the damage they caused. Remove the band aid, allow it to heal, and move on.

Today I am grateful for laughter.  We spent time with our friends last night.  Everyone brought some food and we had a really nice meal together.  We definitely ate too much but it was a beautiful time.  At one point we kind of drifted into separate groups, each sharing conversation and ours spent a huge majority of the night just laughing and talking.  The laughter really made the evening.  Not that I haven’t been laughing lately but probably not that much.  It really felt good, like a whole body cleansing and releasing of fears and thoughts related to other things going on outside.  We were all present with each other and the whole evening flowed and our groups merged and separated and flowed with each other.  It felt good to have so many people to connect with and enjoy each other’s company.  Sometimes you need to remember that laughter really is the best medicine.      

Today I am grateful for standing my ground.  My people pleasing tendencies haven’t often made me a really strong person.  I’d know I’m right about a certain feeling and still give in when other people came around.  For a long time I was bark and no bite (not that I take joy in biting).  Regardless, my husband and I have had a situation with some acquaintances for a few months now that resulted from some pretty unfair expectations on the other party’s part.  I was told that I was being blamed for the majority of the situation and since then we have not spoken.  I will admit there are times it’s uncomfortable but at the same time I do not regret standing my ground.  Friends would not have tried to put us in a situation that compromised us in any way—and friends wouldn’t have been mad at us for saying no.  People in our group still talk with them and have different feelings towards them, but I have stood my ground and I am setting the boundary that the behavior wasn’t appropriate.  Relationships can always be repaired but I am not the one who needs to reach out at this point.

Today I am grateful for ideas on moving forward.  My husband and I have been trying to figure out how to change our lifestyle for a while.  We are looking for more time and financial freedom and a more creative way of living.  It’s taken a while to decide what we want to do—projects we keep on our own and projects we do together (we still aren’t 100% decided).  Regardless, I love being in an environment that stimulates creativity.  We went to a market with our friends yesterday (they have a booth for their business) and we saw so many people promoting their businesses and it was so cool to see that level of creativity in people.  Truly, people are amazing and the scope of human creativity knows no bounds.  It’s a beautiful thing to witness.  While we were there one of the ideas my husband has had for a business showed itself in a different way—meaning the guy had the business my husband is considering but he’s doing out of a place we hadn’t considered before.  That was the first time in a long time I’d seen my husband’s eyes light up or show any type of excitement.  We discussed the opportunity and we started discussing the opportunity for our other business moving forward.  It’s an amazing experience to be in the flow of creativity.  I am grateful for the ideas.

Today I am grateful for progress.  With anxiety, I’ve always been a jumper, moving from one activity to another before ever really settling or finding out who I am.  I never felt safe enough to stay in one place long enough to actually see something through.  I also never wanted to get stuck with someone else’s responsibility because I never said no—so if I just disappeared, that person would have to deal with it and I wouldn’t be the bad guy.  That’s a habit I’ve wanted to break for a long time. I’ve had creative ideas and I wanted to carry them forward—and I wanted responsibility for those.  The last few months I have truly buckled down on some projects that I love.  It feels different.  It’s almost like the sensation of a key fitting in a lock and turning it.  I know this is the doorway to where I want to be.  It’s the doorway I’ve waited for for a long time.  I am grateful to move forward.

Today I am grateful for family.  I love my family, I always have.  I’m grateful to have the family I do because they’ve encouraged me in a lot of ways.  I didn’t always get the support I needed and I’ve found out some truths behind their feelings lately and it’s ok.  It hurt at first, but it’s something I probably needed to know in the end.  It’s not like our relationship will end over it, but the relationship needed to change and I think we are there.  I think we needed to become a little more of who we are and this summer has brought out a lot of things for me.  I thought they felt a certain way and the truth came out and, yes, it impacts how I feel about them because I wish this had been said sooner.  Had they told me the truth sooner I would have made different decisions in my life.  I get to make the decisions now.  I still love them, I just know to put less stock in my role with them.  That’s ok.

Wishing everyone a wonderful week ahead.

There’s a difference between loving someone and loving how someone makes you feel.  Let’s start with the easier one: loving how someone makes you feel.  Honestly it’s a difficult distinction to make at the beginning of any relationship (friendship or romantic or even a business) because we are flooded with excitement and feel good hormones that tell us the experience is good so we misinterpret that as feeling good because of that person.  It can be hard to separate what we are feeling from the person so realizing we like the feeling and not necessarily the person can take a while to clarify.  For example, if someone is constantly talking about a topic that excites us, it can be hard to distinguish liking that excitement from liking that person.  The trickier of the two is loving someone.  Loving someone is more than being happy around them or feeling good around them.  Loving someone encompasses accepting every facet of a person even if we don’t like it.  The irony of the simplicity of love is how complex it is.

