“Whether you are strengthened by life’s difficulties or broken by them is completely determined by your mindset,” Tom Bilyeu.  We’ve had a very challenging year.  A long illness, a horrific pregnancy, losing a baby, losing a dog, losing out on houses while trying to find our forever home, challenges with work.  It has been hard to not feel broken.  I’ve lost my mind repeatedly, feeling like the world was against me.  I can’t say that everything has turned around—it hasn’t, and I have no idea where this is going to take me.  I’m struggling to find the reason behind it. 

I know that I don’t have the choice to break down.  But I do have the choice to let go of the broken parts and put them back where they belong—or leave them where they lay as needed.  I have a choice to build something completely new.  Either way, I am still here.  I’m not where I want to be but I still have the opportunity to get there.

My skin still crawls when things go topsy-turvy and I can’t figure out why.  I am a person who believes that there is a cause when things go wrong.  I want to know what it is.  I want to see the purpose behind the pain.  I do believe that the lessons repeat until we learn them—but I’d like a different vantage point.  Maybe I feel broken because I’ve made it too complicated.  Sometimes things just aren’t meant to be.  It’s as simple as that. But my type A mind struggles to accept that. 

I’ve tried enough times that I know experientially when I improve the way I think, the things around me improve as well.  It doesn’t mean it’s easy, but I know it’s true.  I also know that keeping positive is a lot of energy because it can feel like we are constantly stopping and starting as we try to make our way.  Keeping our spirits up isn’t pretending we don’t feel hurt—it’s acknowledging it and trying again anyway.  And repeating until we get it. 

I’ve been blessed with a stubborn tenacity that pushes me forward through some really tough things.  My lesson is to push harder.  I give up quickly at times because I want my efforts to be worth it, and that isn’t the best mindset to have when it comes to building your life.  The worth isn’t determined by how quickly things happen, the worth comes from the value we see in it.  If I’m just trying to achieve a goal, once it’s done I will need something else to occupy me.  Proving how much I can do isn’t enough. 

Enjoying life and taking in the experiences we have make us more resilient and helps us navigate the unexpected—and even the expected.  I’m learning that life isn’t necessarily personal—it’s purposeful.  This means that things don’t happen to us, they happen for us to get us where we need to be to fulfill our purpose.  That is all we need to do—be wise enough to recognize our purpose.        

“The idea is to die young as late as possible,” via paradise awakening.  I’ve become rigid.  I came into this world with a level of expectation that has constantly been handed back to me. I have been proven wrong again and again and again and I let it wear me out.  I am exhausted.  Then I saw the above quote and I realized that I have stuck myself in a box believing I was free, that I was stuck when I had the key the whole time.  That was a dangerous thing for me because I developed a low tolerance for change and things that didn’t go my way.  I made my way the only way.  I wasted time making things exactly how I wanted and demanding the world shaped to my whim.

This isn’t to say that we don’t have a level of control in our lives but we have to recognize when we need to pivot otherwise we can let decades pass and then look back wondering what the hell happened.  I also never realized the work required to attain the things I wanted.  I never realized how many times I may hear “no” along the journey.  How many walls are actually out there.  I also didn’t realize that there are walls we can walk around, or step over, or even break through.  It’s a matter of deciding how to handle the obstacles in our way.

Being young carries a level of adaptability and a way to pivot as needed that doesn’t come when we stick ourselves in the same spot over and over again.  When we root ourselves, there is stability, but we set ourselves up to take life as it comes at us rather than to float with it.  We can’t forget that trees also change and grow—and we need to as well.

I’ve been taking walks with my son every night for the last week or so and I see how he enjoys life.  Simply being outside and riding his scooter while I walk with him, taking in the nice weather.  We don’t need as much as we think we do.  We just have to enjoy what we have.  He is also taking me on a new journey.  He is taking me out of my head and bringing me back to my body.  I’m trying to remember what I always have known:  there are moments that go so fast and we need to be present to enjoy them.

I’m not a patient person and we are dealing with some challenges finding a house (we’ve put in five offers on different properties and have lost them all) but my son is teaching me how to be patient.  As I’m coaching him through understanding we can’t get everything we want right away (he’s obsessed with Lego Mario), I am teaching myself as well.  There are a lot of things I want and I need to be an example to my son that things aren’t always the answer.  So, as I’m teaching him patience, the lesson is also for me.  I’m giving myself the love and coaching I needed as a child.  A fine example of the universe sending us the messages we need.

