Tom Petty’s Wildflowers has been my favorite song for much of my adult life. You belong among the wildflowersYou belong in a boat out at seaYou belong with your love on your armYou belong somewhere you feel free. Nature is my happy place. I can breathe. Unwind. Create. Feel at peace in mind and body. Route 3 loomed above my childhood home. A major highway in New Jersey that will lead you to the Lincoln Tunnel - and ultimately, New York City. The weed infested hillside next to the Route 3 offramp was my sacred space as a child. A place to collect ladybugs. To pretend I was on safari. To find stillness. When my then boyfriend, now husband, asked me to move to Colorado in 1998, I didn’t hesitate for a second. Three weeks ago, … [Read more...] about Meet Yourself Where You Are
Self Acceptance
None of Us Are Okay
It’s been one hell of a year. For me. For everyone – as we continue to live our lives as normally as possible amid an evolving pandemic and all the uncertainty that brings. My friend Cindy said it perfectly when I met her for coffee last week. “None of us are okay.” Amen to that. I have some sad news to share my friends. Despite all the flights back and forth to New Jersey to help take care of Mom this year. Despite everyone doing the best they could - my sweet Mama lost her battle with cancer a little over a week ago. I am sad, but I am also so very grateful for the lessons and memories and outpourings of love. There is so much beauty, even during the most difficult of times. If we’re willing to look … [Read more...] about None of Us Are Okay
Welcoming Ourselves Home
Self-love. How many books + blog posts + podcasts have been dedicated to this topic? Writing about self-love is easy. Accepting and loving ourselves all day, every day is HARD. Like really hard. While surfing around on Brain Pickings today, this pop up appeared… I (of course) clickety clicked because who doesn’t want to know what it means to, “(really, finally) love yourself”. “Love After Love” by Derek Walcott is exquisite. Is it a poem about (as the pop up says) what it means to really, finally love yourself? Maybe. I mean, the beauty of poetry is that it’s open to interpretation, right? Some say this poem is about healing after someone has broken our heart. But I like to think it’s about healing after we break … [Read more...] about Welcoming Ourselves Home
I Am Practicing
When we are trying to make changes in our lives, so many of us just want to get to the part where we are confident and doing it well. But being human doesn't work like that. We need to practice before we become capable + confident. It can be such a relief to remind ourselves that we aren't skilled at something. That we’re still practicing. Give it a try. Instead of… I should be better at this. I should have this figured out by now. Say… I am still practicing. Doesn’t that feel 1,000,000 times better? There is relief in realizing that it is okay to stumble through change. There is relief in knowing that no matter how much we practice, we may never get to the part where we are confident and doing it … [Read more...] about I Am Practicing