I'm just a girl in the world...feeling cautiously optimistic.

I don't know if it's the residual stress from having my first born in college or if it's because the holidays are beginning to creep in, but I have been thinking extra hard about my life and where I want to go from here.

I remember just a few years ago, the thought of actually just having a posting schedule seemed like the biggest feat I might never be able to accomplish. Fast forward to now, I have a million and one projects that I willingly choose to juggle, and I seem to keep trying to add more as if it's a contest on just how much I can run before I collapse.

My growth journey started in 2020 after finding out I was having a daughter. I always thought I'd just be a boy mom but I think that was more me wanting to be a boy mom so I could continue to avoid actually living a life I have always been daydreaming about. The thought of me not having my "ish" together and having a daughter to emulate all my mistakes was the push I apparently needed to stop being afraid and start figuring things out.

After years of experimenting, researching, and continuously auditing every little thing I did, I've gotten to the point now that I know and understand my purpose. I have a pretty good vision as to what I want to do now but for some reason I have still been standing in my own way just enough that nothing is working out the way it could if I'd just allow myself to succeed.

You see, once I healed all that generational trauma and lived in hermit mode for 2 years, it finally dawned on me that I actually reverted back to the little girl i was before the world messed me up and tried to force me into a specific box.

I was never meant to have fencing.

So after all this enlightened contemplation this fine holiday weekend, I started building on a plan I inadvertently started a month ago.

If I am not getting the results I seek because I am standing in my own way, how do I trick my own mind into overcoming them. The answer is productive distractions!

Last month I decided that all those habits that I derailed from, after moving my son to college, needed to be reinvested in. Before July I really felt like I was on a roll and couldnt be stopped. But a week out west proved to be just the right amount of stress to have me coming back home and giving up on damn near everything. I abandoned my podcast 3 episodes away from the end of season 2, I had no drive to paint anything because one painting was giving me trouble and i just couldnt be bothered, and my posting schedule went to a shade of "why even bother". So, when I finally said enough is enough I made a plan to start implementing all the habits that supported me thus far, one at a time.

Insert the habit list I created for myself!

I started with simply drinking bone broth before consuming anything else! It was easy enough, if I got up early enough to drink it at home while getting ready for the day I would or if I was running late I had some in my desk to drink as soon as I got to work. I even stocked my desk with my favorite instant coffee so that I wouldn't sabotage myself on days I woke up far too late.

Starting with this habit also habit stacked a lot of checked boxes for me as well. First and foremost, I am very rarely hungry before 10am and eating brekki first thing in the morning let alone getting in protein before anything else is hard enough so drinking a cup of warm bone broth as my first habit in the day not only insures I get in even a semblance of protein and nutrition but the warmth helps aid in healthy digestion as well as lowering the potential of bloating throughout the day.

I concentrated on this 1 physical habit every day for 3 weeks! Above all else, if I only accomplished one single thing it would be this and once the habit formed, I'd add a second habit and go down the list that I created.

I will also add that at this time I also created a new posting schedule because I like to overcomplicate things but so far it's worked extremely well!

Everything had been going very smoothly. I was almost craving my bone broth when I woke up, I only missed posting 2 things for my social media and I started implimenting the new workout program I made for myself....then came this past Friday.

I am going to assume its my body's natural reaction to holidays but every cell in my body said "NOPE, absolutely not" to everything! By the time I got off work I had to have a real hard talk with myself about how the world is not ending and I need to take a deep breath and stop with the dramtics.

So I took some time before picking up the kids after work and I cleared my head. I ended up thinking about how I am who I am and what things I actually like, because if I am rebuilding habits I dont want them to just be centered around my health. Ive spent far too much time in a quantum mind state that I have all but neglected the classical state of being.

I asked myself, "What things from your childhood made you happy that you abandoned?"

And I made a new list! A list of all the activities, hobbies, environments, situations that I adored as a child but abandoned because someone else ruined it for me. And wouldnt you know, that is exactly what I had been missing this whole time!

I didnt stop likeing or doing these things because I realized i didnt like them, I abandoned them because someone did or said something that ruined the experience for me and made me feel like I wasnt allowed to have it anymore.

So this holiday weekend I refocused plans, I caught up on all these little tasks that I've been avoiding, I spent time with family without even thinking about work and I honed in on exactly what it is I am working towards.

It's not to say things wont evolve or now that I am vibrating at a higher frequency than I was last week that I suddenly have all the answers but I do have a more clear direction as to what I am actually trying to achieve and that alone feels like I conquered a staircase in my head.

This week I will be focusing on continuing my content plan and adding in some work blocks for projects to build in these habits further as well as adding in my new plan for physical movement and stretching. And then if the gods be willing, I will slowly add learning Mandarin back in if my brain isnt overloaded because a huge passion of mine has always been to be a polyglot.

Fingers crossed for a great week! May your life reflect the things you love and every hurdle be a quick jump to the next blessing <3