There is so much wisdom in youth that we discount because of lack of experience.  We dismiss the simple wisdom in favor of the self-inflicted complication of our reality.  If we learn to remember what we were born with, with what we inherently know, then we retain the qualities we need in life.  There is joy everywhere, not everything needs to be complicated, sometimes we just need to play, we need to love quickly and accept people as they are, sometimes we need a really good hug, sometimes we have to try over and over again, and sometimes we need to take things slower than we would like—but we will always get there.  If we do all of that, we can’t go wrong.  Stay young.

“Be like water,” Bruce Lee. I thought a lot about what this quote meant.  Does it mean be formless, no identity?  Does it mean always stay your course?  Or does it mean be flexible to the environment around you?  I believe it means the latter flexibility while maintaining the integrity of who you are.  Adapt, but don’t lose who you are.  Water is one of the most powerful forces on Earth.  It does what it does with no care or concern for what others think of it.  It simply is, and it gives life and takes it away.  It moves in it’s own rhythm.  When water sits in one place it becomes stagnant.  We need to take that lesson as well—if we try to control or keep things the same for too long, we lose the ability to move and we become stagnant as well.  We are meant to move. 

It’s key to know ourselves, to embrace our power like water.  When we know who we are, we move differently.  We don’t force ourselves to be in situations that aren’t a good fit, situations that might make us spill over the edge.  We move on.  We don’t make a big deal of it, we don’t force, we just move.  The human side of us may get upset because we see we may not fit in everywhere, even if we think we really want it.  But there is a driving force in each of us that keeps us on the track meant for us.  Sometimes we have to carve our own way.

Like water, I honor who I am.  I’m embracing my identity and I feel the desire to prove and adapt to other people’s expectations fading away.  I only want to be me.  That is something I’m willing to work for.  When we allow other people to set the bar for us, we may never attain their goals.  It’s more important to meet our own goals, to set our own expectations, to shatter our own glass ceilings, than to search for the approval of someone who can change the level depending on how they feel that day.  We aren’t designed to meet other’s expectations—we are designed to embrace who we are.    

Rachel Wolchin said, “I’ll never stop doing it just because it didn’t work out the first time.”  Also like water, we need to be resilient and persistent.  It may take time to achieve what we are looking for, but we must always keep going.  Head toward our goal with relentless determination and know that we will get there one way or another.  We may have to turn new directions and carve new paths, but when we are true to who we are and we honor what we are meant to do, we are unstoppable. As a fire sign I used to feel like water would put me out.  Now I see that all of the elements are in us at all times and it is our job to learn how to use them.  Everything we are can be used to create or destroy—I choose to create.

“The lies are always loud.  The truth is always quiet—I promise you,” Via the universe has your back. We are looking for a new home and it has been a nightmare.  First world problem, I know.  But this year has been challenging and we were hoping for something positive to come.  As we’ve faced rejection after rejection for a new home, I felt a near uncontrollable anger.  I also feel helpless because we aren’t finding what we want and when we get our hopes up, we lose the prospect.  It has started to feel like the universe is telling us we aren’t worth a new home, that our dreams aren’t going to be realized.  I have taken it personally because this is such a personal decision—it’s our future.

Just as we got the news that we lost our fourth house, I had two really difficult encounters at work.  One was with an employee that has been struggling for a while.  There was a minor altercation while I was gone the other day and as I discussed the event with her, we brought up some past events that had occurred between us and she essentially told me that I was a terrible manager.  I tried to not take it too much to heart because of the history, but it was still challenging.  Later in the afternoon, my boss held a surprise meeting with myself and a colleague essentially insinuating that I wasn’t managing another team well because my team asks questions to my colleague, the department educator—so my leadership skills were brought into question regarding a brand new department for me.  I was blindsided, especially with the second meeting, because I had asked the coworker involved if she knew what was going on and she said no, only to find out that she was the one raising the issues that were brought up. 

