So, let’s face it. I’ve been gone for a REALLY long time. I thought long and hard about how to re-introduce this blog. I think I put this post off for so long because I simply could not think of an introduction. I wanted my opening paragraph to be thought-provoking and poetic. Then, I remembered that I’ve never been one for idle chatter, so I’m going to do it my way and jump right in.
In the last two years, a lot of life has happened. A Lot. I have had a front row seat to some great wins, but also an immense amount of loss – particularly loss of family members and loved ones (I was up to 9 at last count). After each new round of bad news, it felt like my light would get a little dimmer, but I would press on. Keep moving forward … until it all came to a head towards the end of last year when my grandfather (beloved spouse of my late grandmother who inspired this blog) took his last breath. I was completely gutted. My life was starting to feel like the butt of God’s cruel joke, and I had had enough.
I like to reside on the “bright side,” but everything felt dark. I’m very familiar with grieving the death of a loved one, but this was deeper than that. I started moving through my days on two speeds – intense emotional pain and “blank stare.” And the last thing I wanted to do was talk about any of it. Friends would call to check on me, and I would let them go to voicemail. For the first time in my life, I could not see beyond “today,” and I could not even articulate why. That is a scary place to be for a twenty-sixer. I mean, I built a whole website around being extraordinary, and I was feeling anything but.
Outside of work, much of my life came to a grinding halt by my own choice, but there was one commitment that I kept – my standing appointment with my therapist. Yes, I have a (very good) therapist. I know it’s a taboo subject, but it is one of the best decisions I’ve ever made (more on that later). For weeks on end, she was pressing me to explore my feelings – still probably my least favorite thing to do. I found the whole exercise futile. At some point, I said, “My grandfather died. I’m mourning that loss. I really don’t have anything else to say about it.” Then I thought to myself, “I guess grief’s got my tongue.” Eventually, I realized that yes, grief had silenced me. But I wasn’t just grieving the loss of my favorite guy. I was grieving over the life that I thought I would have by the age of 34. I would eventually bring this up in another session: “You know what bothers me most? Nothing about my life looks like what I thought it would. I can deal with death. I can deal with unforeseen obstacles in my career. I can deal with not having a family of my own. But I cannot deal with all of those things at one time. This is not the life I envisioned. I did not sign up for this.” BINGO. I think that’s called a breakthrough.
That epiphany is what set me on the path to grieving healthily and learning to love the life that I have, even if it’s not the one I signed up for. Here is what I’m learning along the way neatly packaged in four little steps that may help you do the same:
1. Practice Radical Honesty
I firmly believe in the power of positive thinking and blind faith, but sometimes I think we’ve gone so far down the new-age rabbit hole, that we start to live in a place of denial. That is why I chose to go to therapy – I wanted a safe, judgment free zone where I could be honest with myself about the entire state of my life and my thoughts and feelings around it. I’ve acknowledged some of these feelings before, even on this blog, but I needed to really work through my “stuff.” The moment I started doing this, a strange thing happened. I didn’t feel negative or depressed. I felt incredibly empowered. More empowered than I ever felt trying to convince myself that I was living my best life while the proverbial roof was caving in. Strangely, the more I gave myself permission to acknowledge the bad, the more I could feel the good again. Then, more good started to show up.
So today, I’m giving you permission to do something that may be very unpopular – put the vision board and words of affirmation to the side, just for now, and be brutally honest about what’s really going on with you. You can do this with a therapist like I did or with a trusted friend. You can even choose to just put it in a journal or drop it in an email
to me at dg [at] december26er [dot] com (I promise to read it without judgment). It doesn’t matter. The goal is just to unapologetically tell the truth. If it turns out that you’re content or downright euphoric over your state of affairs, awesome. Not so much? Guess what – that’s awesome too. You’ve now taken the first step towards facing what needs to change. Over the next several months, we’ll talk more about how to actually change it.
2. Clear the Clutter
One day, I stood in my closet with the intention of getting rid of a couple of dresses that I no longer wear. Before long, over half my wardrobe was in bags on its way to Goodwill. The next weekend, I moved on to the kitchen and starting packing up all those free promotional water bottles that were hiding in the cabinets and appliances I never use. Then it snowballed. I threw away a bunch of stuff I was holding onto “just in case,” and started unsubscribing from email newsletters that I never read. I even reduced the number of frivolous text and social media conversations I used to feel obligated to have. These simple acts of detaching myself from excess made me genuinely value what was left, and it shifted my energy towards welcoming fresh and new experiences into my life.
If you’re feeling stagnant and like much of your life is outside of your control, start clearing your clutter in whatever form it takes. Trust me – your mind will feel clearer, and you will send a message out into the universe that there is space in your life for more. If you’re looking for a way to get started with your living space, check out this 31-Day Household Organization Diet.
Check back in next Tuesday for Part 2 of this post!
