It so cliché to choose this time of year to start making changes in your life, but I feel like in my case I wasn’t really given a choice. I either make the changes now, or be a miserable lump of self-pity for 2012 and no one wants that, especially me. Truth be told, I think I hit my self-pity quota some time in November, so my New Year transformation has already started, but with good results, so here’s to keeping up the momentum!
A psychic once told me (haha, have you ever heard a bad story that started out that way?) that some people hit their mid-life crisis in mid-life…but some address all those concerns earlier, usually in their early 30s. I think maybe my parents did that, and its why they have been able to enjoy these last few years so much. I also think that maybe I am being given a chance to do the same, to re-evaluate before I got too far along a path that would make me miserable someday, to re-establish what makes me “tick” and to embrace it, to live the life I was intended to live. Its an exciting concept, this second chance. A good reminder that life isn’t going to follow that plan that you make for it, no matter how hard you try, and you have to allow yourself to be open to whatever path is in front of you. I would have fought against my path forever if life let me, but instead life threw a wrench in the cogs, something that was sure to mess things up royally, something that even I couldn’t control. And voila, here I am, finally going the way I was meant to go. And you know how I know that where I am at right now is right? Because its so damn easy! It feels good every day and I have this new-found hopeful feeling that constantly reminds me how it feels when you don’t have hope.
Sure, I miss my old life. I miss it everyday. I miss love...giving and getting love is such a beautiful thing that it is almost worth living your entire life for…almost. I miss the security of knowing what was going to happen next. I miss having a home. But is it worth having those things if its at the expense of all the other wonderful feelings I have been feeling, reawakening inside? Probably not, if things ended up the way they did. I guess what Im saying is that being with the man you love and planning a life together is great, but living true to yourself and taking advantage of all that life has to offer is great too…what isn’t great is when those two things are mutually exclusive. You shouldn’t have to choose to have one at the expense of the other.
So, after all that has happened recently I can look at the bright side because I have one of those things, and the hope and possibility of the other, along with the experience to know that both have to co-exist for me to be happy.
So this year my resolutions should actually be pretty easy to keep. I resolve to be true to myself, to be ME in each and every way J I resolve to make this new city my home. I am sick of feeling like a visitor everywhere I go. If the only complaint I can come up with about Minneapolis is the Vikings, I think I’m in a pretty good place…and I want to stay (for now ;). I resolve to rekindle my old loves, and not the ones you are thinking of! I love music. I loved music so passionately that there was rarely a moment in my life that music wasn’t a part of. I want that back. I love honoring my temple, my body, with physical activity and good nutrition. I managed to justify living the lifestyle I have lived for the last four years because of external factors beyond my control. But those factors aren’t there anymore…it's time to get my health back. Lastly, I resolve to remember what is important and not lose sight of it again. My family, my friends, my health and well-being, my career, my passions…it is possible to have a relationship and all of these things as well, and I intend to do it…someday J Today, I’m just going to be my fabulous self and see where life takes me…cuz clearly it has a better idea of where I need to be than I do!
Cheers and Happy New Year!J