The lies came fast and hard—telling myself that I was incapable and that I was doing a terrible job and I had myself fired.  While I know that leap was too much, they were not unfounded.  I don’t understand why my boss allows colleagues to talk about each other rather than to each other.  The entire conversation could have happened with each other had my coworker told me she had concerns.  Instead she went to my boss and made it seem like there were so many problems to resolve.  The more I thought about it, the angrier I became.  I found myself the recipient of too much nonsense today and I didn’t know how to shake it off. 

What I believed in that moment was a lie.  I am more than capable and it is not my fault if you choose to not bring forward an issue nor can I be responsible for fixing it if I am not aware it exists.  Your job is an educator—if my staff have issues, then they need to be educated.  That is more of a reflection of your skills than mine.  My reaction was to fall into my old self and start asking what I could do differently.  Part of it was to learn, don’t get me wrong, I’m learning the role so as much help as I can get is appreciated.  But I shouldn’t have immediately assumed that everything I was doing was wrong.  There is mutual accountability because if you want a certain result, then you need to share that with me. I’m not a mind reader.

At the same time I realized that I no longer want to be in the business of trying to figure out what people want whether it was negotiating a price for a house or for what I’m supposed to be doing in my role.  I’m smart, I know how to lead.  And just because I lead differently, that doesn’t make it wrong.  My role as a leader is to also be clear on what my needs are and what my expectations are.  That is my only responsibility in life: to be clear on my desires and what I am able to bring to the table.  The decision is mine, and I am able to determine where I go from here.  The message may not be received well, but I’m done being complicit in an organization that chastises and ostracizes people for not obeying their every whim or not being able to fulfill their asinine demands or read their minds. 

So that is the truth—and it’s quiet but it is true: I am more powerful than I’ve allowed myself to be.  I’m beyond being dictated to.  I’m not the weak person I’ve allowed myself to portray.  I know the truth is that I need to go my own way.  I’m different than what they expect and they are trying to manage that.  That doesn’t make me wrong.  It means I need a better fit.  I’m not worthless: I’m inherently worthy and capable.  And I will get where I’m meant to be—the right house and the right career.  

After yesterday’s discussion on legacy, I spent some time looking up my mentors.  I found out that two of my biggest influencers had passed away several years back.  We lost touch after time and I hadn’t seen them for years.  While I was reading their obituaries, I realized I had wasted so much time focused in my own world, lost in what I was doing and what I was trying to accomplish that I completely lost sight of the lessons these wonderful people taught me.  Sadness washed over me at the thought of letting them down.  I don’t even remember if I told them how much they meant to me.

One of them was my college humanities professor.  I didn’t know him long but his class changed my life.  Early in my time with him, he taught a lesson about decision making and referenced kicking a wall.  I laughed out loud and he said to the class, “Yeah, she has kicked the wall a few times.”  The way he looked at me wasn’t judgmental or critical—it was with complete understanding of my young humanness.  That look said, “We’ve all been there.  Welcome.”  It resonated with everything I was experiencing at the time, dealing with a personal trauma and recovery. 

He took us through many lessons comparing who we used to be as a society and how we have continued some of those traditions today.  He wanted us to see that, even though we believed we were ever so evolved, we retain much of the same traditions from thousands of years ago.  He spoke of looking through different lenses and seeing all viewpoints.  During one lesson he said, “Sometimes you have to see that 2 and 2 equal 5.”  It blew my mind.  Sometimes things don’t go how we plan or we see people doing things differently than we do—it doesn’t matter.  I remember we were discussing Oedipus and no one answered his first question so he walked out of the room stating if we weren’t going to have a discussion then he wasn’t going to teach.  Always come prepared!  My favorite thing about him was that, no matter what he taught us, whether it was about rose windows or about cross cultural homecoming traditions, he always used his own slides.  The man traveled around the world and he had a personal account for nearly every lesson he created.  He taught us all to take chances because you never know the lesson you’re really learning.  For our final, he talked to each of us individually about our papers.  During our meeting, he held my paper in his hand and he looked at me and he said, “You understand all of this stuff, you’re going to be just fine.”  Maybe it was just the timing of my life, but those simple words carried me further than he would ever know. 

