2016 In Review

1. What was the single best thing that happened this past year?
The single best thing... goodness, such pressure on a question. I don't know that there is one big huge thing that happened that stands out, this year has been a lot of things working under the surface. I loved my time with Chelsea in New York, and sharing my city with Sarah and Dasha this summer. I am so stoked on the roommate I ended up with after some craziness, my salary that I got this year is nothing to turn my nose up at either.

2. What was the single most challenging thing that happened?
A relationship that I've been working through mentally.

3. What was an unexpected joy this past year?
Hearing myself say "I'll do my best, but I'm never going to be perfect." And feeling totally calm and accepting of that. (The conversation was in relation to God and faith and life and how it's not a merit based system and I have to keep reminding myself of that.)

4. What was an unexpected obstacle?
Dealing with the feeling of having a bit of a sabbatical but not knowing what to do and trying to stay somewhat positive. A month off that didn't really feel like a month off, in fact I forgot it happened.

5. Pick three words to describe this past year.
Listen (my word of the year worked!), dig, choppy

6&7 - About spouses, so N/A this year.

8. What were the best books you read this year?
I read 70+ books this year, started so many others and decided I didn't want to continue them. There were many I enjoyed but these stand out the most.
Present over Perfect
The City Baker's Guide to Country Living
Scary Close (2nd reading)
All the Bright Places
How to be a Person In the World
Harry Potter 6 & 7 (re-read)
Finding God In the Waves

9. With whom were your most valuable relationships?
Sarah, the ladies of WD's, the one with my counselor

10. What was your biggest personal change from January to December of this past year?
Allowing myself to be imperfect not just in theory and by logic but in feeling too.

11. In what way(s) did you grow emotionally?
I learned the beginnings of mindfulness, a practice that I see being very, very helpful moving forward.

12. In what way(s) did you grow spiritually?
I dug in and started questioning what my beliefs are, not just what I think and say they are but what is really going on underneath. I read books by several Christian authors, have another to either end this year with or start next year with. I questioned God, I got mad at God, I realized I was still operating under old beliefs of what God was and how he/she/it worked and I started questioning those. I allowed myself to feel and mentally speak to what I use to think were betraying thoughts. If God is all being and all knowing then He/She/Ze/It already knows what's going on so I may as well make it an open conversation.

13. In what way(s) did you grow physically?
It's just coming now at the end of the year but I started getting really tired of my excuses about my physical health. I realize I've been saying the same things for three plus years of why I can't do so many things I want to do and I'm tired of hearing myself talk. They are valid excuses, the road to getting better and being able to do some of those things if not all of them will be challenging to say the least but it's far from impossible.

14. In what way(s) did you grow in your relationships with others?
I backed off of some relationships but spent a lot of time working out different things I felt about them. My hope is that in the new year I will be able to come back to them with a better understanding of myself and my boundaries so we can rehabilitate and grow.
I learned to let people tell their own stories. It's something I will continually work on, but I think it's important. I want people to trust me, and I think they can, but I also realize that what I think is no big deal to share might be a huge deal to others.

15. What was the most enjoyable part of your work (both professionally and at home)?
That I have the time and the freedom to work on my health with doctor's appointments and health insurance. I also enjoy the steady income that has helped me work on budgeting.

16. What was the most challenging part of your work (both professionally and at home)?
Communication

17. What was your single biggest time waster in your life this past year?
Facebook and crushes

18. What was the best way you used your time this past year?
Going to counseling. Definitely.

19. What was biggest thing you learned this past year?
I learned that the previous assumptions I had about how life should be, ones I didn't even realize I had, were not quite right and were causing more distress than anything else. There has been a lot of shifting and reconfiguring and deciding where I want to be working in the middle of that.

20. Create a phrase or statement that describes this past year for you.
Neither of these are mine originally but they have been so very true: The only way out is through and the time will pass anyway.

