This morning I saw a friend I haven’t seen in three weeks. And like everyone this time of year, she excitedly asked, “Are you ready for the new year?” I chuckled and just said, “Honestly, I am not nearly as excited for the new year as I am that 2019 finally came to an end.”  Is it just me or did last year feel SUPER HARD? All year I felt like I was in a race I wasn't sure I signed up for. But the trick was that I had to run it in thigh-high mud. While it was snowing. While it was raining. While the sun then bore down on me and while picking up weights along the way. That may sound dramatic or embellished but if I broke down for you all the challenges I had to face last year, your eyes would glaze over with gratitude that your year had different challenges.  

I am proud of myself that I made it through Christmas Day. And then I slept, basically through the new year and up until this past Monday. I just needed to lay down. Ever feel that way? Where just laying flat is the answer to all of life’s problems? For me, what I really needed to do was stop the merry-go-round, sit the hell down, turn myself off and shut down until further notice. That’s a serious level of rebooting that not everyone does. Maybe we all should once in a while or maybe you all think I am crazy for ceasing all activity for a period of time. Because who the hell does that? Me, that’s who! A person who struggles with high-functioning anxiety dodging way to many curve balls in a small space of time, in this case a year. I know when to sit down. I know when I need to recharge on that deep level. And it isn’t often. But 2019 pushed me over the ledge of physical and emotional exhaustion into a place of tiredness I have never before felt in my life. 

I pride myself on being the Calm in the Storm. I have done it for so long that it is a pure super power at this stage of my life. I have spent 20 years ensuring that I use this power for good and not evil. That it helps me, not hinders me and my growth. It’s become a learned skill that endlessly educates and empowers me as a person, woman, friend, daughter, wife, sister, business owner, entrepreneur, and wielder of light. As I join the world again, I am going to openly talk about it and share the things I do to maintain my mental, emotional and physical health through all kinds of storms. I know I cannot be the only one who struggles to find their way through the daily challenges while still never giving up on being a positive influence and refusing to give in to the bad ones.  

In January, everyone is talking about New Year’s Resolutions. Instead I want to talk about New Year INTENTIONS. Resolve feels like doing something out of obligation whereas Intent feels like eagerness or willingness. Resolve feels like work where Intent feels like a natural part of ourselves. Like the questions, What would do if you couldn’t not fail? Or What would you do if every second of your day was free and yours? Intentions are our deeper inner yearnings for ourselves yet we like to talk ourselves out of them as if they are pipe dreams. They are not. They just haven’t b allowed to surface and so you don’t know they can. If I talked myself out of everything I have ever wanted I would never have been a performer, I would never have moved to new cities, I would never have learned a new language, or taken yoga, or said yes to my husband’s marriage proposal or gone back to school and began a business at 40 years of age. We get what we work for and what suits our natural self. The kicker being that if we don’t want it enough, we don’t make it happen. That’s the difference in Resolve and Intention.  

I hope you will indulge me as I dive back into my own Intentions and share them. Perhaps you wish to discover yours. I know that the path to my well-being is through positive, consistent, supportive actions that feed my emotional, mental and physical self with only good things to ensure that only good things come back out. So here I go…

Welcome to my own Holistic Living path. I invite you to walk with me and wish that you find encouragement for your own path along the way.