journal

you can do hard things. but you don’t have to.

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Yes, I’m talking about you.

You were born with a ferocious strength that you might’ve forgotten about along the way. Perhaps you spend your days trying to prove that to yourself. To find what you think you’ve lost. Or what maybe you think you never had. Well ladies, let me tell you, you have it. It’s inherent. You have the strength to do hard things, you do do hard things…but that doesn’t mean you have to.

Life has taught me that she can be tough. She throws enough curveballs, lemons and shade your way that you will surely get your fair share of opportunities to flex your strength. Don’t you worry about that. But there is a strength we often don’t acknowledge. The strength of shutting down, tuning out or, better yet, flat out deciding that you’re not going to deal with that today.

At the moment, this is the strength I’m leaning into. The ability to say to myself “that’s alright, your plate is full, you don’t need to touch that one right now.” If you’re reading this then you already know that I am a big fan of self-work, self-worth and personal growth. I have a built-in need to find the problem, address the problem and work on that shit until it’s gone (or evolves into the next phase of whatever it is meant to be). So the very idea of knowing that an issue exists and intentionally choosing to not address burns my soul to the most microscopic level. Eze will happily tell you about my need to “point and fix.” I will happily keep him away from this paragraph 😉 Call it a dedication to being “better” or a mark of perfectionism, I’m not sure, but doing the work is part of who I am…and it’s not always the right approach.

Sometimes the work needs to look a little different for it to have the biggest impact. The ability to identify what is taking up mental space and truthfully acknowledging how much you can actually work on (not handle) is a whole different strength. That is a hard thing. Understanding what you can actively engage with while making progress with…and being able to save the rest for another day (week, month, year) is big. It’s turning one thing down to give your full attention to another. It’s turning one thing down, temporarily, so that you can give it your all when you’re feeling more capable, determined and ready.

I’ve got some big stuff to process right now. Things that dictate how I want to be in this world, the way I want to raise my son and how I hope to create a space for him in this world that allows him to thrive. Big stuff, important stuff. But right now, my plate is full. I don’t have the time/space/energy to break that down…so I won’t. I’ll save it for next month when I know my plate will be a little lighter, days a little freer and my mind will have the space to do the work it needs to.

So if you’re looking for a little advice today, here is it: show yourself just how strong you are. Allow yourself to be surprised. Give yourself permission to say “no thanks, maybe later” and mean it. You don’t have to do it all…right now. If it’s important, you won’t forget about it. You just might need to wait until you’re ready to pile it on.

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cultivate, inspiration

how do you know you’re going in the right direction?

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My mother tells me stories about her life that shock me. That surprise me. They make me wonder how one person could possibly have lived all of that. As a kid, I couldn’t help but sometimes wonder if her stories were inventions, or at the very least, exaggerations. But I figured, believing them was always so much fun, so why not? Add to that, her mothers’ were pretty wild, too. Maybe it was just in the blood.

Looking back on my own life, I’ve already got quite a few stories to tell. Some extraordinary. Some sad. Some just flat out embarrassing. Stories that make me wonder if my son will someday doubt me. Stories that reflect courage, bravery, failure and a lot of change. I’m sure if you look back, you’ve got stories that do, too.

These stories are ones of transition, transformation. I have made big decisions (and small ones) that changed my life in big ways. Sometimes, these changes were out my control, and the only decision to be made was how to handle them. Ahem, ‘rona. So, I have asked myself a lot if I made the right choice. If I am heading in the right direction. Sometimes the answer is yes and sometimes the answer is no. But the question is, how do you know?

I’ll start with the ugly truth: sometimes you just don’t know. Sometimes, when you’re just getting started, you can’t be sure. What you do know is that you have that tugging feeling, that aching feeling, that tells you you just have to do the thing you’re about to do. It’s a dream/choice/change that occupies your thoughts, that you can’t kick out of your head. It’s the thing you can’t stop thinking about.