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Salty Foods and Feeling Free

A faded red hatchback waiting in front of me at a stoplight. A girl in the back with a Burger King crown, reaching to pull back the bag of food being passed from the front. It looked like summer break, I could practically smell the fries. The light turned green and they moved forward. Despite the food bag transfer they pulled into Taco Bell. Maybe the first bag didn't hold enough, maybe this summer day was one for a fast food mission of epic proportions. I wanted to be there, in that car...I wanted my own crown, sitting in the back seat between my friends, listening to the song of the hour, passing salty foods and feeling free.

On Any Given Day

Where I'm at right now. I'm lost and found and right where I started but also, somehow so far ahead. I'm 30 and feeling no different than my 20's but starting to recognize the distinction. I'm spending weekend nights dancing with many my sister's age and wondering how much of my week to week it should really take up. I'm constantly being pulled to pictures of hiking and gorgeous views off of the highways. I listen to songs about small towns with few roads. I look at pictures of rooms that are set on expanses of land and I feel a pull.

I remember Montana and want so badly to go back. To the second story room with little decoration and abundant calm. To the porch across the hayfield where I sat with a puppy sleeping on my lap. I want to go back to the steady sway of the day, of sitting in the sun with dogs at my feet, to driving back up the dirt road, to laying in the bed with the sounds of Montana putting me to sleep.

I'm tired of planning, I'm tired of overthinking, I'm tired of disappointment in myself and anything else. I'm spending time in the morning writing, sometimes trying to examine my wishes and next steps, other times asking for direction. Please lead me, I don't want to keep leading myself. Where am I going to shine brightest? Where can I feel that peace again.

At the risk of sounding just awful, I am homesick for a place I'm not sure I've ever been.

I'm not here to write how to's. To wax poetic on things I know to be true. I am not here to create listicles or fancy images for click bait.
I've been looking for blogs that have heart, that tell the stories of the day to day. The small adventures, the actual vacations and not the "I gave up everything to travel the world and I'm making millions at it." I'm tired of the perfectly styled. I go toward the blogs that have fewer followers hoping to still find the accidental grittiness, the lack of filters.
I appreciate what people have been able to accomplish, I appreciate that wild hearts have been given space to create a life that they want to, but that's not what I came to the internet to see. I came here, to online journals and blogs so long ago to read other people's takes on ordinary days. To read about their dreams and their messy messy minds. I come here for that and yet I am tired to put it out there myself. So here's the real. Here's what is true in my head somedays and feels like a lie others.

I'm homesick often for places that don't actually exist, I'm also challenging myself to create space to feel home right where I am at. I'm wanting the peace that I found in the Montana days but also wondering if that's the prize after working on some other things.

I'm working on keeping my eyes looking straight ahead and less in the rearview mirror.

Lately

Proud of myself for: waiting to listen to the new Jason Aldean songs until the whole album was out. I had listened to the two that were played on the radio and one my sister recommended but after that I stopped. He kept releasing new ones and I didn't want to know half of the album before I got to hear the rest so for the first time ever I was patient and waited. Such a small thing but I found myself enjoying the wait. I wasn't mindlessly listening the minute I got the chance, I was intentional.

I've been doing a lot more of this kind of thing lately. I've been working on enjoying where I am at, not believing in the "I have to have/do/listen/read this thing Right.Now." I've been using the library for books and if I can't find it there then I don't read it. I zip through books way too fast to justify the spending. Not to mention, there are soooo many books out there that I could read. This one book that I want right this minute isn't actually going to change my life. Or rather, it isn't the only thing that's going to make my life better right now. I don't NEED it in order to keep moving forward. I get easily swept up in the "I need this to make my life better" and I've been questioning that a lot in the past year. I justified so much spending over the years because I told myself this one thing (many times over) was going to be the thing that turned my life around. Turns out, nope! So I've backed off.

