Shine. Possibility. Radical Self-Love.

At the beginning of January I was browsing on the Pinterest, and I came across an interesting little blog post. The gist of the post was that at the beginning of each new calendar year, you choose a word that you would like to encompass that specific year. The word, or words, are to be directly tied to your goals, and would serve as a reminder of how you would like the next 12 months of your life to play out. In essence, this word would become your mantra for the year. I briefly read through all 100 of the "get some inspiration suggestions" to see what would jump out at me, and settled on two words that would compliment one another: Shine and Possibility. I looked at them over and over. I read them several times a day for a few days in a row. I wanted to see if they were something that resonated with me enough to carry them in my heart. I needed to decide if they inspired me to live up to them for a year. I was sure I wanted to let myself shine through my art and writing, and be open to the possibilities that doing this might bring. Last year was my "I'm going to write and make art and show the world" promise to myself, at which I fell miserably short. I wanted this year to be different. I wanted to "live up to my potential". Growing up, I'm sure I saw that phrase on my report cards about 60, 000 times as an elementary and high school student, although I could never figure out how any teacher could possibly know that I even had potential if I was determined not to live up to it.

A few days after I chose my mantra, my boyfriend made the decision to leave me. No face to face goodbye, and plenty of need for closure on my part. I will love him always, but deep in my heart I have come to terms with the fact that he was right, and that his leaving was for the best for both of us. Regardless, I felt angry, hurt, brokenhearted and absolutely blindsided. I looked at my mantra for the year again. Shine. Possibility. Seriously? How the fuck was I supposed to shine now? I looked at the list again, willing another word to jump out at me. Any word to reflect how I could possibly cope for an entire year with my unexpected newfound singleness. Not that I haven't been single before, and for long periods of time, but I honestly thought that Brian was The One. I had made future plans for us. I thought we were going to spend the rest of our lives together. I thought, I thought, I thought. I was wrong. I scanned the list again and again. Making Peace. Heal. Letting Go. These were the same words that I'd been dealing with for the past two or three years. I'd made peace with many things. I'd let go of just as many things. I had healed from numerous past wounds. I was so fucking tired of doing those things. I'd done those things with all of my being for what felt like forever. I'd conquered the healing process and the letting go process and although it's incredibly healthy, I wanted it to be background noise this year. I wanted those things to be automatic, not what I spent my whole year immersed in, goddamn it.

2 AM and I’m still awake, writing a song

If I get it all down on paper it’s no longer inside of me,

Threatening the life it belongs to

And I feel like I’m naked in front of the crowd

Cause these words are my diary, screaming out loud

And I know that you’ll use them, however you want to

                                     ~Anna Nalick

I looked back at my original choices. Shine. Possibility. Even though I was incredibly sad, those words continued to draw me to them like little beacons of hope. Words of forging on. Healing and Letting Go could be done as well, but Healing and Letting Go felt like they were holding me still until I was done. I have been treading water with Healing and Letting Go for a long time now. In my heart I didn't feel like being still anymore. I picked another phrase out of the list to add to my year. A word that encompassed those things with a different connotation - Radical Self-Love. Yes, I thought to myself, this time it feels right.

If you are interested in choosing a word mantra for your year laying before you, the above mentioned blog post has a lot of really great ideas: http://www.viviennemcmasterphotography.com/2015/01/02/100-words-of-the-year/

Dear Damn 2013

Dear 2013, you were the hands down worst year of my life. You were the year that showed me the true definition of heartbreak. I was literally brought to my knees with it. I laid awake on countless sleepless nights for months on end, sobbing and unable to breathe with the heartbreak that will forever mark 2013. That sorrow completely overshadowed the year, consuming my entire being. My. Entire. Fucking. Being. I never imagined that I would be able to recover from that bitter ache that was relentless within me. In the end I was able to pick up my shattered pieces and move on, but admittedly, a slight twinge remains.

Dear 2013, you were the best year of my life. You showed me that even though I had been shattered  into a million miniscule pieces, broken beyond fucking recognition, I could survive. I was taught that even when it felt like I could not go on...when it felt as if  I could not exist in this life for one more second...the world would continue to live and move on without me. I learned that above all, time really is the great, true healer. This was the year that I discovered who I really am. I became authentic and comfortable with myself, and I learned to show that authenticity. This was the year I became true to myself.