But sometimes you do know. And when you do, when you’re on the right path, your body reacts to what your mind isn’t sure of. Does this new thing make you feel energized? Excited? A little bit nervous? But mostly the giddy kind? Does it scare the shit out of you and inspire you at the same time? Does it make you feel motivated? Does it make you feel like you’re growing? Meeting new parts of yourself? Seeing yourself in a different light? A truer light? Does it feel like you’re coming into your own?

After the body reacts, your environment starts to change. Are you now meeting people that inspire you to continue? Do you find yourself in communities you hadn’t previously been apart of? Are opportunities opening up for you to continue deeper down this path? If the answers to these questions are yes, you, my friend, are headed in the right direction. If the answers aren’t so clear or the opportunities are not (yet) presenting themselves, you just might need to look at your approach from a different angle.

The “right” path isn’t always a clearly marked one. In fact, it seldom is. But the signs are there to tell you you are headed in the direction you’re meant to. At least for now. Your “right” path will twist and turn and sometimes even send you back in the direction you came from. Be open to re-evaluating where it is you want to go every few steps you take down your path. Just to be sure you wouldn’t rather look at the scenery elsewhere. And if you do, that’s okay, too 😉

 

// Here’s a story: fifteen minutes after I took this photo in the Atlas Mountains, my ear was licked by a random sweatsuit-wearing camel trainer on the side of the road. He gave me digestive biscuits. And a permanent trauma of camels.

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skipping ahead: moving past insecurity

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This is an old photo I would’ve never dared to post. Partly because my ass is hanging out and my mom would likely disapprove, but mostly because I would’ve analyzed every curve, edge and wedgie and decided that it wasn’t good enough.

Standing at the mirror five minutes ago, smushing my postpartum belly together and assessing the fact that the muscle has all but disappeared from my once almost flat abs, I now look at this photo with a completely different set of eyes. It’s funny how simple it all can be, growing. Once you kick out the hate, there is a lot more room to love.

Standing at the mirror five minutes ago, smushing my postpartum belly together, I looked at my own reflection with a different heart. I looked at the body in front of me…and then looked beyond it. Me, the person under the skin, is me. I know her, I know all about her. We’ve been through some shit. And she’s solid. She’s strong. And I like her. I respect her.

Looking in the mirror now, I try to jump as quickly as possible to that last part. I respect her.

In the process of becoming, I have learned that there is no final destination. There is merely evolution, a changing of place, a different manner of being, existing, of taking space. Our minds – and bodies – are a reflection of our movement through time, through life. Doubt and insecurity are things we conjure up along the way. We don’t start off with them (my son’s grinning face never shows shame when I’m wiping literal crap off his thick thighs), but at some point, we welcome them into our hearts and minds with open arms and then struggle to tell them to pack their bags and call Tyrone.

Now, it’s not easy. I know that. Insecurities are clever little things that know how to dig deep and occupy a lot of space. They get into the cracks and corners and make you believe things that are simply just not true. And what’s worse, though you already know this, is that they come from somewhere. Getting past them can be a life’s work but there are a few things that have helped me to skip ahead and move past my own self-doubt.

↠ Remembering that everything gets its 15 minutes of fame. But it doesn’t have to get more than that. Most of the insecurities that take up our time are really banal, petty things that we genuinely won’t care about in the future. Think about some of the things your younger self wasted time worry about. Maybe it was your arm hair? Your nerdy glasses? It is so liberating to recognize when you have moved past a thing. If you’re able to think objectively about where your negative thoughts are going, remind yourself this: you will get past it.

↠ Holding on to my truths. You already are good at a lot of things. You have already accomplished things you are proud of. I’m sure of it. No matter how big or small, identifying and holding onto those truths make building confidence easier. When I’m feeling down about myself, I force myself to say something nice (and true). Some days it takes a little longer for something to come to mind and that’s okay. But you can’t leave until your statement comes to mind. Sort of like the self-care version of sitting at the table until your veggies are all gone.

