From Modern Prairie to Rebirth

Happier YOU with Amy?Letter:?REBIRTH.

May 20th, 2022

Happy Friday! How has your week been? Mine could be captured in one word, which is "fascinating" as I had the opportunity to attend?The Future of Everything Festival?by The Wall Street Journal in NYC. How would you describe your past week in one word? Is that "calm", "complete", "zen", "meaning", "fulfilled", "chilled"... Bring it on!

In this Friday's Happier YOU Letter, I'd like to talk about rebirth, as part II of the previous issue on birth. So last week, I discovered that Melissa Gilbert who played Half-Pint in The Little House Series had just created a movement for the modern mature women. Reading her "why" on her newly created web site made my heart sing, as it's also a form of birth: rebirth.?

“Some might say this is about a midlife crisis. I call it a midlife reassessment of priorities and my realization that real satisfaction and meaning, for me, at fifty-six years old, came from canning tomatoes and cleaning the chicken coop rather than implants and hair color and other efforts to stop time from marching across my face." (Melissa Gilbert)

Melissa shared about?the new chapter in her life where she bought a rustic house in?the Catskills and fixed it over the pandemic, making it her new nest where she enjoys raising chickens and planting flowers. "Growing older has given me the confidence and permission to discover my authentic self. I have become more empowered by embracing change and my reaction to it and now understand the importance of slowing down," she said.?

While I admire how Melissa reinvented herself, they made me wonder, "Does each of us need to grow old to pause, to reflect, to find meaning, to discover our authentic selves and to feel confident? Or rather, this is the skill we need to have?throughout our lives?"?

How about imagining our life as a series of stories of the hero's journey?where the end of one opens the door to the next. And each story?follows the formula used in many fictional stories: The hero is motivated to conquer a quest in another world, faces with and overcomes multiple challenges till a finale where he is tested to the max, wins the battle and returns home, transformed.?

In real life, we may have had a career we loved, achieved tough goals, made meaningful contribution, honed our skills, and got to know many interesting people. Then we outgrow it. We wonder what's next. We look deeply inside. We get to the next career challenge.

Or we may have had a life event with which we experienced the four stages of grief. Then we feel better. We wonder what's next. We find a?meaning from it and create a movement.

Or for many mothers, we may have taken a career break and tended to our children and our home. Then the kids now can be self-sufficient. We look into the mirror and see wrinkles start to form on our faces. We wonder what's next. We want to go back and let the world know we are not just a great mom and wife: we have our life purpose to live and unique talents to utilize.

Life is wonderful that way as we are?forced to discover the parts of us where never know of and enter the next story with more powerful insights, to become the better version of ourselves and fully actualize who we really are towards to the end of the series. This is true happiness.?

And having been a trusted companion of many women / mothers on this journey of rebirth for the past five years is indeed a result of a rebirth for me, too. So alive I feel.?

For a happier YOU:

Take a moment each day, or even a week, a month, a year to detach from the busy life where you may feel lost, and ask yourself:

• "What's my calling? Who am I called to become at this stage of my life?"
• "What are my priorities for the next year, the next three years, the next?five years?"
• "At the end of my life looking back at my series of the hero's journeys, what would make me feel truly fulfilled and know I have lived to the fullest of my potential?"
• "How do I translate all these into a career and a life that really align now?"

I know these are simple questions,?but they are also hard enough and?trust me, helpful enough and even more fascinating than?The Future of Everything?;)

Onwards to Happiness Infinity,

Amy Nguyen

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