What does it mean to love someone?  We’re often taught that love means never fighting or pushing and that it’s constant harmony and bliss.  The reality is that love does run on a spectrum, ranging from tolerate to adore to love to the ultimate culmination of power.  In the simplest terms, love is an acceptance of what is—but that doesn’t mean we are complacent and allow bad things to fester.  Love fosters growth in all parties involved because it points out better ways to do things and it enhances our strengths.  While it doesn’t seek to change people, it does encourage change toward the positive.  Love is a union beyond the physical—a physical union doesn’t really require any type of emotional connection so don’t allow physical involvement to cloud this issue either.  Love is an embracing and a protection—it’s a safe haven to incubate life and creativity together.  It’s an allowing of energies to exist as they are but combining to be something greater.

We feel good in other people’s energy, especially energy that is aligned with ours.  It can be easy to misconstrue what that really means.  But given time the rose colored glasses fall away and we need to get honest about what we really feel and distinguish between what we feel with someone versus for someone.  We are meant to manage our energy and guide it toward what feels good, that is true, but we also must maintain clarity about where that’s coming from.  Keep the source internal rather than internal.  Entering a relationship of any kind is an energy exchange and it’s important to be discerning on how we spend our energy.  It’s important to be clear on the purpose and the exchange of energy.  Love is very real, I don’t ever want to diminish or undermine that emotion because it is quite frankly one of the most important emotions we can experience.  As I said, love is on a spectrum, it’s just important to be clear on where we are on that continuum.  Don’t mistake a temporary feeling for such a powerful emotion.  Learn to harness that power and expand love to all. 

Continuing our discussion from yesterday, we limit our beliefs because we don’t trust ourselves.  We don’t trust ourselves because we don’t keep our word to ourselves—and that word can be about anything.  We stop exercising or we stay at the draining job or we don’t meal prep or we don’t fill the car with gas after work or we don’t finish cleaning.  Keeping our word to ourselves means holding ourselves accountable to the decision we made.  When we are accountable and see things through we know we are capable of the task.  When we believe and know what we are capable of, anything becomes possible because we know we can develop the skills needed to do anything.  Trust in ourselves is key because we need to know that we can rely on our abilities.  When we can rely on our own ability, we feel safe enough to attempt something and know that even if it doesn’t work out that we will still be safe.  That it’s ok if it doesn’t work out because it isn’t life or death—we can try again.  “Failure” doesn’t mean the same thing it used to when we were fighting for survival.  Failure is literally an opportunity to try something different.

Learning to trust ourselves starts with honoring who we are and getting clear on what we want.  It’s too difficult to keep our word if we are doing things we don’t believe in or that aren’t aligned with who we are.  That isn’t to say there aren’t valuable lessons in doing things for the sake of helping people or learning a new skill just to keep sharp.  But when we operate from who we are, those decisions are clearer and make it easier to honor our word because it’s coming from the core.  It gets confusing because we are also trained to be nice and to do things for others that may not be good for us because we want those people to like us.  Then we create stories about why we can’t help when we should have simply said no in the first place.  People pleasing is dangerous, helping is valuable.  Don’t confuse the two.  If we want to create trust, help others, if we want to create resentment and learn to skulk away from life, continue to people please.  Either way, don’t allow the outside influence who we are at our core.

The goal of life is expansion—expansion of emotion, of space, of ideas and creativity, of experiences, of connection.  In order to step into that expansiveness, we need to trust that even in the unknown we are capable.  We need to know what we can do and we need to know that we WILL do it.  That all starts with clear decisions and follow through.  If we have a vision of who we are or of who we want to be, then we need to decide that is who we are and we need to operate as that person to move forward.  Do what we say we will do and life starts to change.  We create momentum and we see results and suddenly new avenues open up and we decide to follow that.  It’s all about mindset and committing to that vision we have and deciding to keep our word.  Knowing we are capable and showing ourselves we are capable are two different things.  Showing is about results, telling is about spinning.  Choose carefully.  Make the commitment and keep our word and watch life change. 

