6 in 6 Goal Challenge

Let’s do a recap of my goals.

Goal #1: Stop smoking for good.
Goal #2: Be more positive.
Goal #3: Drink more tea.
Goal #4: Workout regularly.
Goal #5: Write more.
Goal #6: Do more of anything that is good for my soul.

So where am I now?

Goal #1: It’s day 8 of no smoking. Yippee!

Goal #2: I’ve started writing 3 positives a day everyday, which actually makes a huge impact on having peace in my soul.

Goal #3: Check! I’ve even been trying more teas.

Goal #4: I started doing 30 day workout challenges. I’m currently doing a 30 day gladiator challenge and a 30 day kettlebell challenge. Which is great because when I want to smoke, I either squat or use kettlebells and the urge goes away!

Goal #5: Technically I have started writing more since I’ve been writing positives for each day, but I would like to blog atleast once every couple weeks if not more. So that’s my next challenge!

Goal #6: This I’ve been doing, but not as much as I’d like. Since I still have 3 months to go, I still have some time!

It’s cool to see that I’ve actually accomplished these goals and even though I’m not fully where I want to be with some of them, I’m getting there. It’s a feel good moment!

Next subject to talk about will be kindness.. and I’m already excited for this post!
Until then though I’ll end on this note… inspiration for your Thursday.

A Colorful Life.

Do you ever look at life as being colorful? When I think of creating, writing, reading, road trips, taking a walk, etc. I think of everything filled with color. A vibrant life.

When I think of being tied down or stuck, everything around me seems dull. Gray. Bland.

I think that’s what part of my problem is with being in a relationship with someone who already has kids. It’s a very hard situation to be in. It’s hard on your self esteem and on pretty much every aspect of your life. I found an article last week that summed it all up and actually made me feel like less of a crazy person.

When it’s not your kid, you look at everything they do with your head first and then your heart. If you’re the parent, it’s the opposite. When I read the article, it made everything make sense because I never once looked at it that way. But that doesn’t make it easy. Not in the slightest.

For me to deal, I create. I write, I paint, I design. Anything to get any kind of negative or upset energy out of me, I try to turn it into something positive instead of self destructing as I used to. The last few months have been a little rougher in the kid department, so I’ve been busier than normal you could say. It’s not that anything is bad, it’s just different. Split families are very difficult to say the least.

A huge part of me would love to be able to pack up with Kev and my dog and move to North Carolina and just see where the water would take us. Wilmington would be my first choice, we’ve been there once and it’s exactly where I would want to be. A little part of history and art all in one.  At the same time, I love the home we’ve made and we can always visit those little towns and cities where I get that sense of freedom back. And I truly believe that’s what it is, I feel that I’ve lost the sense of freedom that I once had with myself. So that has to do more with me than anything else around me, although the situation doesn’t always help matters.

Life is too short to worry about who wants to be in yours or who doesn’t. You can’t control what a kid does or says when the’re not with you and I’m proud of my accomplishments and the life I’ve chosen. So, only time will tell what will be in store for the future. In the meantime, I’ll work on continuing to make my life more and more colorful everyday. Most importantly, I’ll make sure that I’m the one that’s happy with it.

A new adventure begins.

 

 

So in my last post, I was giving up my business.

That has changed.

I love what I do and it’s truly a part of me. Instead of giving up on my true love, I was able to find a full time job, that will also allow me to create while still getting more time with my family, which means, I also have time for my business. It makes my heart happy and it starts tomorrow.

I can’t express how excited I am to have a normal life again. I missed my nights and weekends. This is the first weekend in months that I haven’t had to go into work on a Sunday afternoon and I absolutely love it. In a way, the last six months also feel like an experiment. A test for myself if you will, to see what I really wanted in my life. Lucky for me, I was fortunate enough to find it and fight my way through.

I hope this next chapter is a good one and I’m able to hold my head high and succeed even in the rough times. I’m blessed to have some very special people in my life who believe in me even when I don’t.

My adventure awaits… until next time ❤

 

Finding peace in life and myself.

There are many things learned in a lifetime. Some of which we tend to ignore, some of which we live by every day of our lives. I think there comes a point for everyone when you realize what’s worth fretting about and what’s not. And most everything isn’t worth it at all. Just added stress that no one needs.

Now I know there are big things that put a burden on all of us at different points in our lives, I’m not saying there aren’t. I’m talking about the little things that you can easily brush off and not make into something big. This in turn should make dealing with the big things a little more tolerable when they cross our path. But the small things like spilling your coffee all over the counter first thing in the morning, being late to work because of construction, a crazy annoying co-worker who you just don’t want to deal with most days, or making sure your house is completely spotless before you get company, these are things that can be controlled. They don’t have to put you in a bad mood or into a downward spiral thinking the world is going to end. No, life is a crazy unexpected journey. You have to take the good with the bad cause if we didn’t have the bad days, we would never fully appreciate the good. It’s about changing and growing and forever learning about yourself. And it’s about learning to love yourself. I am the queen of self destruction. Or atleast I used to be (I do have my moments, but it’s improving, thank goodness!), it’s a process but I’ve learned, and am still learning, to love myself when I never thought it was possible.

Loving yourself doesn’t mean it’s all about you. It just means accepting yourself for who you really are, regardless of what others have tried or still try to shape you into. Not everyone will agree with every choice you make in life and that’s ok. All that matters is that you can live with the decisions you make. Cause at the end of the day, you’re your own best friend. You have to be. If you can’t be happy with yourself, you can’t expect someone else to be happy with you. And you also can’t expect happiness to come from being with another person. Being in a relationship isn’t going to make everything in your world a fairytale, it should be a fairytale before you venture into that new part of your life.

Which brings me to something a friend of mine sent me today:

Be with those who bring out the best in you, not the STRESS in you!

How perfect? Such a simple saying but so many of us ignore it. Life is too short to stress about people who aren’t worth stressing about it. If someone does more harm than good when it comes to you or your sense of well being, it’s best to let that person go. You deserve it to yourself to do so. It doesn’t have to mean there’s hard feelings, some people just grow apart over the years and that’s ok. It’s a part of living. People come in and out of our lives for reasons, even though sometimes it’s hard to understand when we have to part ways, especially with someone who means or once meant the world to us.

When you learn to let go of the things that don’t matter and you begin to find peace within yourself, you’ll never look back. It’s one of the most amazing feelings in the world, like a newfound freedom. It only took me 30 years to learn this. Like they say, better late than never right?