2013 will mark the year that, after what felt like a lifetime, I began to write again. I wrote about what I loved and I wrote about what hurt me to the core, and that pouring out of my soul started to heal me.

This was the year that I decided, out of the blue, to pick up a paintbrush for the first time and paint a picture. I painted that picture, and I found that I loved it. The best part was that I discovered my fear of being no good was unfounded. Even if the painting had turned out to be terrible, it was a starting place and it can only get better from there.

This was the year I realized that my fear was simply all the made up shit in my head, consisting of my own limiting beliefs. This was the year I took a step back and got some perspective, and in those moments I discovered that I am limitless.

Whadda Ya Mean I'm Not the Centre of the Universe??

I had a discussion with a friend the other day regarding our inability, or rather our lack of wanting to, let go of people when relationships end and it is our time to exit from each other's lives. We've all heard the theory that people come into our lives to teach us something, and perhaps they're only meant to be a temporary character in the whole of our existance. Well sometimes that can be a hard philosophy to swallow, especially when you thought that person had a forever role in your life. Sometimes we want to hold on to a relationship because it made us feel good, and we just can't bring ourselves to believe that anything will ever feel that good again. Maybe we don't want to let go because we know if we do the other person won't want to make the effort to maintain the connection. This hanging on to things long after it's really over inevitably ends up making us miserable and resentful that the person we love so much isn't working into our plans the way we so very much want them to.

"When you fight to cling to people who are no longer meant to be in your life, you delay your destiny. Let them go."

~Mandy Hale

Shortly after the aforementioned conversation, I read something that really challenged my way of thinking. Within the article there was a sentence that basically said, "Do not hate them for leaving, for they are on a journey too". Ummmm....pardon?? This was an entirely new concept to me. I, the one who considered myself to be moving in the direction of self actualization did not think of this? You mean I'm NOT the centre of the Universe, and everyone that comes and goes through my life isn't just here to serve my own life's purpose? They have life paths of their own? Now that's some crazy shit being thrown at me right there. Huh. So I'm also coming and going in other people's lives for their purposes as well. Imagine that....there's a way bigger picture outside of my singular view of the world!

Mulling this new view over in my mind edged my thoughts toward my father. My dad was absent for most of my life, and as a result I spent most of my life being angry at him for not being the dad I had envisioned, or the dad I needed him to be. In my mind it was always about my needs and wants. I eventually came to terms, after he died, with the fact that even if he did a less than stellar job by my standards, he literally did the best job as a dad that he could. Just realizing that was huge for me. Imagine, he was LITERALLY the best dad he could be with what he possessed within him. He wasn't the terrible, evil person I made him out to be in my mind, he was a human being with his own challenges and his own hurts to heal. He simply wasn't a person who knew how to maintain our relationship or effectively show that he cared. And by effectively show he cared, I mean show his love in the way that I wanted him to.

"Just because someone doesn't love you the way you want them to doesn't mean they don't love you with all they have"

~ Unknown

Delving a bit deeper using my new found knowledge, I realized if I had (as an adult) taken the time to ask the hard questions and have the difficult conversations with my dad, I might have caught a glimpse at the real soul he was inside his human form of existence. I may have discovered the tough experiences in his past that made him into that person who couldn't connect with me. Instead I took all of it in on a deeply personal level as a public announcement that he didn't love me. Maybe, in having those difficult conversations, I would have discovered nothing more than the fact that we were unable to make the connection I had always longed for. But now I have learned the ultimate lesson that I was as much in his life to help him on his journey of self discovery as he was in my life to help me with mine. And therein lies our connection as much as I can make it clear in my mind right now, our mutual entwining, however sporadically, in life.

Now as I proceed through my existance, I will try not only to see how others are the catalysts for my own essential life lessons, but I will take the time to consider the role I am playing in their lives as well. Will that change in my mindset make it easier to let go of those relationships that are so hard to pry myself away from that it almost feels like a damn addiction? Will it help in the knowing that not only is it time for them to move on, but it is also time for me to move on? Will it make it easier by reframing the situation to realize that I am teaching as many lessons as I am receiving? Will all this help me to depart from those relationships gracefully in love and light rather than with bitterness and pain? I think it will. I really think it will.