Imagine the version of yourself that does everything they say they will do.  The version that’s willing to take a risk, and not care what others think.  That is a powerful person.  That is someone focused on their goal and doesn’t allow outside influences or distractions to alter the course.  That is someone who understands time and knows how to break down tasks.  Someone who keeps their word, especially to themselves exhibits a discipline few have but we are all capable of.  I know this because I spent decades of my life in victim mode, complaining that everyone else was the cause of my misery or misfortune.  It took me at least two decades to realize that the reason I wasn’t getting anywhere was two fold: I struggled to make a decision and I rarely followed through when I did.  I couldn’t decide because the options were overwhelming and I didn’t want to miss out.  I couldn’t follow through because I was easily distracted or I’d think it wasn’t working too soon—the moment I felt something was off I’d get scared and give up.

I see now that part of that was also conditioning to the pressure of society where if I didn’t meet their standards I was a failure, and the other part was biological/chemical.  Society makes people believe if they aren’t perfect then they aren’t worthy or their venture isn’t worthy so I’d jump ship really quick to go back to what I knew.  Then there was the anxiety and depression I couldn’t control.  As soon as I’d give up (for a legitimate reason or not) I’d spiral into hating myself.  That mentality is a huge step back for anyone trying to reach a goal.  But I’ve learned to flip that around.  Instead of feeling like a failure, I’ve learned to see that it’s an opportunity for evaluating and deciding differently.  I don’t have to be quick to dismiss anything, I can choose again and that choice is to approach from a different angle or to let it go—because there are times when things aren’t for us and letting go is the best option.  But if we decide to keep going and we see it through, that reward is infinitely greater than stopping.

I want to touch on the power aspect of this again.  Psychologically, when we complete tasks we get a dopamine rush.  When we continue a task that has proved challenging and we see that through, it’s even greater.  The point of a challenge is to expand and expansion is the goal of life overall—we are meant to create space.  The more we rise to the challenge, the more expansive life becomes because there are more options.  The other part of completing a difficult task is establishing trust in our abilities.  We learn how to accomplish certain things and we know we are able to do more and we can build on that and create new things beyond that as well.  As I’ve said in other pieces, it isn’t about power over other people, it’s about power over our minds and actions to create, to take what is in our minds and make it real.  We have the ability to become entirely different people by making different decisions.  Committing to ourselves and our vision, seeing it through, is what makes that happen.  Trust for ourselves means we are more discerning in our choices and where we spend our energy so being someone who sees things through is important.  Imagine what life would look like if we all saw things through.  Then start with ourselves.

Patience means that you already trust that it will happen.  I always imagined patience as something slightly manipulative.  Like there was this carrot at the end of a string with something I wanted that I would get if I could sit there and do what I was told long enough.  Honestly I HATED patience.  All the energy in my body demanded movement and flow and immediate action—the furthest thing from sitting there pretending to be willing to wait.  And what was even more irritating was seeing other people getting what I thought I would receive for doing the same thing they were.  What was I doing wrong?  Why wasn’t I worth what they were doing?  After all, I’d done the same thing if not more.  It felt like a constant test I was failing and something that existed to point out the inequity in life.  I mean, I’d done the time to earn things, and there were certainly people who had waited longer than me—so why couldn’t we get what those who had done less “earned”?  No, patience was not my friend. 

All of that puts patience as a reward based thing—we aren’t being patient because we are patient, we are patient because we think we will get something out of it.  The reality is, sometimes we have to be patient because there are different pieces falling into place.  Some of us are working on a 48 piece puzzle while others have a 4800 piece puzzle.  The latter takes longer to put together and may be more detailed.  Time is irrelevant and the things that are meant for us will find us in their time.  We can’t rush the timeline of our lives.  It isn’t about getting what is “due” to us, it’s about knowing it’s there and it will reveal itself at the right time.  Patience isn’t about the reward, it’s about our ability to focus the lens like we talked about and see what we are putting together.

To this day I am still not a patient person—I wake up and hit the ground running and constantly have an endless task list, and yes, I still want to get what I want now (because why wait, really?).  But hearing that viewpoint, that we trust it will happen on its own timeline, did change my perspective.  Patience isn’t about getting a thing or receiving a reward.  It’s knowing that life flows in its own rhythm and we are part of it. Living is the reward.  We get to do what we want while we are here and we can choose to fuss and fret over the things we lack or we can appreciate the beauty of life as it is and go with it.  We are here either way and we can choose our experience of it.  The longer we mope about how many pieces we have, the longer it takes to put it together.  Just do the work and all will come together when it’s meant to—it’s all there waiting for us to reveal it.