Learning to:
+ question myself with curiosity and support instead of shame
+ speak my truth, sometimes it's messy and embarrassing as hell, sometimes it's eloquent and helpful
+ believe in my worth (not going to lie, typing that feels really uncomfortable still... but I guess that's why I'm learning)
+ allow myself to miss things while also working to really appreciate the benefits of the new situation

Thinking about: Clothes I want to add to my closet that I want to reach for, that are comfortable but also good to go to my casual workplace in, clothes that can be thrown in the washer at the very least, ideal if I can toss them in the dryer after. I told myself for years that clothes weren't that important to me or shouldn't be that important to me. Turns out, HEY, I was lying to myself. I like clothes, finding ones I like that fit me right is quite a task, that's the part I don't like. I also didn't leave myself any room in my budget to buy clothes so any time I did felt like I was overspending and breaking the bank and shame was attached, no wonder I thought I didn't care much about clothes. While this might seem like an unimportant thing to think about, it kept coming up so it was time to face it. Turns out I also have told myself I'm not creative so I didn't give myself space or money or time for creativity. I've told myself I'm not athletic, I've told myself a great many things that are simply untrue about myself and therefore didn't make room for them and have suffered a bit because of it. Sometimes clothes are just clothes, sometimes they are a symbol of things you do and do not allow yourself to have or want.

Watching: Parks and Rec! Oh my gosh how have I never watched this ever before? It is the best. THE BEST.

Looking forward to: New season of New Girl, the start of the show This Is Us (Mandy Moore? Jess from Gilmore Girls?!), speaking of... Gilmore Girls coming to Netflix!, maybe restarting Desperate Housewives. I didn't think of myself as a TV person but dang... I sure have some shows I love.

Reading: A lot of faith based books lately. I struggle with faith and religion and the like but I keep finding myself drawn to it in different ways. Sometimes I find myself really enjoying the books and sometimes I find myself reacting to them strongly. I'm digging in more and I'm glad I am reading them.
Also:
How To Be a Person In the World - Ask Polly columns all together in a wonderful book!
Present Over Perfect - The best. Want to read over and over again
Loving My Actual Life - Fun, easy read. Read it right after Present over Perfect so I might have been a little burned out on it, but it has some good points in it, things I want to try.
Wild and Free - This one is bringing up a lot of resistance but I am continuing on because there are parts that are equally reassuring/helpful.
Since You've Been Gone - great/fun YA novel about a girl completing a list of dares/tasks her friend leaves her.

Almost ready for: Fall. There is a hint of crispness to the mornings that I love feeling. Sometimes the nights are cooler too. As much as I am not looking forward to winter, I would love a long Fall. A slow transition between the hot, hot summer and bundling up and dodging ice.

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January Review

I keep going back and forth about what I want to do here, if I want to write at all, what I want to document, because it still feels like another chore, and I've decided that at the bare minimum I can document my goal/word of the year/etc progress month by month. So here we go.

Word of the year:
Listen

Intentions/Goals:
Reach out /// Manage money
Cook new things /// Create more
Scroll less

My word of the year is working well even when I forget about it. As I mentioned probably numerous times to people around me and on here, I have been going to a counselor and working with her has been so phenomenal to the way I process my thoughts it's life changing. I still get lows and I still spiral from time to time but it's not nearly as much as now I have set an automatic habit of questioning certain thoughts as they pop into my head and thinking about why I feel crabby or sad or anything else and what negative beliefs about myself I am holding on to when I'm feeling low. My spirals are more shallow than they were before, I can snap myself out of some of them, I can figure out what I need to do next, I can explore what triggers that specific feeling and I also have this awesome sense of confidence growing. I have new positive messages to be replacing the old negative ones with and I am so grateful. Life. Changing. My hope is that by the end of the year I will be even better at managing my lows and spirals not just through thought practices but also better eating and exercise. With that I really look forward to the positive inner mentor showing up more. I'm looking forward to getting a sense of who I really am underneath all these things I've held myself contained with. Some hard work is being done and it's so worth it.