One of my greatest mentors was my high school French teacher.  I have more stories about her than will fit the page.  She was a short, slightly rotund woman, with a deep yet feminine voice who came across as your favorite grandma.  When you started speaking with her, you immediately understood she was no one to fool with—sweet as pie, but she knew her stuff.  Worldly, wise, welcoming, she embraced life and never hid her passions.  She spoke of choosing to speak French when she was younger because it was pretty—and she went on to make an entire career out of it.  She taught me that following your passion brings you to your purpose, even if it started because you thought it was pretty.  She had planned to retire my sophomore year but stayed with our group until our graduation, two years later.  She believed that what you started, you finished and she wanted to see us to the end. 

I developed a real talent for the language and she spoke to me about it, never pushing it, just wanting me to enjoy it.  She made me student of the quarter, the president of French NHS, and she awarded me the French senior medallion for my efforts.  She brought us to plays and musicals and operas and shared her love of the French culture in every way she could.  We always celebrated Mardi Gras with King Cake and she made crepes before school started at least once or twice a month.  More than that, she was there for me after I started cutting again and she supported me through a toxic high school relationship.  She told me, “I know it’s hard but it is not worth your time to deal with un salopard like that.”  Yes, she taught me to swear in French and it was a uniquely bonding experience.  We read “The Little Prince” in French and watched the original “La Belle et Le Bete” and she loved bringing us across the world.  I sang at her retirement party.  We kept in touch after I graduated and, as more time passed, my life took over.  To some degree that is exactly what she wanted—to embrace life and to live.  Let go of the nonsense and simply do what you love without shame and without holding back.  Create a life you love, a room full of cherished treasures because they are all memories. 

For both of these extraordinary people, I am incredibly grateful.  My life has been all the better for them.  Even if I hadn’t seen them recently, I have always carried those lessons, the memories with me.  It isn’t lost on me that some of my greatest teachers were actually teachers—I’ve always had a lot to learn.  There are always people who impact us and their lesson goes far beyond the classroom.  Often times it has nothing to do with what you’re studying at all.  It’s about life itself and those are the people I admire most.  Taking their passions and applying it to everything they do, applying it to life, and sharing it with everyone they meet.  It is who they are to their core.  I am so glad to have had two amazing experiences in my life, at different points, that carried me through. I still kick the wall sometimes, and I often dream in French—my heart knows where to go. 

In memory of Hans Dahl and Madame Kathleen Gabbey, thank you. 

“You have no idea what your legacy will be because your legacy is every life you’ve touched,” Maya Angelou.  We are trained to believe that our lives are measured by how much we achieve, accomplish, and acquire.  I bought into that for a long time.  I also believed that our success was determined by how much power we had.  I let frustration creep in because the more power I tried to have, the more control I tried to exert, the less control I had. I felt like a doormat because people were happy to take advantage of the person getting things done for them.  But I was just as guilty.  I was manipulating the circumstance because I wanted people to treat me a certain way or do the things I did for them, for me.  When we try to manipulate the circumstances around us, the people around us, it isn’t authentic.

The truth is I never gave much consideration to legacy.  I wanted to do something and to make a name for myself while I was here.  I wanted to have the freedom to do things and not report to anyone.  I wanted to live my life as I deemed fit.  I thought people would give me the means to do that if I did what they wanted me to.  Really, they just allowed me to serve their purpose and never got around to mine.  We are responsible for our own dreams—no one else. 

As I’ve matured and started addressing the things in my life that need to shift to get me where I want to be, I see how relationships with people impact us.  Something I never admitted before is that I’ve spent a lot of time hating people.  I hate feeling insignificant and I’ve had many challenging relationships where I’ve been left drained, taken advantage of.  I’ve always felt that as people with a higher sense of responsibility and a greater understanding of our relationship to each other and the Earth that we had a stronger obligation to do better.  We are able to do better and we should do better.  It has taken a lot of time to see that people come from their level of experience and they are working with their own frame of reference; we are all doing the best we can.  Beyond that, we need each other.  There is no room for hate.  We need to teach each other.

Our impact doesn’t have to be some grand project that changes the world.  We are more often able to change the world for one person at a time.  And maybe that is enough.  We can make someone feel better with a smile, a random act of kindness, guiding them, or listening to them through a hard time.  Understanding the role support plays in people’s lives—we are social creatures and sometimes all we need is to know we aren’t alone.  Maybe the goal isn’t to acquire, but to inspire.  I’ve been blessed to have some amazing mentors in my life, people who opened up to me, but allowed me to open up in ways I never thought possible.  People who lived their lives with passion, not pressure but still made an impression.  Life isn’t about closing off because of who we aren’t, it’s learning to open up with who we are.  That is our legacy.   