In photography, we adjust and manipulate the lens and change the focus until we create the version of the image we look to capture.  You choose the lens—sometimes you have to change the zoom or the angle.    The same is said about life.  We choose what we focus on.  We can zoom in tightly and focus only on what’s in front of us, or we can take a wide lens and see the big picture.  Sometimes the moment is rough and we feel deep in it, like we are held under while everything else around us thrives.  Other times we are the zen, the focus while there is chaos around.  We choose to see the beauty or the burden of the moment.  We’ve spoken about choosing our thoughts and this is the core of the concept: shift our focus and we shift our thoughts on what we are seeing.  Sometimes we are too close to the source to see what the big picture is so our decision doesn’t encompass all the options or information.  Sometimes we are pressured by outside sources because they benefit from us making an uninformed decision when we don’t have that information. 

The world we currently operate in benefits when we don’t have the information or when it pressures us to choose with limited information.  We are often forced to make snap decisions because of how quickly this world moves and we are trained that if we don’t move now we are going to miss out.  That’s an unnecessary pressure we place on ourselves and that we allow society to place on us and that time pressure isn’t true.  If we master the ability to slow down and really observe where we are and make sure we see the whole picture, we give ourselves the opportunity to choose differently.  We are able to see the bigger picture and make a better decision.  The world does indeed move quickly, but it ironically gives us all the time we need.  Think about those moments of aligned inspiration and creativity—the time flows differently there, suddenly moving quickly but slowly all at the same time.  It is all the time we need.  We can decide if we are moving fast or slow and we can set the limit/boundary on our need to make better decisions by taking our time.

This whole life is one magnificent game where we get to create all of the events and things we want in our lives.  We were given a giant playground with all the materials and resources we could ever need and a mind that allows us to take those things and turn them into something else.  We were given ideas and thought and emotion and love and purpose and all of those things are infinitely more important to focus on than any manufactured crap that is put out there designed to make us forget who we are or think a certain way.  We choose the course of our lives through love and patience and honoring who we are.  We choose what we experience through what we feel and how we feel influences how we see the world.  We can always choose to be down or depressed about the bad things that happen—because sometimes bad things do happen.  Or we can choose to be empowered and take up the mantle of our purpose and enjoy creating the life we are meant to have—we can see the joy of being the calm in the storm and all of the doors that open for us. Choose your lens. 

Today I am grateful for purpose.  I’ve spent a lifetime trying to find my purpose and what I really want to do when I “grow up” so to speak.  I’ve struggled to maintain what I am “supposed” to do with what I want to do.  As I’ve worked through my journey toward self-love and acceptance, I’ve written over and over again about the importance of following joy and taking risks.  Sometimes life gives us nudges in the right direction and other times it shoves us directly on our path.  This past week has demonstrated with complete clarity that my purpose is not just something I’ve suspected, it’s real.  Always trust your intuition and follow your own rhythm.  Know that the pieces always come together when you follow your own course.  I’ve had the gift of being able to share my purpose with others just over the last two days and it has been the most natural thing in my life.  I think that was the final click: nothing about it was forced.  Do what feels right, what feels good, and what brings joy.  They say find your gift and how to share it and that is your purpose.  100% fact.

Today I am grateful for support.  It’s a vulnerable thing to share new sides of ourselves with people at times. When we show who we are and people respond and show up, that is an incredible feeling.  Not to sound cliché or trite, but not only does it feel amazing to be able to support people through who you are, but it feels amazing to see them reciprocate and respond to it.  Forming that connection is a gift.  Support doesn’t just go one way.  As a people pleaser, stepping out into who I am it sometimes feels like I’m getting my sea legs when I’m sharing this information with others because I’m not used to standing on my ground, I’m used to figuring out what people want and contorting to give it to them.  But the more practice I get the easier it becomes.  You never know what people need and how your gift may help them.  People show up when you least expect it.

Today I am grateful for preparation.  I used to get mad at myself for how much time I spent preparing for things instead of just doing them.  I could talk myself out of anything just by overthinking and over-preparing.  I do think all of that trained me to be a more detailed person in general which made me sensitive to the details in others, the things people don’t share. I know it isn’t always necessary and it can definitely cause delays to prepare like that, but it has helped me be more sensitive to the potential needs of others and to learn how to cover a broad spectrum with a topic.  What used to hold me back has answered a lot of questions and it has helped me move forward into my purpose.