Intentions and goals:
I have been reaching out here and there pushing myself beyond my normal boundaries and comfort zone. I am taking more dance classes because I love them and while that may not seem like a reach it really is. I am allowing myself to not be as good as I want to be, to show up and practice and embarrass myself in order to get to where I want to go, and to do what I love to do.
Managing money has been going really well. I have a goal of how much I want to make in the next year, I am listening to a lot of podcasts about it, I'm keeping positive thoughts around it, I am writing down my credit card balance weekly and watching it shrink little by little. I'm liking the process, the shift from thinking of money as a drag to something exciting is a journey for sure, but I can't want to see what it brings.
I do this in waves. Sometimes I just get in a cooking mode and make 4 new things and other times I do the same old same old. I have been incorporating kale into some of my meals, tried different kale smoothies and kale and quinoa mixes and haven't been too disappointed yet.
I don't know that I've been creating all that much. I'm still figuring out my schedule of taking care of my big goals and creating doesn't have a good spot quite yet. But I'm working on it, always on my mind.
Scroll less.... well, I can't say I'm as good at this as I want to be yet, but I did mute a lot of people on my FB feed, I added a couple groups that were about goals and community and I have been paying more attention to when I get glazed from scrolling and reading too many things. It's in motion, I could do better, I'll get there sooner or later.

What else has been going on? Well February 1st I started Chalene Johnson's 30 day challenge and it has been pretty awesome so far. I will probably be sticking with her goal achieving process for a while. Through her program I have figured out 10 goals that I am working on, one of which is an overarching Push Goal which helps a lot of the other ones fall into place. I was going to wait for my birthday to start really laying down my measurable goals for the year and beyond but this came at the right time and now for my birthday I'm just going to have a list of fun/silly things I want to do in my 30th year. Pretty pumped about all of it.

Other goals and things:
Started a plan for drinking more water. It's going really well for the first time ever!
Working out with a trainer
Going line dancing once a week at least!!!
Started really searching for my next job. March 31st is my last day at my current one.

Other things I'm thinking about:
Mindfulness/Meditation and Living in the present
Drinking more water
Eating at least one green a day... eventually one with lunch and dinner (progress is a slow process with me and veggies)
Getting back to the things I love
Intentions and Values

In less than a month I'm going to be 30!!! Crazy. Awesome. I'm ready for the next decade.

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It's Okay

I've been taking pretty good care of myself lately by getting some counseling sessions in, doing some horseback riding lessons, signing up for a personal trainer to kick my butt and binge watching all six seasons of Parenthood in a little over a month. But I know that sooner or later there will be something that makes me sad, and tears will come. Part of the reason I've been feeling so good lately is that when those times come I don't get mad at myself anymore.

We've come to a place in society where we don't want people to feel sad so we try to bully or "inspire" them to choose happiness instead. Happiness can definitely be a choice, and sometimes you really do just have to keep pushing on, but I think that in pushing on all the time and "choosing happiness" we have forgotten how to acknowledge, respect and process all the other, less pinteresty emotions. Those emotions are just as important, they are just as necessary and they are just as valid as happiness or joy.

Bullying people or glossing over that they don't feel good isn't getting us anywhere. Reminding a friend or a loved one that other people have it worse than them doesn't make the pain go away. I searched on Pinterest for anything that bucked the trend of "I choose happiness" but there wasn't one thing, so I made it.

Sometimes we really just need to cry. Sometimes things don't feel good and we aren't ready to feel better about it. Sometimes we wallow, and the better we are at accepting, feeling (not feeding) and allowing the emotions the space to exist, the better off we'll be. That can seems scary, sometimes it feels like looking into a black hole***, sometimes it feels plain lazy and lame... especially with these perky, "I am in charge of how I feel..." memes popping up all over the place... but I have found that the more I acknowledge and accept, the more I allow and don't fight, the easier it is to choose to be happy another day.