↠ Cultivate confidence. Get good at something. Or decent. Or just have enough fun that you totally don’t care if you’re good at it or not. And keep doing it. I’ve always been into fitness but I’ve never, ever been able to do a pull-up. During a postpartum-in-front-of-the-mirror-who-am-I pep talk, I decided that it was time to learn to do pull-ups. I got some resistance bands to help hold my weight and even with that, I can only do a couple. But you know what, I feel like a total badass just trying. Eventually, maybe, I’ll be able to do it on my own, but for now, I’m having fun and fun always feels good.

↠ My critic has a name. Yours should, too. Doubtful Diane. She’s a real biatch. She knows just how to knock me down. But now that my self-doubt is personified, I know when she’s coming around and I’m getting really good at knocking her down. Or at least outrunning her.

↠ Giving compliments…and accepting them. Woof, this is a hard one. How many times has someone said something nice to you and you’ve rejected their kindness? Probably a lot. I never really realized how often I did that until someone I loved stopped me and flat out asked me: “Why should I bother telling you how impressive/intelligent/attractive you are to me if you always just shrug me off?” My inside answer was that I didn’t believe those things to be true about myself, however, in time, as I changed my rebuttal with a “thank you” I allowed myself to feel the joy that someone else was trying to give me.

↠ You really, really can’t compare. Everyone says this and they say it because it’s true: you’ve got to stop comparing. I believe that there is a way to objectively measure your own successes against someone else’s in a positive way that helps you grow, however, that’s usually not what’s going on in your mind when you’re feeling self-doubt. Everyone shows up to the table with their own shit. Their own backstory, their own struggles, their own strengths. And even if you have some crossover, it really will never be the same because you inherently are different. Stay in your lane and cheer each other on.

Moving through life, becoming who I am and will be, I know that my doubts will change. The way I think will change. I will take up space in different ways. I will not always care about the things I do right now – I may care more or I might forget about them completely. But what I will do is always try to skip ahead, as fast as possible, to the part where I remember my golden truth: I respect her.

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thirty four: balancing expectations + finding flexibility

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If you don’t bend, you break. These are the words I have been – and will continue – repeating to myself.

If you don’t bend, you break.

2020 was…well, it was. It sure was. It was all the things. It was awful, it was big, it was slow, it was sad, it was joyous, it was enlightening. It was a lot of the things and it was all the things. It took away and it gave back. For all of us, in varying doses. In other words, 2020 was really fucking hard.

For the past twelve months, I have felt like I have been pinned down by an unrideable wave. With my back pushed into the coral, eyes unsure whether to look around at the bright colors around me or upwards towards the surface I can’t seem to reach. For brief moments, I’ve caught my breathe, my lips barely touching the air before plummeting back under the pressure of the white water. Every second of those moments are filled with confusion and contemplation: there is profound beauty always mixed in with the darkness of the unknown.

Perhaps what I am describing sounds like depression, but it’s not that. It’s living a life without anchors. It’s wandering in a space that you weren’t sure ever existed. For the past year, I have often felt like I am not in my own life. Instead, someone else’s life. A life I didn’t sign up for, one that isn’t objectively all that bad. Just definitely not what I had expected for myself.

This year has given and it has taken away.

Never in my wildest dreams did I expect to give birth without my the support of my mother.
But I did.
Never had I imagined laboring in a language I could hardly understand.
But I did.
Never did I think I’d spend three months of my life locked in the confines of a small city apartment without the chance to leave for fresh air.
But I did.
Never would I have pour my life savings, heart and soul into building a business I love only to shut down months later amidst a global pandemic.
But I did.
Never, ever, ever could I have fathomed keeping my son away from the love of my family because it was dangerous.
But I did.

Why am I sharing this? Because this is real life. And real life happens. And it doesn’t always feel good. And sometimes, it feels really good and really bad…at the same time. 2020 robbed me in so many ways of the life I have worked hard to create for myself. I have the perspective to understand my own privilege, but this isn’t about that. This is about knowing what you want, working hard for what you want, setting goals and expectations…and nothing working out as planned…and what to do when that happens.