Today I am grateful for silly moments.  The intensity of the last few months has been challenging.  I recognize that there are many more important issues occurring right now and that the fact we are looking for a single family home is a privilege, but that doesn’t take away that it is a stressful event.  We’ve been so wrapped up in it we lost sight of fun for a while.  Yesterday we were at the store for no other reason than to find my son a small Lego Mario set.  We found a box of Key Lime Pie Kit Kats (which are absolutely delicious by the way) and my husband insisted I buy the whole thing rather than a few packs.  As we were checking out, the system didn’t recognize this giant box of kit kats so we had to ask the check out lady to help us.  She had to open the box and pull one out and enter the quantity—of an entire box of kit kats.  “How many?” she asked us.  I broke down laughing and thanked her for her help, paid, took my box of candy and we left.

Today I am grateful for expanding my brain.  While we were at the store, we DID manage to get the expansion to the Lego set for my son.  We came home and, honestly, my mind was blown.  My husband was tired so I decided to build the set with my son.  These things don’t have any instructions anymore—you have to go to the app.  It was SO cool.  I know, I’m probably several years behind, but it was so much fun seeing this little world pop up and being able to interact with the toy like that.  Not to mention I haven’t played with Legos for a while so it made me think and really pay attention while we were building it.  Plus seeing my kid so happy, playing with a “real world” video game, not stuck behind a screen, using his brain, felt really good.

Today I am grateful for faith.  I’ve been struggling with the idea that everything happens for a reason.  I’ve been working on faith in general for a while as well as manifesting to expand my connection to source.  I’m struggling because a lot of the things I’ve been trying to manifest haven’t come to fruition.  I know, when it comes to faith we are supposed to believe that if it doesn’t happen it wasn’t meant to be.  But I found myself bitter because there was one thing in particular I really wanted to manifest.  It was perfect and there was no doubt I really wanted it.  When I found out I didn’t get it, I really got sad and my connection to source, to myself, and anything else sank.  As we moved on from the loss, things started shifting and a person involved in the situation started saying they were doing everything they could—and I found myself resentful because I couldn’t tell if they had put in the same effort for what we lost.  Had they put in that effort, would we have gotten what we wanted?  That resentment won’t help, so I have to rely on faith that we are heading in the right direction.

Today I am grateful for accountability and ownership in my life.  I’m not where I want to be—and it is entirely my fault.  I’ve spent years in a wishy washy, unclear state, taking what I could get, people pleasing, acting in ways that wouldn’t get me what I wanted (but still hoping they would miraculously appear), or not taking action at all.  Plus my follow through hasn’t been the greatest because, for a long time, I was scared of accountability.  I was scared that I wouldn’t be able to maintain.  I’m grateful because I am able to turn that around.  I don’t have to stay stuck—I can change it up and I can get myself back in line.  More importantly, I can get really clear.  My ego and my heart have taken a lot of hits over the last few months but it has made my role very clear and it has pointed out exactly what I need to do.  I’m not passive in this, I am a creator.

Today I am grateful for knowing where I stand.  My job has been pretty consistent over the last few months and I’ve been working on developing new teams, but last Friday, I felt ambushed by my boss and one of my coworkers telling me about issues with one of my teams.  I was not blessed with the ability to read minds, and I had no idea what was going on.  I still don’t understand how it’s an issue since it related to my teams needing education/training and they were reaching out to the educator/trainer; call me silly but that sounds like you just had to do your job…but maybe I’m still a little sour on it.  Regardless, that same day I saw another coworker had been announced for a program with our merging hospital that I didn’t even know existed.  What got me is that she had to be nominated by our boss.  I felt a level of humiliation knowing my boss didn’t think me capable for the opportunity, that my work hasn’t been deemed enough or worthy, yet she hasn’t told me what is wrong.  So now I know something is up and I can make the choice to appease and to what she wants, or I can do what is right for me. The choice is mine.

