So, it’s been a while since I have posted anything that others could read and somehow it feels a little awkward to me. I have started 50-something (okay, screw the vague 50-something-it’s 52), completely different drafts and not posted or finished a single one of them. I started each one with the intention of posting them and then…froze, changed projects, or at times just stopped working on them altogether. I was expecting perfection and of course none of them were perfect-they were, as I harshly self-judged, mediocre. They’re not really terrible, I’m just being dramatic.

But really, putting the jokes (ie. coping mechanism) and my OCD (<—another coping mechanism) aside-things have been H-E-A-V-Y and this is bird feed. These past few weeks have felt heavier. You are quite literally reading word vomit here. Today has been horrible-one of my best friends unexpectedly lost her Dad. My heart is broken for her, and I ache with her and so desperately want to take her pain. So, from my head to my fingertips, straight to you-in whatever manner you are figuratively digesting this. Sorry-that was gross but I’m serious-it’s word vomit. So…WELCOME! to my brain. I’m my own editor and I say the mess stays, so it stays. I started this blog as an outlet. A way for me to get it, whatever it happens to be, out of my head and maybe in doing so help someone else along the way. But friends, we know as he so eloquently put it, “The best laid plans of mice and men oft go awry.” – John Steinbeck.

COVID hit the world and it single-handedly paused, stopped (shut down), and changed it. This blog post isn’t about COVID and it’s not political so if you’re still reading you don’t have to turn away just yet. I mean, if my colorfully grotesque description above didn’t scare you off, hopefully the capital “C” word didn’t either. Anyhow, if you’re still here…ever since COVID (<—Is that what cofefe meant or did he just need coffee???) became common place, has everything just seemed HEAVY? Maybe it’s just me, but it’s all felt really dang tough. Everything. We lost my Aunt towards the beginning of the pandemic. Her death and the death of my Cousin before her have weighed heavily on me (neither COVID-19 related). My Mom has been ill and was in the hospital for a good stint. My Mother-In-Law has terminal cancer and has been given a short countdown clock to watch. My Uncle has been extremely ill as well and so many others. My daughter, also a perfectionist and has good dose of ‘fight’ in her like her Mama, has essentially been attending virtual school since March last year and that’s gone just swimmingly (<—to be read with sarcasm with an added emphasis of the eye roll please-it’s better that way I think). My son had a detached retina which required emergency surgery and had an extremely rough recovery-twice. I transitioned to a new role at work. My hip was rotated and stuck backwards for the better part of a year. I have cried so much that my dog now senses my tears and will not leave my side (or face) until they have subsided. I could go on, but you get it-I have been stressed. It has been HEAVY. At the same time, I know, I am so dang BLESSED. I know I am not the only one, because I know several people in my life for which life has just been so dang heavy lately for them also.

If things have felt heavy to you, how have you handled it? If I’m honest, I feel like I’ve outwardly held it together pretty well. I mean, no one stopped me and said they were concerned, so there’s that. But it’s the people in my circle of trust that have definitely seen and felt the cracks. They have seen me sad, exhausted and hurt. Whether they realized it or not, they watched me keep it together and falter alike. They have seen me at my weakest and most vulnerable. Those closest to me in the circle have undeservedly absorbed some of the fallout when I wasn’t capable of being my best self. I am ashamed but I am also human. I’ve tried my best to continue to pursue this journey of becoming my highest-self but dang it is tough even in the best of circumstances.

One of my 52 different half-finished blogs was a love letter. That sounds weird but whatever-we’re winging this. It was reminders and things that work to get me out of a funk. It seems this is past due, but here we are at the funeral pyre of 2021 and the birth of a brand-new unblemished year full of opportunity and potential. I did pull this gem from one of the things I wrote on a day I felt so head over heels in love: “I used to think it was so sad to be an emotional person so tapped-in to your Self that it ached terribly. Read that last sentence again. REALLY! How odd it is. How lonely. It occurs to me that when I considered the outlook of an emotional person, I had always considered it from the perspective that assumed pain would inevitably meet you at the end of the path when you parted ways with someone, or maybe even parts of yourself if you were that intertwined. Even if you led a “happy” existence, the pain of loss-the grief and sorrow that life and death would produce enough pain to be soul-shattering. All this time. I have sorrowfully underestimated the power that love has. It is truly unfathomable. Real genuine love has the ability to make a lifetime worth of pain pale in comparison.” If you’re tapped-in to your emotions maybe this resonates with you also. Being an emotional person can be the HEAVIEST feeling in the world-You carry not only your emotions but often the weight of those around you. Being so tapped-in to your emotions, you have the ability to experience the full range of them, good and bad, if you open your heart to them.

If you’re still with me-you are a RIDER! Mount up, we’re about to ride into 2022 manifesting baby! 2022 feels like the warm golden color of sweet harvest corn. Okay, I’m weird. Whatever. I’ve been told it’s called synesthesia-if you believe in that sort of thing. Going into the new year, I hope you know how incredible you are. How talented, special, and loved you are. How worthy you are. How you are worthy of so much more than you’ve ever dared to dream for yourself. I hope you are open to receiving all the blessings that will come to you throughout the year, be they love or lessons. I hope you trust your Self (your intuition) and when you are faced with adversity-I hope you remember who you are and who you are becoming, and you have the strength and forethought to act in a way that supports your goals. I hope you are blessed and fulfilled. I hope you live and are present, for the moments are fleeting. I hope you feel gratitude in every situation good and bad. I hope you love your Self like you love others. Stay HEAVY on the love.