With the changing of the year, I also changed my own year and rang in the big ol’ 34. Thirty-four. Just reading the letters spelled out feels different. I am thirty-four. When did that happen? In the span of the past 365 days a lot has changed, every single thing feels different because every single thing is different. This is a fact. What else I know to be true is that 2021 holds no promise to be better, different, worse or otherwise. We are continuing our path into the unknown. So what are you supposed to do with that?!

The type-A in me has a new planner by November each year, with ambitions, goals, projects and plans already filled in for the year to come. I love building something to look forward to and I passionately work on the sharp corners of myself with yearly intentions. But this year I’m doing things a little differently. Thirty-four year old new mom slightly wiser Gina is going to do it differently. Why? Because if you don’t bend, you break. I’ll admit it: 2020 broke me. And from it, I intend to grow again.

2021, or 34, is the year I intend to practice increased flexibility in all aspects of my life. Learning how to create expectations without holding on to them (woof, my mother has been telling me to do this basically my entire life…#lifeswork) will be the grease between the joints. Expectations are the baseline we set for ourselves, and they’re a good thing, but they’re also a slippery slope. They help us to measure our own successes, our own values, but they’re also a source of great disappointment when they’re not exactly as we had in mind.

I have absolutely no clue what is in store for me this year and planning it out seems a little pointless. Waiting for that moment or that change of tides is equally pointless. I will live my life in shorter moments, stretching out the days, looking around at the beauty and the chaos with a healthier balance of curiosity and contentment. This year, I will (try, let’s be honest, I’ll try) commit to being more flexible with myself, my expectations, the outcomes of my efforts, the efforts I make and how I choose to allow them to define me.

Wish me luck. I know it won’t be easy.

To bending, breaking, growing and glowing,

Happy 2021! Or 34 😉

 

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support postpartum care in siargao + workshop your way through crisis

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2020 has come in swinging. With a vengeance. As I’ve mentioned before, the unexpected change of this year has left me quite naked. But I know that I’m far from the only one impacted by the neverending turn of events this year has thrown in our path. The current state of the world has brought about SO many changes in our lives and has given us all different challenges to face. It’s okay, you are allowed to complain, to feel frustrated and just flat out pissed off. This year is total shit. But it’s not over…and we can all help turn things around.

The women in our community in the Philippines have been hit especially hard during this pandemic. With the tourism industry at a full stop, a typhoon and an indefinite lockdown, expectant mothers in Siargao are struggling to get the care they need. The “hospital” (and I use quotes because it really requires a stretch of the imagination) is shut down to all non-COVID patients, leaving expectant mothers no choice but to hire a private doctor or deliver alone in their homes. Medicines, vaccines and basic newborn supplies are more expensive than ever, if available at all.

To do my part to help combat the spirals of anxiety many of us are experiencing, I am offering one of my private workshops for free to any and all of you that would like to join! If you are able, we welcome any donations towards the care of these amazing women that are battling a true crisis during a time that should be showered in joy. A pair of shoes for you is a safe delivery in a clean clinic for an expectant mother. A cup of coffee at Starbucks is a vaccine for their newborn. Anything and everything helps and a little goes a long way.

If you aren’t in a position to donate but still would like to join the workshop, please join anyways. The more balance and joy we can find individually, the more we have to share with others.

What you need to know:
HANDLING THE ANXIETY OF CHANGE WORKSHOP
Sunday November 15, 2020
10am PST / 7pm CET
email me at: feel good (at) cactus and the wave (dot) com to join or DM me on Instagram.

**** If you’re unable/not interested in participating but would still like to donate, please make your contribution to: paypal.me/puntapuntasiargao

Being a mom is tough work, COVID makes it a crisis. A very big thank you in advance for your support.
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cultivate, inspiration

shift it sunday: break it down, build it bravely.