Today I’m grateful for decisions.  To piggy back on knowing where I stand, I know what was brought up on Friday was a hit to my ego, it wasn’t a reflection of who I am.  However, it isn’t appropriate to expect that I know what you’re expectations are if you haven’t told me, and if you haven’t shown me what I need to know then I cannot be expected to execute.  SO.  I can make a decision to move on.  I know what works in my life and what doesn’t.  I have to evaluate what is a good fit and where I want to be.  I don’t need to be made to feel incompetent because I don’t have inhuman powers (mind reading) or because I refuse to work a 15 hour day 7 days a week as a salaried employee.  That is a boundary.  If I’m not meeting that expectation, then I’m happy to let it go.  My opportunities may present themselves in other places and I don’t need to waste my time trying to appease you when I can let myself flourish where I belong.  I get to decide what I’m worth; that isn’t decided by some arbitrary figure that you decide to not share with me. 

Today I’m grateful for expression.  “The greatest misconception about communication is that it took place,” George Bernard Shaw.  We have a nasty habit as humans to believe that we are clear simply because we say something and we also believe that people understand as we do.  I’ve been on the receiving end of unrealistic expectations followed by complaints that I didn’t understand what was needed when no one told me what was needed.  I am a highly capable person and I can pick up on most things pretty quickly—and I’m also pretty intuitive.  I will express myself with truth and humility and with the intent of sharing, not dictating, knowledge.  I’m privileged to know the difference.       

Wishing you all a wonderful week.   

“Don’t doubt yourself just because this is new to you,” Amy Porterfield.  Porterfield is referencing starting work or an enterprise or going for that thing we want.  But we are faced with doubt all the time.  We never really know what the day is going to bring so we are always potentially facing something new.  For me, as I face some struggles in my marriage, I’m facing new things every day, and I doubt myself all the time.  Owning and admitting my toxicity has been humbling to a degree I never anticipated.

I started approaching myself with honesty about a year ago—owning and admitting faults and flaws and learning to accept them.  But it wasn’t until my recognized how unhappy my husband was that I really started digging.  There were layers there I didn’t know existed and things I did believing that I was right caused so much frustration and pain—the very thing I was trying to avoid through control.

As I shed the layers I thought were my identity, I realize they were a shield.  I wore it like armor, safe in the belief that I was right.  Learning who I am without that weight is terrifying because I have no idea who that person is.  I’m doubting every step I’ve made because if the person I’ve been for so long can be wrong and has no certain footing, how can a person I’ve never known know any better?

As scary as it is, I know it’s also a chance to practice patience while I learn what this person is about.  There is great freedom understanding that you don’t have to be any one thing in particular.  You can shift as you need to.  You learn and adapt and integrate what you need and shed what you don’t need.  There is no room for doubt in who you are becoming because you will always surprise yourself with what you can do.  There is no room for perfection, either.  Perfect doesn’t exist.

Doubt only serves to undermine what you know in your heart to be true, your innate abilities.  Doubt is like keeping your life on pause when everything is moving full throttle.  It’s also moving too fast because you’re afraid you’ll miss out.  When you eliminate that and accept where you are, you are able to accept yourself as a beginner which leaves you open to learning.  The purpose is to learn as much as we can—not to live perfectly.  Perfect is impossible as we never know to whose standard we are living.

As we elevate and evolve to the next levels in our life, there will be people who come into your life simply to distract you from your purpose, to instill that little bit of doubt in you.  Having a strong sense of self and knowing what you are capable of is key in shutting out any outside sources of doubt.  We are often our own worst critics, but there are people who are simply here to push us to our limit.  Know that starting something will push others as well, it will stir their own doubts and they will push it on you.  Do it anyway.  Keep going and keep learning—you never know, you might bring something new to the table.  Keep going. 

“If an egg is broken by outside force, life ends.  If it is broken by inside force, life begins.  Great things always begin from the inside,” Unknown.  As my husband and I embark on our next steps together on the heels of a personal breakdown/breakthrough, I feel this to my core.  I focused so intensely on outside forces, I literally didn’t see where I was ugly.  Not that I didn’t know I was doing something wrong—my difficulty with many relationships speak to that—but I couldn’t figure out where I went wrong until I flipped the script and really dug into who I am.  I was breaking my life from the outside by making it something it wasn’t.  Once I started breaking myself down from the inside, with intent, I felt a shift.

