I saved this picture as a memo to self a week ago. The memo that I leave in my inbox to “get to it later”. This morning I woke up to make myself gluten free pumpkin pancakes that turned into basically pumpkin scrambled eggs – my intention to start that memo was there. I need to love my body better to calm it down. My autoimmune disease is ugly when I lack self love and self control. So I ate my pumpkin scrabbled eggs while texting a friend. Lucky for me she gets deep because she is similar in nature and was sent the same memo. Todays question I was pondering is why can I be an expert in loving others well – get lost in them – give all of who I am into someone else – in all areas of my life – and continue to come up short on myself? I can do all the things that remind me of self love- meditate/pray, listen to worship music, make healthier food choices, swim, find treasures on the beach, read a good book, sleeeep, tell myself how pretty I look in a certain outfit, go back to grad school, and the list goes on and on. Still the output never equals the input. The truth is what I told my friend today: I absolutely love loving others but loathe loving myself the same way. In the same breath, I also reminded her that the mind is a powerful thing – and that being brave is walking into territories even in your late forties- that you aren’t comfortable with. Perhaps since I was born a people pleaser and focused on keeping everyone else happy throughout myself or fear of losing them- I conditioned my brain to put me last. Perhaps I need to recondition it to know – I am worthy and fulfilled even alone sipping on my Saturday cup of coffee.
In a circumstance I would have never anticipated being in, I have learned more about an incredible heavy situation that there is more than what meets the eye. When we come to the end our lives it isn’t only who we are as adults that matter, it is who we were since birth. Every person that held us, every first word we spoke, every classmate we ran faster than or swapped stickers with. Every high school production, every accolade, every crush. It is all encompassing and all relevant in who we have become. Our roots of our story is when we learned how to walk, read, connect, love. Recently, I have been in a situation supporting one of my oldest and dearest friends sum up the collection of beautiful pieces of her life. Incredibly hard as someone who loves her; while also honored as someone who loves her. It got me thinking about the impact of her life on mine – from year 6 to 46. The spaces we hold for people over the course of our lives are all relevant – at any age. I reached out to people that were in our early roots because I want nothing more than for her to see her life’s story from start to finish – through all of the eyes that she has impacted. And a call today with an old classmate reminded me, relevance doesn’t change at adulthood. Our heart doesn’t age. My 6 year old heart loved her as my 46 year old one does. Our 18 years of childhood filled with many of the same faces all matter and are all relevant. And the glorious beauty out of something so significantly hard is, we are all memorable every step of the way and every day. In the worlds eye we are irreplaceable, abundantly loved, and forever held.
We expect to arrive at our knowing by this profound meditative, transformative, hippy retreat style space. Like the universe only speaks to us when we are doing yoga or writing in our journal. The truth actually is God arrives when we least expect it. At His own profound timing even when you aren’t wanting or expecting it.
It might be with a sweet sound of chimes or come in with a roar of thunder – You can be at a yoga retreat or a vacation full of joy that you were trying to skirt away from that knowing – but when He says “incoming” – the Galaxy parts – and there it stands – the stars blink to your soul:
You know. And now there is no unknowing.
You know.
You know.
You know.
And with tears in your eyes – you thank Him for it.
The knowing comes not when you yearn for it but when it comes to find you through the divine. Only then will your eyes see with clarity instead of cloudy – that it is time to let go of what you thought would be.
I spent years of my life some time ago hypnotizing, starving my body to fit in an idealistic version of what the world reacted as beauty. The world rejoiced with compliments when inside I was empty, sad, lonely, and in the worst job of my life. Beauty has nothing to do with fillers but Everything thing to do with the stories behind the fine lines. It has nothing to do with created barbie bodies, but everything to do with the babies I birthed through these rounded hips and infants cut out of this protruding stomach. That the ultimate beauty is the soul that I carry, regardless of my pant size. This includes never working for a “hot girl summer” body, but honoring the fact it is deserving to be loved as is. It includes rest when it is tired from a life long autoimmune disease diagnosed this past year and a brain that needs to be monitored.
Honor the sacred highest vibrations in people, places, and things:
When you forget who you are, in a land you are new, it is easy to be swept up in things that are not rooted in your highest alignment. For as much as you wrestle it, remold it, rename it, it will never fit. Bless and release. After a few years of molding into a place/space moving far from the core of me, I realized this year I needed to return. Abandoning myself, my beliefs, my highest self- doesn’t serve anyone or anything thing. It just fills up time with a plastic version of who I am. Low vibrations only attract low vibrations. Be unwavering in who you are – no matter when you replant yourself.
