I am absolutely convinced that 2020 is going to be the year of transition, transformation, and awakening for many of us. However, a lot of it is going to take some real talk and realizations.
Change is never easy, no matter what it is. But, wouldn't you rather be Happy & Healthy than staying in a situation or environment, relationship or a job that does the opposite
Familiar, Fear, Safety and Comfortable: All words that will get you killed in this lifetime - starting from your brain, then your heart and eventually your body.
Nothing worth having comes easy. New horizons are definitely scary as shit but the alternative, in my opinion, is much worse. Living a controlled, mundane life, immersed in a daily 9-5, where the work culture is toxic, negative and feeds on keeping good people with real potential down, should never interest you - No matter how big the paycheque is.
Its time to change your psychology. Its time to really discover your dreams and not be afraid to go after them. If you don't have a dream or know your purpose, then spend some time thinking about what honestly and truly makes you smile. You may be surprised at the list you can form.
Get real quiet with yourself and think, really think about what kind of legacy you want to leave behind, what kind of role model you want to be for your kids. What will make you nod to yourself in satisfaction on your death bed - knowing you left nothing behind that you regret and no dreams un-explored.
Its time to get serious about what truly ignites you!
Strange how life works.
When you're young, all you feel is invincible. Time is limitless. So, it doesn't matter what you get to (or don't), how many times you screw up, if you show up or break your word because there is always time to change things, make things right or take a different path.
Then, you get older and everything changes. Time becomes the one thing you obsess over because you can't get enough of it. The day you are finally hit with the realization that time is limited and that you may not get to do everything you want (or need to ) before the last curtain call - becomes one of the worst days of your entire existence.
You want to make the most of the time you have, however long or short it may be. Regardless of the length of time in front of you, the last thing you ever want is to be laying on your death bed, full of regrets. Yet ironically, it is only when near death (or faced with it) that we truly see the real picture and just how precious time actually is.
As I sat in the back of a small viewing chapel this past weekend, saying goodbye to a dear friend who died on New Year's Eve, I was suddenly struck with this sense of urgency to accomplish my goals. I thought about all the things I want to do, see. How much I want to fall in love again. See different parts of the earth and make a real contribution in this world - through a legacy that I can leave behind when I'm gone. My heart began to race as I watched him, laid to rest. All the things he wouldn't get to do and if I am being honest, all the things he should have done too.
As I watched friends, family, and acquaintances line up in a single-file line, waiting their turn to pay their last respects, it made me think about what kind of legacy I will leave behind. What message about the person I was, do I want to leave people with. It became more evident to me, sitting there, what I have always believed to be true: I don't ever wish to be the richest person in the cemetery. I wish to be the poorest one. When I stand before God, I wish to be all used up of all the gifts he gave me. I want to have shared all of myself with the world. What I want is to be the person who touched everyone. The person who changed everyone's life for the better - because I lived. I want there to be a line around the block, of people waiting to see me off. To speak well of the person I was, sharing fond memories of all we did together.
I don't have much time here. Maybe that's true, maybe it's not - who knows. Regardless of which one it is, I need to stop obsessing over it and put things into some real perspective - fast! The important thing is that I woke up in that little chapel. Funny... My friend had to die so that I could be sent the message to start living.
My eternal love and respect, forever Franco. Although you are gone, you live on, in and around the hearts of all those who adored you. And from the looks of what I witnessed - they were many.
As 2019 ended, I laid to rest giving others the permission and the right to tell me what to do or to validate their poor opinions of whom I should be.
For 45 years, I feel as though I have allowed my family, friends, partners, colleagues, bosses and even strangers, dictate how I have felt about myself. Words, emotions, and feelings that manifested into something worse inside my own head, inside my heart. It gave birth to a lot of self-doubt, unworthiness, self-hate, depression, and feelings of being unloveable. The voices and noise in your own head can be maddening but, the noise put there by others - catastrophic!
Now, don't get it twisted. I and I alone am responsible for what I let into my head and heart. I own that shit. The choices I have made, the voices I have listened to - all my own fault. I wasn't strong enough to drown out the bullshit of others, nor was I brave enough to allow myself the chance or courage to kill the demons in my own mind. I was afraid. I have always been afraid.
But, as sure as I am sitting here, writing this, pouring my heart out - ITS OVER! This insanity stops right here, right now!
No one has the right to make anyone else feel unbalanced or unworthy in life or of who they are within it. No one has the right to make someone feel less than or that who they are isn't good enough. That their dreams aren't valid, making you feel as though you always fall short of their respect or expectations.
I vow that 2020 will be different. A new mantra starts now. I begin a new hustle, a higher vibration, a new love for and with myself.
So, if you don't hear or see me much in 2020, it means that I chose ME over YOU - finally. It means that MY VOICE is the only one that matters, not yours. It means that I have chosen to be around those who fill me with positivity over negativity. My belief in my self, out-weighing your constant disbelief in who I am or can become.
And to some of you, others that I, unfortunately, cannot drown out of my life, because they are blood well, you will only get the cordial me - which will be nowhere near the core or heart of me.
I appreciate you and unconditionally love you (of course), but FUCK YOU TOO!
