I am taking time for me.
Time to breathe, time to relax, time to figure out who I want to be and
where I want to go from here. It is
impossible to move ahead when you don’t know where you want to go. I am not looking to move for movement’s sake
or just hoping luck will push me in the right direction. I want to consciously look at my life and
decide what is best for me.
I guess what I am saying is that I want to find myself. My adult life has been a whirlwind of work,
relationships, and taking care of others.
I have lost many of the parts of me I liked best and don’t understand
why I never felt good enough about myself to develop others. The beauty if this time is that I am not
wallowing in regret. I have done some
pretty cool things with my life, but now I want to put myself first and make
sure that I am holding myself accountable for living a life true to who I am.
I am reading The Woman’s Retreat Book by Jennifer Louden. Yes, I know it always comes back to a
book, but I truly do not know a better way!
Anyway, I have always loved the idea of a retreat and the few I have
been on were truly amazing. This book
guides women on how to take all sorts of retreats from the big ones you
probably think of when you hear the word to simple solo retreats that can be
done in an hour. I like the idea of
short term retreats because it requires me to actively remember to put myself
first and to remember that I must take the time to figure out if I am being
true to what I truly desire.
I am not going to say that it has been easy to come to the
determination that I needed to do this because it certainly has not. My husband and I are both at turning points
and that has made it even harder because I feel that much more guilty about
saying that I need this time for me and it is non-negotiable. But, this is the only way that we are going
to be able to make the most of our lives.
If one of us is discontent, it will rock the path we are on
together. Not only that, I need to be
strong enough to do it for myself because no one else can or will do it for me.
So, how do I feel now that I am embracing the path to
self-discovery? Scared! I want to go back in time and be that
idealistic girl who was sweet as pie and did not believe people had anything
but goodness in them and bad acts could be reformed. But, I also know that I am a strong woman now
and seeing the world for all its problems does not need to make me jaded and
scared. I can be strong and sweet, tough
yet vulnerable, open to love. These are
some of the things I hope to truly realize during this time.
We are already at the end of April and I wonder if I have
started to play big yet. I think taking
this journey means yes. For while I have
always been a fan of all things self-improvement, digging deep and taking a
closer look at myself and my dreams has always been far out of my league to
even attempt. Well, I am at bat now and
I am looking for a homerun. I would say
that is playing big!