I’m grateful I have such a patient partner because the level of frustration he must have felt had to have been intense.  Not only did I break my own egg, I was breaking his egg as well.  He couldn’t help me cope with some of the things I was feeling because that was for me alone and I lashed out.  I lashed out for every single thing he ever did wrong to me and it felt justified.  But that isn’t how you move on and none of those issues had anything to do with what I was feeling. 

I never realized how easy it was to confuse which way the force was going.  Things I thought I was doing for the right reasons ended up failing or breaking apart.  The things I wanted to do fell to the wayside.  And the things I did because I felt obligated nearly always worked out, so it got very confusing.  The only real progress I seemed to make was when I did things for other people—but it was only moving their projects forward, serving their interests.  So I learned to equate progress with their approval.  I suffocated my own life because I couldn’t tell where I belonged or what I needed to do.

After facing some of my own demons (because apparently I have a lot of them) I know I need to let go and pay attention to where the intent is coming from.  And, quite frankly, to let go of any force, inside or outside.  I allow my expectations to run wild and find disappointment at every turn so I try to control the outcome which is the ultimate choking force, destroying, not creating life.  I’ve also realized that my entire life (all of our lives) are like the egg: it’s fragile, and it holds life itself—and it emerges when it is ready.  That cannot be coerced.  Life runs at its own pace.  Be patient enough to let it unfold as it’s meant to.    

Focusing on work has been helpful.  I’m bored at times but I see things shifting.  One of my staff said I need a girl’s night and she isn’t wrong—I can’t remember the last time I connected with anyone.  But for me it isn’t about partying—I need a messy, snot-flying, reconnecting thing.  Connecting with people and mostly with myself.  Because I’ve been so on the outside that I’ve been controlling the external.  Being outside of myself will help because I can shift the perspective on someone else and their needs.  I’ve been too in my head lately, being who I’m expected to be—and who I’ve thought I needed to be.

If I’m still me, not who I’m pretending to be, then maybe it is the real me I’m looking for—or just the real in general.  I started seeing the life around me and how some people can dive right in.  They have a remarkable ability to stay present and they know how to navigate as things come their way.  Then I looked at my life, the things I’ve built and acquired and I had an overwhelming feeling that it was all an inconvenience.  It was all needless responsibility and unnecessary stress to prove I could do it.  I had to give so many things attention I felt I was always behind.  Now I see it as a good thing because I was focusing too much on inward emotion and creating a toxic pattern of victimhood and martyrdom. 

The more I got out of myself and learned to take care of what was around me, to understand the privilege I have in creating this life, I felt better.  I learned new interests and things that really spoke to me.  I also learned where my capacity lies.  If I don’t like the way things are going I am able to change it.  I’m not stuck.  I learned to no longer over indulge or to over commit myself.  I learned to say yes to what I really want even if it means letting go of certain things (see the yes and no discussion).  I also learned to accept that I can’t have it all or do everything—I’m human.  Even if I can’t have it all, I CAN have what is meant for me.  I CAN have my purpose.  I’ve been afraid to step into it for fear of losing what I know or admitting what I want may not be what my husband wants.  Fearing loneliness.  Fearing I don’t want what I thought I did, what I’ve already spent so much time on. 

Maybe I’m coming to terms with that the relationship I’ve had with the self I knew is over.  I’m protecting the core of who I am and she’s trying to come out.  Protecting her over expressing her is causing more harm because I’m perceiving dangers and slights against me that aren’t even there because I don’t know how to truly trust.  It’s hurting others because they can’t be who they are around me.  Whatever I’ve done and for whatever reasons I’ve done them, I’ve made people uncomfortable by me being uncomfortable.  But I’m growing and I’m trying.  I’m being honest.  Above all, I’m ready. 

I know I will have to be gentle with myself and I may fall into old habits.  I just have to keep looking for the chances to grow.  To be authentic.  No matter what it means.  Believing I can do what I need to.  Being open to life.  Imperfect they may be, I have amazing people in my life.  Imperfect I may be, I can always do my best.  And I have to accept their best as well.  That maybe I’m not for them or vice versa.  Or that we aren’t meant for each other.  And such is life. It doesn’t mean we are bad people.  It just means that our paths are different. I’m excited to see what this next chapter brings.  I’m gentle with me, but also accountable.  Open to being me and allowing others to do the same.  Open to being human and doing better now that I know better.