Tag: mental health

I’m a Contradiction and I Love It

Well, sometimes.

Most of my mental struggles in life come from trying to reconcile various contradictions within and around me. When I can’t figure it out, I feel ashamed. That is a rough place to be.

Some examples:

I love to move my body doing things like dance, hike, swim, and yoga and I love to binge watch Netflix in bed for a good 12 hours.

I can feel angry, sad, frustrated, and relieved all at the same time.

I love making healthy meals from organic, whole foods and I love to eat a Whataburger meal with a pint of ice cream for desert.

I can be the sweetest, most thoughtful person and I can be selfish.

That person who said they loved me also hurt me deeply. And vice versa.

You get the idea.

So there are times in my life when something comes along at just the right moment and in the perfectly right way to where there’s no room for me to deny it or ignore it. These moments are always followed by a major realization and a perspective shift that improves my well-being dramatically.

Acceptance is one of those ideas for me right now though it’s been in my awareness for almost 10 years. Not only self-acceptance, but acceptance of my reality in any given moment and acceptance of others as they are.

In the past, I equated acceptance with giving up or not caring or whatever. But now I see the nuance, the subtlety. I can accept myself for who I am, what I am, where I am, when I am, how I am, and why I am yet still allow room for growth and change. I can accept my past, the people in or not in my life, the present, how things have and are playing out around me yet still allow room for shifts and dreams.

This may sound contradictory. It is. And that’s okay.

I’m reading a book by a poet philosopher biologist and it’s so fascinating. The author tipped the scales for me to fully accept that existence is a contradiction and therefore so am I. In any given moment we are both living/growing and dying/decaying. From a cellular level to a spiritual level. Yep. I like it.

There’s no escaping this contradiction of existing if you are a life form in this biosphere. You live. You die. All the time and in various ways. I’m a living dying contradiction and I don’t have to reconcile anything. I can be all the things I want or don’t want and it’s okay. Accepting myself, others, and life ‘as is’ allows me to feel more relaxed which in turn allows for shifts to happen.

Funny thing that acceptance.

So Many Niches, So Little Time

I have a lot of niches. In these days of “pick one thing” business advice, I feel lost and stuffed into a box. It just doesn’t work for me. Don’t get me wrong. I think it’s brilliant if you are someone who has a very specific service or product to offer the world and that offering makes your heart sing and pays the bills. Sometimes I’m even envious of people with such a life path.

a path

It just doesn’t work out for my life and I’m done trying to force it. Especially when my main niche is learning! I’m a nerd and I love to learn new things, experience everything I can, and then share the benefits with others.

My résumé easily provides proof of this claim. I hold degrees in Psychology, Education, and Metaphysical Research. I hold certifications in Yoga, Meditation, and Ayurvedic Astrology. I’ve worked or volunteered in the fields of retail, customer service, food service, management, education, wellness, relationships, hospice, parks/recreation, and as an entrepreneur.

Beyond the formal stuff, I’ve learned how to do all sorts of things from plumbing and electrical work, to carpentry and design. I can patch a roof, repair vinyl flooring, change the oil in a vehicle, drain a water heater, build almost anything out of wood, and much much more. Hmm… my niche is beginning to sound a bit like self-sufficiency.

For fun I study nutrition, trauma recovery, herbalism, gardening, canine behavior and training, dance, mindfulness, photography, art, website design, beekeeping, biology, and the list goes on. I really really love to learn and then apply what I’ve learned to living life. I value efficiency, effectiveness, creativity, ingenuity, and integrity.

Throughout all of this learning, what I’ve come to realize is that I can take in all sorts of information from other sources yet the real true wisdom is in my experience. If I try something I learned and it doesn’t quite work for me, I can make adjustments by listening to my body and my intuition. In this way I build my own personal manual for living my life and it is always in flux. What worked for me when I was 26 doesn’t work now at age 46. What works for my sister or my best friend may not work for me and vice versa. As I grow and change, so does my understanding of what I need to live life in a way I feel fulfilled and joyful.

A personal wisdom journey is a truly fantastic and magical path to travel down. I wouldn’t change it for anything. I’m also quite good at assisting other people along their own personal wisdom journey as I have an extremely large tool box to pull from and an all-encompassing perspective. Let me know if you’d like some help starting out on your own journey or if you need a new perspective on a well-worn path you’re already traveling. Contact me! I’d love to help.

I Met My 100 Year Old Self Today and She Told Me to Dance :)

I met my 100 year old self today in a meditation. She was so great! She was healthy, spirited, and had a mischievous glint in her eyes. I asked her some questions and man did she seriously blow my mind. The answers I got were different from what my 46 year old brain tells me. Super fascinating!

A bit of balancing practice today!

Then I thought about how much I’ve learned by trying to do things the way someone else told me to. At first I was like, man, what a waste of time and years of my life. But then it came to me that all of those moments led me here. To my now. To this experience of being able to do things in my own way. To listen to my own experiential wisdom. To listen to my own body. To listen to my own heart. To listen to all of me.

I’ll save my 100 year old self’s answers for another post in case you want to try it too. Then you’ll have a clean slate for hearing your answers. So just get into any comfortable position and consciously relax your body while taking a few slow breaths. Then imagine your 100 year old self standing in front of you. Take it all in!

What does your 100 year old self have to say about relationships? Love? Living life? Health? Your body? Work? What you do? How you speak? How you treat yourself? How you treat others? Worry and stress? Happiness? What’s really important to you? And any other questions you come up with… Ask them! And listen. Good stuff!

Share something that surprised you! Or something you weren’t expecting. I’d love to hear what you have to say in the comments below.