Today I am grateful for love.  I love my family and I love my friends and I love being able to live this life.  Things change in the blink of an eye for the good or the bad.  You never know what the next moment will bring so spending as much time in gratitude and love as possible is key.  I hate how I feel when I’m stressed, anxious, or hurt.  I hate setting unrealistic expectations of others and being disappointed.  It isn’t always easy to accept people as they are especially when you do expect a certain level of reciprocity and understanding from them.  But practice allowing people to be themselves is infinitely more freeing for all people involved than forcing them to be something they are not.  That is what love is.  It’s not quite that blind acceptance because we encourage those closest to us to do their best, but it isn’t dragging someone into something that isn’t for them.  Love is an opening an acceptance of self, of others, of time, of where we are, and of what we are able to do. 

Today I am grateful for power.  I mentioned above that in finding my purpose, things around me have become clearer.  In the last week things have happened professionally that have absolutely altered my mindset about what I’m willing to tolerate in my life.  Not to be dramatic but I’ve literally uncovered tons of things happening behind my back, specifically from people who are supposed to support and lead me in that environment.  I got angry at first because I honestly can’t believe people still do crap like this to each other.  But then I got grateful.  I’ve known for a long time that there were parts of this job that didn’t fit me and that would never align with who I am.  The fact that it was confirmed is a good thing.  I can trust my intuition.  I’m also grateful because it has not given me the opportunity and the drive, and yes, even the push I needed to focus even more intently on the things I need to be doing and to step more firmly into my power.  Not every will see our value, and if they can’t see the value, then take away the opportunity for them to put a price on you in the first place.  I’m not a commodity—I am a talented, powerful, purposeful being and I am not here to live your agenda.  I am here to own my power.

Wishing everyone a wonderful week ahead.

“I never had friends like the ones I had when I was 12.  Jesus, does anyone?”  Jerry O’Connell.  I LOVE this.  Yes, it’s tinged with the very nostalgia we talked about getting caught up in (and avoiding) the other day, but I think this is also resonant of the very feelings I spoke of in that piece.  We are all looking for a certain feeling from a certain time.  There was a safety in those moments we are trying to recreate whether it was with friends or with family.  But these are the people we carry with us because they were with us in our formative years.  They ARE our formative years.  they show us the way to make it through learning how to become the next version of ourselves. They saw us in our discovery and we helped find each other as well.  That is not an insignificant thing.  And nostalgia aside, those formative years are so important to our being that any symbol of safety from that time, any symbol of familiarity where someone sees us for who we are is something we can latch onto.  We feel less alone when we have someone to go through it with us.

I was never trying to say that nostalgia was all bad, I was merely trying to help people understand that it isn’t a place we can live and that we aren’t necessarily trying to relive anything, we are trying to recapture a feeling.  There are other ways to recapture that feeling than going back to how things used to be. The truth is anything can be nostalgic.  There is another truth: that we can find the safety and connection we are looking for in any moment.  We just have to be willing to be as vulnerable as we were as children.  We have to understand that we still don’t know everything even if we know more now and that this life is always a learning curve.  We deal with the cards we get and we can choose to find security in our own abilities.  Our safety is within.

When I think of the friends I had when I was 12, there are two, maybe three who are still around and I do consider myself fortunate for that.  As I’ve gone through each progression of who I am, I find that there are pieces of myself that I want to bring back.  There are pieces of myself I started exploring long ago that I feel still need to be developed and explored further.  But I don’t necessarily want to go back to who I was at that time.  There was a piece of me who wanted to perfect and redo everything I did “wrong” back then but now I know that was just a sick part of my mind who couldn’t cope with not being perfect.  But putting that shield aside, I know that all is how it was meant to be and I am grateful to be where I am now.

The truth is we can look at this moment and be grateful we have come as far as we have. It’s important to acknowledge who we were and thank that version for teaching us what we know now.  We aren’t meant to carry the burden of who we were, we are meant to move forward into who we are meant to be.  Don’t get stuck, but yes, there are things to be grateful for, there are moments we need to appreciate from the past.  There are lessons we learned that we will carry with us forever and those things will always fare us well because some of the greatest lessons we can learn we learn as children.  Allow ourselves to continue to grow and develop and always strive to keep that openness.  The world is a magical place and we create most of it in our minds.  Love it, but don’t get stuck there.  Growth is key.