Honor thy gifts you have been given:
I swore I would never work in a school system again after experiencing such an insurmountable trauma from my last experience. I swallowed it as something being wrong with me. Returning to working in a middle school part time this year healed the part of me that a broken system made me feel so broke. It reminded me how valuable I am, respected, and needed. It reminded me that I wasn’t made for toxic systems but for supportive ones. It has solidified I was made for this, and was asked to consider full time in 2023 for a reason. I also have ushered in with great abundance my abilities to go deeper talking to people that have passed, healing people, and allowing my intuitiveness to serve.
Honor letting go of the version you thought would be different:
Sometimes our dreams we thought we wanted are not in fact in the cards. Perhaps they are remolded into something else just as beautiful, perhaps they were not meant for you all, perhaps the timing isn’t right. The important part to go on with is to never stop dreaming BUT to never stop living despite waiting for a dream to come true. If it is meant for you – it will come. If it’s not – there is a bigger reason- another lesson. Perhaps what you thought was a dream was the best version when really God has a bigger vision you haven’t thought of.
💜For anyone who read my Sandy Hook story earlier: I don’t believe in coincidences… not with my long history to the story I posted earlier today. The bracelet message wasn’t the end of my connection with Catherine’s Mom Jenny. We continue to align in a God ordained way when it is essential for healing. Today I wanted to see the picture I had of Jenny and I at Catherine’s Butterfly party held in honor of her birthday every year. I put in “Newtown” in my search engine to my iPhone …. Up pops the picture Catherine made that was on the fridge with the lady bug like the bracelet!!!!!!! I haven’t seen it since the day her mom shared it with me! In fact I didn’t even know my phone had saved it! Love eachother with grace and a tender heart. Catherine has taught me never to second guess the gift God has given me nor to hold onto it as it just could be the one thing that can spark someone’s grieving heart to seek out more heavenly comforts 💜 Jenny, I hold you not only today but everyday in my heart. Always forever – mother to mother and with great honor and faithfulness. 🙌🏻
💚12/14/12💚💔 (With permission from this Mother- a personal story I have never written about re: Sandy Hook) A decade ago I had a vision in the wee hours before the day broke open, that was by far the most scariest vision my “gift” ever gave to me. Never did I expect for that vision to happen hours later mere miles down the road from me at a local school in a neighboring town- and CERTAINLY not to first graders. Instead of writing another somber tribute of the pain of living in that community endured. I am going to talk about a momentous heavenly healing moment my “gift” offered by God to a parent that lost her child that day who I hold so close to my heart. I saw this mother on television being interviewed by Anderson Cooper miles down the road a day after the massacre. He brought up her unwavering faith and how she was devoted to teaching CCD. As I cried at her daughters story and her love for God, I heard the Lord speak clearly- “you will buy her an Alex and Ani bracelet”. I told God – “I’m not going out there to find her and be that person to bombard her in her unimaginable grief. If you want it to happen you must make it so”. A few years later, around the anniversary, I was asked to speak about my heaven experience to my churches grief group. I knew two of the Sandy Hook moms would be there, but wasn’t sure who. I went in and sat across from this beautiful Momma I saw on tv years prior and quietly told the Lord “well done”. I told them my story and answered questions since I was in first grade myself when my experience happened. On the way out I told her if she needed to hear my story a thousand times I would tell her and if she needed a friend out in public, I am one(sadly the world treated these parents like local celebrities melting in grief being watched with provocative intrusive stares). A few days later was the anniversary, she messaged me via Facebook and asked me details about my experience. We ended up making plans to meet up for coffee days later. I was driving to the cafe to meet her, when I heard God tell me to go get the bracelet, as I passed by a local gift store. I went in and held one with Angel wings and asked God “is this the one?”. He answered clearly, “no the one beneath your hands”. The one beneath my hands wasn’t anything to do with faith, but I am very obedient and bought it. When I got there I explained seeing her years before on television, my giftings, and handed her the box. She opened it up, the bracelet had the words “pathway hope sanctuary”, which couldn’t have been gifted at a better time. This beautiful Mom was designing the ultimate homage to her daughters love of animals, and opening an animal sanctuary in her name. We cried. I thought this was the miracle. Then I got home and received a text saying “you are never going to believe this Aimee” with an attachment. A drawing that was up on the fridge in her home that her daughter drew, was extremely resemblant of the charm on the bracelet that looked like a lady bug of sorts. This was how our connection made only by God began in our interwoven healing process.