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What kind of life could I create if only I were braver?

Stealing a quiet moment to indulge in my (sixth) piece of chocolate and a new book while sitting in the warm October sun, I came across this question: What kind of life could I create if only I were braver? It hit me like a ton of bricks.

I have spent all the days of my short life trying to practice bravery. I have tried to consciously choose to operate from a place of courage rather than fear (or possibly the fear of regret) so that one day I can look back and know that I gave my life my damn best shot. Yet, with this “new normal” we are living, the crisis of the pandemic has ignited too often a crisis within me. A self-doubt, a second guessing, an uncertainty of self that fosters a spiraling negative narrative to take up space where my bravery usually lives.

“Was it stupid to build a resort on a remote island?”

“Should I really have my baby in Spain instead of in California?”

“Was quitting my job all those years ago really the right thing to do?”

“Am I even being a good mom?”
“Maybe I’m not what I thought I was?”

I’m asking myself all sorts of questions. Questions that I know the answer to. Questions that really don’t have any place in my current life because to get to the place I am now, I already asked, analyzed and assessed every angle of those questions before ever even making the decision to do the thing in question.

Now, maybe you’re reading this and thinking, “well, I haven’t lived my life as bravely as I could.” And if that’s what you’re thinking, then I’m really glad you’re here reading this. Because it means that you’re right there, on the cusp, about to live bravely.

Living bravely does not mean living without fear. It doesn’t mean living without hesitation or reservation. It definitely does not mean living without doubt. What it does mean is knowing that there is a truer version of yourself to live, a truer experience to have and chasing after that with all that you’ve got. It means being afraid but doing the real “right” thing anyways, not the “right” thing someone else told you was right. It means dedicating yourself to following your heart, your head and that thing that makes you light up from the inside.

Living bravely does not mean that you have to have it all figured it. Rather, it means living despite not having it all figured out. It means trusting, that with attention and attentiveness towards learning the lessons put in front of you, that you will figure out what you need to. It means making the next right choice. Not all the choices at once, just the choice you need to make right now to get you one step closer to the direction you want to go.

I will warn you about something, though. A few things will happen when you choose to live bravely and they won’t always feel good

  • You will probably lose a few friends.
  • You will probably feel lonely at times.
  • You will probably hear opinions you didn’t ask for. Or if you did, you’ll hear opinions you don’t like/don’t vibe with your choice to be brave.
  • You will put your own values into question. Over and over again.
  • You will always know what if feels like to not live bravely once you start
and it won’t feel right.

When I was 17 and decided I wanted to move to France, my uncle sat me down and asked me to think clearly about the choice I was about to make. He told me that I would likely lose a lot to gain what mattered most to me. At 17, when I could’ve stubbornly replied, “yeah whatever,” I didn’t. I listened. And let his words soak in.

16 years later, as I am typing this out, I have to say that he was 100% right. As I have chased my dreams with all my might, I lost contact with relations that didn’t support or understand my values. I missed weddings and birthdays as my passions took me to the other side of the world. I have felt some serious FOMO. I have asked myself a thousand times over if I’m living in accordance with my values – and I have learned that values change as we change, and that is totally okay. Actually, it’s great. I have learned to be flexible with myself, how I pursue what ignites me, and inflexible about living with what truly doesn’t inspire me to live my best, biggest and most joyful life.

Shift It Sunday Challenge: Break It Down, Build It Bravely.

Ask yourself this question: what life could I have if I chose to live bravely? Insert anything in place of life – relationship, love, job, experience – to take the first step towards living your life more fully.

Try to imagine in vivid detail what it would look like to live exactly as you dream. What does it feel like? Smell like? What are you wearing? Where are you? What colors surround you? It’s your life/job/relationship/love so be specific about the details.

It’s your life. Your one, big, bad, complex, complicated, beautiful, life. Don’t waste it.
Get brave and do the damn thing.

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jack nicholson’s hairline and other thoughts on confidence.

