Soft Belly

Why I changed everything

"...after spending a year and a half in [a] full time role, I knew my cake had been way over baked. I felt empty. I was nearing a dangerous territory of frequent debilitating anxiety attacks coupled with periods of burnout that left me motionless on the couch. I knew that I was in terrible misalignment with my soul..."

"And all of this led me to feeling incredibly out of alignment with how I saw true being. Like a broken record I would say, “I am frozen, I am stuck, I am trapped”. I knew how I wanted to feel, but not how I wanted to live—how I wanted to be. So, I listened to the fear-based logic around me. I listened to the voices outside of my body who shrugged and said, “this is just the way life is”, already having convinced themselves that they’d reached the pinnacle of what is possible. I had convinced myself that the only way out of the sticky feeling was to find another job—to jump sideways to another “safe zone” with a steady paycheck. Another routine, another bodysuit that I knew already so deeply did not fit me at this juncture in my life.

My true boiling point hit in the last days of June. It was exactly a day after we’d returned from Italy that I found myself swaying back and forth in my backyard. I was in such mental shock that I surrendered to the heavy population of DC mosquitos that ravaged all of my exposed skin. I held my arms around me, in a self-soothing rocking. I could hear my wild woman yelling at the top of her lungs, begging for me to listen.

But this time, her voice was in my throat. My wild woman had escaped and there was no way to reel her back in. I paced our narrow yard, crying out loud. I turned my head to the sky and wailed out to the universe. I needed to change everything and I needed to change it right now. I had suppressed her long enough, deep in that gaping, unnourished hole in my gut.

That night, I decided that I would quit my job. I needed capital “b” Big changes. I turned to Dan, my face still plush from tears and said, “I need to leave DC. You are welcome to come with me, but either way I have to go”. Within a half hour we had devised a plan—we would put our things in storage and spend the autumn traveling around the Northeast, where both of our families live. Turns out, Dan wanted a break from the city too. And the minute this plan was on the table, it was as if the universe was given the permission it had been desperately searching for. All of the pieces began to fall into place in the most surreal, gorgeous way. A pattern of glittering stars was leading the way for us to set my wild woman free—to set us both free.

I could feel myself launching my body off of the ledge. I was jumping off the real cliff this time.

According to the stars these past couple of weeks, we are in a period of awakening. We are stepping into a new chapter of how we choose to live. Chani Nicholas mentioned reflecting on the year 2015, asking me to recall what was happening in my life then to potentially indicate some of the themes that may reemerge now. In 2015, I had just moved back home to CT from NYC to start my business. I had released myself from a stylist job at a clothing store that left me so unfulfilled. I felt excited by the prospects of my new business as I emailed as many restaurants as I could find in Connecticut, and began connecting with chefs, farmers and fellow creatives in the area. I went to creative conferences and met incredible women who became my close friends. I did my first yoga teacher training. I felt alive. I felt explorative. I was rediscovering my home state in a way that felt fresh and exciting.

I guess the universe knows what is up its sleeve because I am feeling this familiar moment of expansion once again."