The name of the bracelet is called “ The Way Home” – could there be a more God ordained bracelet made? Below is the description which is powerful and the pictures 💜
Product description by Alex + Ani If you’ve heard the saying “home is where the heart is,” then you’re already halfway there. Resembling a scarab, the symbol of immortality, a shield, a tree, a horizon, and a heart, this symbol represents, literally, that love never loses its way home. Know that love is always present and you’ll never go astray.
It’s been a few years in this Paradise. A place with an endless warm breeze, the sun on your cheeks, and the sand between your toes.
A dream backdrop to a life well lived.
Over the years I have said out loud “I can’t believe I live here”. The beauty is breath taking and I can’t think of a day since I moved here and called it home, that I have taken its glorious beauty for granted – no not even during that horrible hurricane a few months back. Gods beauty of the environment has been the steady win for moving so far away.
The parts that didn’t quite adjust with so much glory and honor was finding myself: mind *body*soul, here in this new land. It is a melting pot of ever changing families also seeking to live life to its fullest in paradise. It lacks roots of longevity of a small town or familiarity with generations of a family name. This is impactful when it comes to peoples truths. Everyone loves the idea of reinventing themselves – sounds so “becoming” and rich in self help. Really – it’s a map of lost roads, a shell of who you are, and more of a chameleon than a human trying to identity in its new nature. Everything suddenly infiltrates you: others perspectives, others beliefs, material things, difference in education, parenting skills, cultural backgrounds, and the list goes on and on. Normally I am so rigid and refined in my beliefs – always the first to swim upstream against the crowd- I found myself abandoning myself and reinventing who I was.Reinventing not because I wanted to run from who I was, but because I had to assimilate to a foreign land.
And today – I noticed at age 46 – I have in the past almost three years- only shared pieces of me – and only in the past six months returned to myself. Realizing – I don’t need to adjust to be included. I wasn’t made to be a shell of someone I used to know. It’s ok to go against the grain even when things are extreme. And it isn’t normal to relive high school drama over and over again when you can’t ever remember a time as an adult ever having any before with friends you have had for decades! DECADES! I also reminded myself of this factor – finding your people takes time!
My two hardest things since moving here that have impacted my being is: church and my inner circle. I finally figured out the latter- YAY for my people! But I’m sadly less hopeful about the church. Church in the south is TOUGH for me. So I continue to seek Jesus in my heart and finding church in his people and his paradise, instead of a man made building. 46 begins the year of fully returning to myself and letting go of all the things I tried that were never who I was or am- while new here. I need to stand firm and be exactly how God made me not a reinvented version because of submersion of environment. Even paradise can trick you into eating fruits from others trees that were never meant for you.
Today on my 46th birthday I have returned to my own tree. The one of deep roots I have grown into since birth. The one I have flourished with fruit and painfully grew from bud to flower. The only difference is I have chosen a different forest to plant myself. It may not be amongst the same oaks I once shivered in the cold with- but now in palms with the sunshine in my face.
“Keep Still” I tell my soul. “Stay here on the mat, with the sound of the ocean, and the sand at your feet. Isn’t it beautiful?”
I drift.
“Not beautiful down the street where hundreds of homes are ruined, people are now homeless, and lives devastated. But you go on with your warrior pose”.
I flow in-between peace and heartache.
Driving to beach yoga this morning was nothing short of life altering. A road I have traveled dozens of times that always brought joy – I now held my breath while holding my heart.
The truth is I wasn’t going to evacuate.
The day before the storm I was prepping and preparing to become a “real Floridian”. I woke up to different news I went to sleep with – the national news was now calling my town by name saying it could be a direct hit. They reported a 90% chance it would hit Englewood, FL (which happens to be where I was beach yoga-ing) and a 70% chance of winds in a category 4 storm. This was not what I was expecting. My phone was blowing up with text messages of people worried asking if I was evacuating. My first answer was “no”. Then an old friend from my hometown in Rhode Island messaged me, a vet from the coastguard and a long time resident of down south. She sweetly said “I don’t want to insult your intelligence but this storm is nothing like anything you ever encountered in New England.” She then went on to tell me to make sure I put food upstairs and an axe incase I needed to get on my second story roof with my family in the middle of a horrific storm. Then I packed my bags.
We loaded the car up with kids and dogs, and said goodbye to our locked up house.
Off we went to higher grounds.
Right before we arrived I broke. I wailed cried – because I suddenly realized in a moments notice I packed a bag of a few outfits each and brought nothing else. There was a chance I would return to nothing. I started to list all the things in my head I left that I loved behind that could not be replaced. I started to think about the fact that if we stayed our entire family and our home might not have survived. And I cried.
Even though I felt solace when the storm had passed that my home had minimal damage and all of my people were safe, my community was incredibly devastated.The weird thing is they didn’t know it.They had no electricity to see the news – I did.