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I woke up this morning, looked in the mirror and saw a giant “Welcome to Motherhood” sign flashing right before my eyes. I had officially join the Jack’s Temple Club and I wasn’t thrilled about it.

What is the JTC, you might be asking? It’s this super inclusive club for new mothers who suddenly sport a bit more scalp where a lot more hair used to be
most notably along the temples of the hairline. As inclusive as it is – they say nearly 100% of postpartum women qualify to join – I had hoped, prayed and honestly thought I – and my thick long mermaid locks – would be spared.

Wrong.

I did get a little clue that my invitation might be coming when I went to the hair salon for a post-quarantine trim and the hair stylist mentioned how thin my hair was. Since she was speaking in Spanish and my level is still evolving, I obviously brushed it off as a miscommunication. I mean, obviously.

Wrong.

Welcome to motherhood.

One of the many things I have learned lately is that we must truly come to terms with how we choose to define beauty and more importantly, where we extract our confidence from. If my confidence lived in my hairline, it would be screwed right now. Thank god, I have a few other reserves to pull from. I did the work – rather, I do the work (constantly and repeatedly), to cultivate positive narratives that empower me to move through my days with more confidence. And it is work. Because some days, especially when the hairline is looking a little weak, I have to try a little harder to remember what makes me me…and why that’s worth something.

6 practices for building confidence and feeling good:

  1. Get up, stand up. No, really. Right now. How are you standing? Where are your shoulders? Is your core engaged? What are you doing with your arms? It might not seem relevant but confidence starts in the way we carry ourselves physically in the world. Your body language is a crystal-clear non-verbal communicator of how you perceive yourself and in turn, how others will perceive you. You’ve never seen Obama slouching during a speech, have you? Nope. So stand tall, take up space and be present.
  2. Build up others. It costs nothing and means everything when someone takes a moment to say or do something nice. When it’s honest (because everyone can tell when you’re full of it), a kind word goes a long way. Be kind, practice compassion and engage with the people around you. When you make someone else feel good, you will feel good, too.
  3. Know your values. When I was in elementary school I made a list (a long list) of the traits my dream man would possess. I was hardly out of diapers but I had a strong sense of what I valued in a person (particularly in Batman, whom I thought to be the end all be all). Turns out, 30 odd years later, many of those things haven’t changed. Knowing what you value in others is a reflection of what you value in yourself. Identify the characteristics that you appreciate, which you possess and practice behavior that helps you live by those values. You will never be exactly the same as that person you admire, but by tuning into what you truly find important, you’ll find that you will become a person you admire.
  4. Cultivate resilience. When that negative voice comes knocking and fills your head with nonsense, what are the most common things you hear? What are the things you repeatedly tell yourself? Try to get a clear understanding of what you’re telling yourself so that you can cultivate a healthier, more honest response to that bitchy voice. Remind yourself of something you’ve accomplished, something you’re proud of, something you like about yourself and kick that Negative Nancy to the curb.
  5. Focus on your strengths. Studies show that working on skills you’re already good at (as opposed to trying to improve your weaknesses) actually improves your skillset overall. As a person who despises spreadsheets and cries in the supermarket trying to figure out the discount I should be getting on the bundles of kale, I am really all about this advice. Now, this isn’t to say to completely abandon areas of your life that could use improvement, but rather, build your confidence through what you’re already good at. Focus on what you love, what you enjoy and what comes naturally to you and the rest will follow with a lot less friction.
  6. Reframe your perspective. Here’s the thing: you’re going to make mistakes. You’re not always going to be the best. You will do things you regret. These are facts of life and they won’t change, no matter how hard you try to avoid them. So instead of naysaying yourself and talking yourself out of striving for what you want or think you deserve, remember that you only get this one life to do it all. And you can do it all. But you have to try. The next time you start to fill with doubt and ask yourself “why bother?” take a breath and try this instead: “why not?“

Confidence is a daily practice. The ebbs and flows, ups and downs of life provide constant opportunities to feel like we’re just not good enough. But each of these moments are also opportunities to feel empowered, to remember how far we’ve come and to prove to ourselves just how amazing we are for being just where we are. So stand up tall, take up space and shift your perspective. You’re amazing. I know it. And deep down, you do, too.