So if today just feels like a huge suckage and the guy (or lady) you like looked at you funny and your soup tasted like crap and someone cut you off and all you can think to do is cry, go ahead. Or even worse if your pet is sick, or something you tried really failed, or if your world really feels like it's falling apart despite your privilege of not being a starving child in China, choose tears. I don't blame you at all.

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***if it really does get too scary and you feel like facing it could be detrimental to your health or living, please, please, please reach out, there are options other than hiding/ forcing or ending. Get a helping hand to guide you through.

Nashville: One Year

I can't believe I never wrote this, okay I can. I hesitated. I started and then I deleted. I started again. Then I deleted again. It's now been a year and three months. Am I ready to jump in to what the first year was like yet?

I'll give it a shot.

Disclaimer: This isn't actually a post about Nashville, it's a post about me and what I have learned about myself in the past year of living here.

My first year in Nashville was a mix of findings, feelings, and emotions. I came here with a pretty specific kind of life in mind. Wide open spaces, people that loved and rode horses, country music, huge trucks, country guys like the ones you see in movies and well, everything you think about when you listen to a country song. Bonfires, dancing in dirt by the light of pick up trucks, lots of laughing and love and southern drawls.

Sue me, I was living in a romantic dream of pop country songs when I came here. Unfortunately, when it came to those dreams, Nashville did not deliver. I'd love to say that I got over it real quick and figured out what else was here, but instead I spent a lot of time wondering what the heck I was doing. I didn't want to move home really, but I wondered if there was somewhere a little better, a little closer to the movie montage, country soundtrack my idealized dreams were.

While that inner struggle was happening I made some friends, I found a couple of people that were willing to go to a line dancing bar about once a month, I found people that loved taking pictures of where they lived and finding new spots to explore, I found a couple of jobs, and I found myself with a lot of time alone. My unhappiness and frustration got worst before it got better and in that I finally really learned the lesson I hadn't been getting for years: Happiness is not solely decided by where I live. Nashville was not my knight in shining armor waiting ready on gallant stead to sweep me away from my dissatisfaction with myself. I did not leave the things I did not like about myself in San Diego or in Portland, they came with me, somehow they fit in between me and the cracks and crevices between all that I owned in my car.

So what then? Looking back I think I bounced my way through the stages of grief. It wasn't just that Nashville was completely different than what I had wanted it to be, it was mostly that I was not magically altered into what and who I wanted to be when I moved here.

I came to a place of anger, frustration, sadness, and sometimes tiny moments of content when driving through a really gorgeous place. I felt like a hot mess. That place wasn't new for me, I'd been there before, in San Diego, in Portland, in San Diego again, in Portland again...back one more time to San Diego, and then Nashville. I don't know if I've just gotten a little more tired in my old age or I'm finally ready to start being more financially stable, but I knew this time that moving wasn't an option (or the answer). The only way out of the hot mess of emotions was through. And I needed help that I hadn't been able to find before.

Almost exactly twelve months after I moved here I started seeing a counselor. It has been the best decision I have made. While I haven't given Nashville much credit for a lot of things I will give it credit here, it was the place I found a counselor that worked, it was the place I was ready to really start doing some deeper work, and it was the place I stopped paused in running from myself.

So where am I at now with Nashville? Well, I'm exploring again, I'm accepting that stores and fancy food places are not for me but that museums, parks and events are. I'm blogging for a local real estate company about a town just a few minutes north of where I live. Another thing to credit to Nashville, it was here that I started getting paid to write and explore!

I'm working on strengthening friendships and going to events that will put me around people in similar situations with similar intentions and goals and I'm doing my best to see the good and accept the rest.

I've gone home a few times since I moved, and while I miss it like crazy and In Cahoots makes me consider moving back home, I still have a lot of work to do here, and while I know that no place was going to make me happy, I do wonder if maybe the distance gave me the room I needed to start making some changes, and facing what I had tried to squash for so long.

I'm not yet convinced that Nashville is the place where I will finally settle down, but it's where I am at for now. And if/when I leave, it won't be running.

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