What I am thankful for...

This Thanksgiving I started the day a little down. My family is mostly all six hours away from me and I was stuck in LA working without them. For the few days before the holiday I even told my husband that this year just didn't feel like Thanksgiving. Usually my family would start doing all the prepping a week or two in advance. We would all decide who was making what and when we would all meet up. It's usually really exciting. We will all relax on the day of and watch the Thanksgiving Day Parade on tv. 

But this year, we didn't do any of that. So, my heart was heavy on Thanksgiving. 

That was, until, I took the time to look around me. I saw the relationships I had made here in LA that weren't family but had become my family over the years. Even though my blood family was 350 miles away, I was still surrounded by love and affection here in the valley. 

So, I learned something particularly valuable this Thanksgiving...I learned that your family is what you make it. In this big, crazy world it is silly to think that everything will always work out perfectly and everyone will be able to spend every holiday with family. And it is in those times that you learn to forge additional family members with the people you come in contact with everyday. 

So, to wrap this long rambling post up...this year is learned that I am not only thankful for my family but I am also thankful for my LA family who always remind me how loved and cherished I am. Additonally, I am thankful for my marriage gained family whom I have come to love so much. They have become permanent fixtures in my life and I couldn't imagine life without them. 

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone! 

Life is tough every once in a while

It has been a while since I've posted anything. I have good reason though. In the past couple weeks I had the majority of my family in town for one of the biggest days of my life. I got married! 

It was beautiful and amazing and I'll never forget any moment of it. 

One thing I wish I could forget though is how it felt when my family had to go home. Don't get me wrong, I have a great life here in the valley with my husband and our cat, Oliver. But, being without your family close by is hard. 

Tonight is one of those nights when my heart is aching for my family. I want to be near them. I want to be able to hold my nephew and play with my nieces. I want to go get my nails done with my new found sister in law. Between school and work, days to go see them are few and far between. 

I will be fine. Life will go on. But I can't help but feel like there lives will pass me by. One day I will wake up and my newborn nephew will be 5 and then 12 and then 18 and I will have missed it. 

How do I make time for people so far away? 

Overwhelmed

Life can be so overwhelming sometimes...

Sometimes I wonder if everyone else is like me in that when they get overwhelmed their mind basically freaks out.  At the moment I am planning a wedding (24 more days), going to school full time, working, and trying to manage my time well to distribute it to family and friends.  With all that said, recently, I have been extremely overwhelmed.  Trying to find the balance of it all is one thing but when I have bills to pay and grades to make it can push me past my breaking point.

My fiancé told me today, when I had a moment of absolute panic (bless him), to just focus on the parts I need to get done today.  It became much more manageable when I could look at it that way.  Today I focused on spending time with my mom, getting a couple things done for the wedding, and doing some homework in the evening.  When I could break it down into smaller more manageable chunks it was easier to digest.  If I don't I end up looking at the giant pile of things I need to do (laundry, checks to write, cars to wash, people to visit and call and check in on, projects to finish, papers to write, chapters to read....AHHHHHH!) If I do that I end up crawling back into bed and saying forget it!

I have always been like that and the people closest to me have learned to tell me to break it into chunks.  When I am reminded of that point I am okay.  But today I became curious as to how other people do it. Do they just deal with the anxiety?  Or do they not feel that anxiety at all?  Do they do what I do?  Or do they try to get it all done in one day?  I began thinking, maybe there is a better way!  Because mine only works if I can remember to do it and usually only after I have had a couple freak out moments.

I have been doing my best lately to let things go.  Letting the person who cut me off go...letting the rude person at work go...letting a mistake I have made go...

It is difficult on some days.  Today was one of them.  I was irritable and grouchy all day.  Emotionally drained.  To be honest, I felt like a total lunatic for the majority of the day!  One second I was okay and the next I was drowning in my panic and the next I was snapping at my cat to leave me alone.

I think what I am learning from days like this is that it happens.  One bad day or two bad days or even a whole bad month doesn't mean that its all bad.  It just means that its a little crazy right now.  In a couple days or a few months from now it might calm down or it might be an all new kind of crazy!  Who knows?!  All I know is that life moves so fast.  You never know what is coming.  So enjoy every second of it.  If you need to be grouchy for a bit, be grouchy.  But then pick yourself back up and try again.  

Compassion

The above picture has the words to the very tough lesson I am learning right now. It is so easy to get caught up in petty arguments with people and to hold grudges that you forget what it is really important in life. You forget that we live in a beautiful place full of broken people. People that are trying to get by in this crazy life. People with mothers and fathers, children, pets, and friends just like you and me. People with money issues...family drama...long hours at work. People with their own set of pains and hurts and sorrows. 

I have started something new within myself in the past couple of weeks. I am really trying to let go of past wrongs and to forgive and forget. I am trying to rebuild relationships that I thought were lost and to root new ones in love. Let go of grudges and hurt that I have felt and embrace the present moment.

A couple of weeks ago the world slapped me hard in the face with something I had been holding on to. By holding onto my hurt I had hurt someone else.  I was raised to feel compassion and all my life I have felt it very deeply. And in that moment when I had seen what my refusal to let go had done, I knew I never wanted to make anyone feel that way again regardless of what they had done to me. 

However, how do you walk that road of being soft without also being a pushover? I have come to the conclusion that it is possible. If someone wrongs me I have within me the power to address it with them and then to let it go. What they do with it is out of my control. For me, and for my life, it is healthier for me to let it go that to hold on to hate and anger and to let "the world make me hard."  

I don't want there to ever be tension between myself and someone else. I want to leave this world some day leaving only love and happiness where I've been. In order to do that, I need to change my heart and strive to be soft. Because, really, life is too short for hate. Don't you think? 