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rethinking minimalism: how the pandemic has taught me to live with less

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I was completely unprepared for 2020. I packed way too light.

I’m sure my story falls in line with about a few million other peoples. We weren’t ready for this year and all the chaos that has come along with it, so I’m not going to play a sad song for my own. But I will say it’s left me naked. Quite literally.

At a whopping 7.5 months pregnant with absolutely nothing that fit me, I left the little island I call home with a wimpy suitcase mostly occupied by a camera, laptop, a few books, a sarong and two bikinis (the only things I’d need in Sri Lanka, where I was headed). After a quick adventurous babymoon to a sleepy Sri Lankan surf town (adventurous mostly because a volcano erupted in the Philippines, redirecting me halfway around the world on six flights with my giant belly and a spicy curry that nearly put me in labor!), we were headed to Spain to await the birth of our first baby. Spain would be in the middle of winter but as I didn’t fit in any of my winter clothes, I figured I’d just live in some old leggings and Eze’s sweatshirts until the baby came. It wasn’t like I’d be going out much anyways (hmmm, hindsight is always 20/20…). After the birth, we would head back to Siargao where my wardrobe would be waiting in my newly built closet. I’d be almost back to my pre-baby size, surfing summer waves and living the island life as three.

Well, well, well.

It’s October. I’m still in Spain. I’m still wearing my fiancĂ©’s clothes.

Life has a funny way of throwing curve balls doesn’t it?

So at this point you might be asking yourself, “well, why didn’t she just buy new clothes?” The answer is simple: I am stubborn. Out of principal, I absolutely hate spending money on things I already have, don’t need, and don’t even want. I’d much rather use my money on doing fun things, making memories and experiencing something new. Even if it leaves me looking like a hot mess. Which I do. At this very moment. A hot, hot mess.

It’s 38 degrees outside and I’ve got the sleeves of Eze’s old football jersey rolled up. Pants, who’s got em? At least I shaved my legs.

I won’t lie and say I feel great about this or even remotely attractive. (Yeah yeah, I know beauty isn’t skin deep but I won’t disregard entirely the impact of a nice-fitting pair of jeans). But I will say that I do feel like I’ve learned a big lesson
brought to me by tough love.

Over these past few months, I have learned that I really don’t need all that much and that I can be pretty creative about how I reuse what I’ve already got. Now, this is a lesson that I have learned over and over again just through traveling – backpacking doesn’t allow for extra fluff – but there was always something in knowing that at home, I’d have choice. This pandemic has be a very clear reminder that our lives are filled with a lot of useless distraction and that these distractions take us away from the work that stands between us and our happier selves. I do love drinking my tea out of a beautiful ceramic mug, but using my old jam jar works just fine, too. I miss a crowded room, buzzing with energy, but the intentionality of a good chat 1:1 hits at something deep. And my bikinis? I miss them a lot. But with only one in the drawer, getting ready for the beach has never been easier.

As life moves towards a new normal, I hope that this will be a lesson I don’t need to be taught again. While I know that I am privileged to even complain, I also know that experience is relative and old habits die hard. So this is where the work lives: invest in a few good things that last, give time to the relationships that fuel you, and don’t share your precious energy with anything that takes away from what makes you feel really good.

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cultivate, journal

when worry strikes
and what to do about it.

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This picture was taken when I was deep in the Sahara Desert, my car stuck in the sand as the sun was aching to set. The truth was, I didn’t really have any clue where I was. As one might imagine, amongst the mountains made of sand, the GPS was useless. A friend from the desert acting as my only guide instructed me to pluck as many plants as I could find and stuff them under the tires. As one might imagine, there aren’t many plants in the desert. Behind his turban, his sand-coated skin squinted. The worry was on his face and yet, he kept moving. Kept shoveling sand under the tires. Stayed calm. Told me what to do. He knew the desert like the back of his hand and he also knew how dangerous being lost in the desert could be.