I thought watching the news on tv had prepared me for the days ahead when I would witness it live.
It did not.
Especially as an Empath.
I had high hopes of riding in on my crisis high horse and be able to save the day.I could not. I arrived hitting a brick wall of grief and trauma.
All of my crisis training and being in a million crisis teams went out the window- I could not be the vessel of taking on others pain – because I was the person feeling pain.
Suddenly being a social worker was useless.Suddenly being a healer wasn’t in the cards.They only thing that stood as tall as the mountains through the storm was my faith.
I sang worship music.
I prayed.
I thanked God over and over.
I layed on the mat thanking Him for the beauty of this beach, the seagulls chirping, the light breeze, the sand in-between my toes, and the ability to do yoga amongst two of my friends, while also honoring the heaviness of catastrophe. And still I rise … in knowing God has a plan. I don’t need to know or have control because He does. I just need to …. Be Still.
The beauty about returning is we are reminded of all the things we have healed from but are not aware of. Sometimes the deepest of healing takes place in corners of silence and honor. Returning also shows all of the people and places that loved us through it. Time and places that held so much pain rooted in my soul – finally freed. The poison was dug and dispensed in the sun and ocean of my new rooted space, and is now gone gone gone. People and spaces of love that filled my heart over running with reminders that I was loved then as I am loved now. That unlike this space I once called home, their love is not seasonal but steady unwavering constant warmth summer like the new place I root and call home. 🌳🌳🌳🌳🌳🌳🌳🌳🌳🌳🌳🌳 Thank you Rhode Island and Connecticut for reminding me how far I have come and how loved I have always been.
I can not put a single finger on why I left part of my heart in California.
Perhaps it was San Francisco, with her rainbow adorned colored inclusive streets, and her beautiful painted ladies Victorian homes. It could be the brisk to the bone air, that came in from the bay filled with hazy fog, that cleaned my lungs from the heaviness of humidity. Or could it be the majestic Golden Gate that literally takes your breath away upon site, or the silliness of the wild seals and sea lions dancing upon the wharf.
Maybe it was the deep spiritual awakening I had, while entering the Redwoods forest. The grandeur of the trees that also felt so protective and inviting. A place I had never been but felt like immediate home. Every branch and root with its own story to tell when I touched it. I realized that day, without a doubt, I was actually a tree hugger for life.
Could it be Sonoma, when I reconnected with an old friend in wine country? With pristine panoramic views, and stories of the land rooted in missionary work. A small quaint downtown that offered local artistry and healthily food choices.
Possibly, it was Monterey, a diamond of the coast. Its gorgeous landscapes and beaches. The patch of grass I rooted myself into the earth in, that felt like velvet. The sea life, the sea smell, the sea color, all of what is the sea…just filled my heart to the brim. Every rock on the beach I picked up felt like a song of the sea. Out of all the places, this one I promised my soul I would return to.
Then, there was Big Sur, where I could barely catch my breath. The dangerous, steep, large cliffs with the winding roads, that met the most picturesque churning sea. I felt like I was a speck of dust, in the midst of one of Gods huge creations.
Los Angeles, how exciting you are! Filled with lights, camera, action, every minute of the day. Gorgeous homes mounted in massive hills, quaint everyday restaurants holding some of the biggest names in Hollywood, and admiring the walk of fame, realizing my hands fit perfectly into Emma Stone prints. Old Hollywood and new, I became a fascinated spectator. I was completely surprised by the amount of wealth the writer of the song “I like to move it move it” had, when I saw his lavish home that overlooked the same point where the Hollywood sign is. Even in our hotel in Santa Monica, producers quietly discussed upcoming plans for various tv shows, and a confessional piece was being shot in the hotel. This city of angels ran on production which left me in awe but wondering where the people go to be real?
Then there is you, sweet Malibu. Your pristine beaches, warm people, and sunsets of a dream. The air, even though so close to the city of LA, has a slowed down pace, that lets one feel connected to self and surroundings. Malibu is like a love song filled with perfect lyrics and notes. Its lavish homes in the hills dripping in excess over looking the ocean, do not reflect the humble, grounded, sweet residents we met there (including the real Gidget). Malibu: It was a treasure I felt so excited to find.
Had I been in my twenties on this trip, I don’t think I would’ve returned east. California spoke to my being in a way I hadn’t expected and showed me a part of my country that was so incredibly different in its nature. It brought something alive in me, that was fast asleep. I look forward to returning to my west coast roots I left in the woods and amongst the ocean. A lesson learned, you should travel your own country too.
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