I love life and life loves me!
My mantra for getting through each and every day. Even on the hard days. I found yoga and meditation many years ago and through dedicated practice and willingness to take a hard look at myself, my life has been completely changed.
The heartache and the joy
Change is my middle name. My childhood was a never-ending series of beginnings and endings. As my dad climbed the corporate ladder, moving became a normal part of life. I moved about every 2 years, but if you count all the temporary corporate housing we lived in, it was definitely more than that. I constantly get asked if my family was in the military because of how often we moved.
The worst thing you could ask me is “where are you from” because I never quite know what to say. Where was I born? Or where did I live the longest? Or where do I live now? Or where do I consider home? All of those questions have different answers.
I was forever the new kid in school which made me shy but adaptable. Just as I would start to make friends and adjust, my heart would be ripped out as I had to say goodbye to yet another friend.
I was well-behaved and polite in school. Never in trouble, actually I wanted to make as little sound as possible so no one knew I was there. My mom said that she regularly went to parent-teacher night and my teachers had a hard time recalling who I was exactly.
Depressed and alone
From the time I was 8 until I was 15, I lived in all over Southern California and then just before I started 10th grade, my mom and dad decided to move the whole family to Nebraska to be closer to my grandparents. This was not great news to a moody, independent teenager for whom living in California was part of her identity. I fell quickly into depression and even attempted to run away from home.
I was still a good kid, I still got good grades (mostly) participated in school, church, and friendships but I was deeply unhappy and hoping someone would hear my cries for help. Somehow, not even sure to this day how I got so lucky, I met this hot barista named Eric at Starbucks when I was 18 and suddenly I was not alone anymore.
Slowly I started to come out from under the fog of my depression. I was in love. We got married just after I turned 21 and quickly moved again. Over the next decade, we moved more times than I can count. How ironic (or predictable) that I married someone who never wants to stay in one place? Seems fitting now that I think about it. Don’t get me wrong I hate to move but I am used to it, it’s my normal state of being.
Time to wake up
I remember turning 30 and having the most magical year of my life. It suddenly felt like life was finally going to go my way. I quit my job, started a business with my husband, and shortly thereafter we left everything behind to follow our dream of living in Europe. Our “quick trip” across the pond turned out to be a 5-year stint of living a nomadic life.
Life was fun and full of adventure, but there was this nagging problem, I felt very unclear about my purpose in life, unsure if I even had one. And soon I was unhappy again. I was lonely living so far from home and needing something to call my own.
It was during this time I was introduced to Dr. Wayne Dyer’s teachings on the Tao de Ching and the law of attraction. The concepts were not unfamiliar to me, being raised in the church, but somehow this new teaching spoke to me on the deepest level. BOOM! I was suddenly awake for the first time in my life. This was my spiritual awakening, my birth as a seeker.
#strugglebus
You’d think after having a spiritual awakening, life would be all good right? WRONG. The next 10 years would prove to be the most difficult of my life. Deep loss, financial instability, debilitating illness, deep-dark depression and crippling anxiety were my new norm.
And while most days I wanted to crawl in a hole and hide (and believe me I did just that, a lot)…something inside me kept telling me to keep looking for answers. I looked everywhere, relationships, coaches, gurus, books, Oprah, yoga teachers…I wanted someone to tell me what to do dammit!
And then, I finally I started to hear it…that small voice that told me I was gonna be ok.
Stillness.
I kept leaning into the small voice, spending more and more time in stillness. A quiet moment. And then another. And another. A yoga pose, a morning meditation. The voice started to get louder and more passionate. My higher self was speaking to me and I was finally listening.
“Your purpose in this life is to awaken to love. Everything else is temporary, only a shadow. Everything else will fade away. Don’t let challenges get in the way of love. it’s real. ” – My Higher Self
A real, tangible meditation practice gave me more answers in 10 minutes than I had found in all the books and online classes combined.
After a decade of searching, learning, examining my limiting beliefs, facing my fears and making mistakes I still don’t have all the answers, and I still don’t know wtf I’m doing 99% of the time. But slowly, over time, things get easier and more clear. My purpose is unfolding in front of me.
I have more capacity to love, to enjoy a sunset, to feel more freedom in my body than I ever have before. I still struggle with anxiety, depression and health issues (pcos,endometriosis and chronic pain) but I know now that everything is temporary and I have more tools at my disposal to help when I have a bad day.
Paying it forward
I have profound gratitude for all the teachers that came into my life and made a huge impact on me, whether they know it or not. I know I will never be the same because of the people who came into my life. And it is because of this that I decided to become a teacher and coach as well. To dedicate my life to serving others. I hope to be a steward of transformation and healing to others as I have been blessed to receive.
There is a lot more to my story, a lot more left to write, but for now I’ll say this…If you have ever struggled with chronic health issues, depression, mental illness, anxiety, finding your place in this world….I see you.
If you are looking for answers, keep searching they are out there but don’t forget to look within. If you want to learn about how to ignite transformation or have more questions please email me or come to a class, I can’t promise that you’ll find everything you need but I can promise that taking a step towards your wellness is always a good idea.
Namaste.