This would’ve been the perfect time for me to panic. To get stressed out. To worry. Worry about what would happen. What could happen. But worry served no purpose in this moment. Worry didn’t have a place at the table. It couldn’t.

When faced with a dilemma, there is great value in reflection. In taking a moment (or several) to pause and consider all your possibilities. There is power in the pause. Unfortunately, what we often do instead is worry. Worry about the what if’s, the hypotheticals, the potential outcome. We give power to worry, we give worry a seat at the table where reflection should sit.

Worry is useless.

Instead, ask yourself this: what would happen if you stopped worrying about it?

If you’re not able to get a clear answer from your reflection, if the pause gives you anxiety and you’re not able to find a path through, change direction. Don’t look to the end, to the hypotheticals. Change your focus towards the details you can define. By focusing away from the worry, you take away it’s power and free yourself to reflect without distraction, without the emotional weight of the unknown.

In this moment, as the sunset over the Sahara, I didn’t worry. I couldn’t. So I worked. We focused on finding the way out even when the path wasn’t so clear.

Got a dilemma? Give it a try. And don’t worry. It will be just fine.

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cultivate

shift it sunday: happiness is hard

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While singing a really ridiculous invented song to my son yesterday in a desperate attempt to stop him from crying, my exhausted mind stumbled across an epiphany. Happiness is hard.

In our modern society, we hold the shared belief that happiness is a human right and that feeling joy is something we deserve in our lives just as much as a roof over our heads and food on our plates. What we don’t often talk about is the work it takes to achieve it. We know well the consequences of our hard work in other aspects of our lives and willingly spend the vast majority of our time dedicated towards these aims. We painstakingly work long hours to pay the rent on our apartments, tackle challenging projects to get promotions, follow strict budgets to plan for our next holiday and subsist on juices made of green vegetables to cleanse our colons and have glowing skin. But what about joy? How did we manage to think we’d get by without putting any effort into that one?

Research show that our propensity towards happiness, like obesity or depression, lives in our genes. That some of us are hardwired to feel joy a little more easily. Knowing this, it would be simple to write off our dissatisfaction with life as a matter of pulling DNA’s short stick. But that just seems pretty lame to me. We all deserve to feel joy, right?

Living a feel good life doesn’t mean living a life that feels good all the time. It means that you are an actively creating a life you love to live and (practicing) seeing things through a more positive lens more often than not. That doesn’t sound impossible, right? Well, good. Because it’s not. But it isn’t necessarily easy. It is, however, well worth the work and definitely within your reach.

It’s quite likely that if you’re reading this, you’re 1) not entirely satisfied with your life and/or 2) you don’t always wear rose colored glasses. No worries. I don’t either! Why? Because the pursuit of a feel good life, the pursuit of happiness, is all about a shift in perspective. And that shift takes work. It takes conscious and continuous action, day in and day out. Even, and especially, when you don’t feel like it.

So how do we get there? We shift.

Shift It Sunday Challenge: create new habits to rewire your brain.

It might sound hokey but it’s not: practicing gratitude and kindness actually make you feel good. So that’s what we’re about this week. For the next seven days – yes, every single day – challenge yourself to:

  • write down/tweet/meditate on/fill in the blanks three things that you happened during your day that made you feel good
  • do something nice – help a stranger, buy the coffee for the guy behind you, hype up a friend you know is feeling down, call your mom. Up to you!

Even when we know what will make us feel good, we often don’t make it a priority and the feel bad spiral continues. This week, shift your priorities to shift your perspective.
It’ll feel good, I promise.

Oh, and in case you were wondering, the song went like this:
Mama and Mini went to the beach
Mama and Mini swam in the sea
and now? and now?
Mama and Mini are gooooooing hoooooome!!

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