The meaning of it all...

I have just started my second term of nursing school and with that new start have had a lot of moments to stop and think about my life.  I have thought about my successes and of course my failures.  I have thought about recent events, both the good ones and the bad ones.  I have had the time to ponder over my choices: my choice to go back to school, to break off this friendship, but to maintain another.  With all of this thinking, I have often wondered, "why?"  Why did I make that choice?  I have also wondered "how?" How it got to the way it is now.... And finally I've wondered "what?"  What can I do right now to make sure that either things maintain their good path or move onto a better path in the future?

If you really think about it, each and every one of our lives is made up of choices.  For example, you chose what you were going to where today, what you were going to do today, and what you were going to say or not say to people.  Those are small choices; however, you have also chose who to keep in your life and who to give up on.  These choices that we are all making every day of our lives shape us into who we are.

Sometimes it can be really tempting to wish with all your heart that you could go back and change it all.  But really, if you think about it, the only thing you can change is who you are from this day forward.  So, I guess what I am trying to say is that the meaning of it all comes down to who you choose to be.  Your life can be meaningful and full of wonder and happy memories if you choose to make it that way.  Some of the most positive people lead trial filled lives, yet they still maintain their sense of meaning.  They somehow know that beyond what they are going through right now that life is beautiful.

In the same way, I am learning that despite what I may have chosen for myself in the past, I can choose to be different today.  I can choose to push away people's misconceptions of me and to build myself up to be whoever I want.  And when, in my pursuit to be a positive person, I fail and speak words of negativity, I can choose to not allow that misstep to define me.  I can choose to move past it and live the life I am craving.

I recently found a quote that I like quite a bit:  "If you want to be happy, be." -Unknown  I think I might be using that in my life more often to remind myself of my choices.

Be yourself

I found something on the inter web today that I thought was very profound and spoken in a way I probably would say it to someone if I had the opportunity.  I unfortunately found it while I was supposed to be studying but that's another story for a different day.  hehe

 Click on this link to go to the youtube page for the vlog I found that posted this.  The vlog is called jennamarbles and it is one that I have followed for a long time.  She is hilarious but every once in a while she posts something like this that makes me go, "yeah, I totally get that."

After watching that I started thinking about my own life and how I have learned to be myself throughout the years.  I have told many people that it wasn't until everything was stripped away that I had the "opportunity" (and I put opportunity in quotes because it was more of a bone scraping, agonizing struggle) to find out who I really am on the inside.  Like she says in the video, it is really nice to have a support group around yourself and it can become easy to rely on those things to define yourself.  However, at some point in every single person's life you have to have it all taken from you.  Your family.  Your friends.  Your money.  Every single thing that makes up who you think you are has to go in order for you to turn inward and figure it out.  I don't think that this is a one time thing.  I think it will happen throughout your life again and again; and then each time you will see exactly what makes you....you.

For example, last year my best friend and I had a major falling out.  I don't think I have ever spoken about it on here.  It was awful and probably the worst experience I have ever been through.  I felt alone and isolated from everything and everyone that I had built up around me.  I felt like a crazy person to be honest because I cried all the freaking time.  It took us quite a while to get to a point where we could talk about it (let alone talk to each other at all) and sort all the craziness out.  During that time, however, I learned so SO much about who I am as a person.  I learned to be self reliant.  I learned that I don't particularly like parties are group gatherings or anything like that.  Actually, I'd probably go a long way to avoid them.  I learned that the fact that I don't like those things is okay.  I learned who my real friends were.  I learned that I was not being the person or friend that I could be.  I learned all about what being a friend really means and how hard it is to fulfill that role all the time.  I learned that I need to (for my sanity) take time out of every day for myself--whether that is a bubble bath, a starbucks run, or just a few minutes alone lying in bed.  I need that time to decompress and be all that I can be.  I learned however dramatically that I have limits to how much I can take from one day before I emotionally combust.  I learned to listen to those warning signs and go cool off before I do.  I learned that beyond a shadow of a doubt that I am a tough, smart, and loving human being who has goals and dreams and things still left to do on this earth with or without anyone else by my side.  I now have a level of self confidence that I didn't have before.  I am by no means perfect but I trust my instincts and know that I can make it on my own.

Watch that video and reexamine your life.  As people, we are constantly changing and evolving and hopefully, bettering ourselves.  Being the best you you can be is a big part of that.     

Eat pray love

I am watching the movie Eat Pray Love right now. I have read the book before and seen the movie before but I don't think I will ever get tired of its truth. I think I can relate so much to it because at my core I am very much like Liz...

I tend to have an idea and then I throw myself into it with all of my heart. I go big or go home. I find something and then run with it. I am an all or nothing kind of person. I don't sit still for long even though that sounds like the most wonderful thing in the world. However, if I am not interested, it is the most difficult thing to get myself to actually try. I lose my temper a lot. I cry all the time for the strangest of reasons. I like to eat and eat and eat. Large crowds give me anxiety. I like to think that I have it all figured out but I am actually taking it step by step. My thoughts and opinions are continually changing. I want to be a kind and compassionate person but life tends to get in the way and sidetrack me. 

Like Liz I want to love and live with no regrets. I want to travel the world and "marvel at something". I want to try new things and not be afraid of what may happen. I want to do yoga. Meditate. Lay on the beach. Feel my toes in the sand. I want to treat money like its not something to hoard and rely on as a lifeline. It's just paper! I want to form relationships. Deep, meaningful relationships that change my heart and mind. Relationships that change my perspective. I want to meet people who have struggled. I want to listen to stories and tell some of my own. 

I am always saying one day. Well, I think that day needs to start immediately.