The Wonder of You

I don’t know you, but I love you.

I don’t know where you grew up, what interests you, how you stay inspired (or not)…I don’t have a peek into your life, but what I do know is that you and I are connected.

We are a part of something bigger – something that transcends space and time.  Your actions, your beliefs, your passion has an impact on this world and that impact will affect me in some way. I can feel it.

You and I are important. Our lives matter, and our choices create a power that we could probably never truly foresee.

We are interlinked and through our very nature of being human, we can agree on one thing. That this life is precious.

And so, if this is true. That life – the air we breathe, the ability to communicate, to wake up and interact with the world around us – is truly and uniquely precious, then I ask you these questions:

Are you living your most amazing life right now?

Is it everything that you ever could have wished for?

Or do you hit snooze and wait for the right opportunity to show up; to take the action that you’ve been yearning for?

If so, I’m going to share with you my dream. My dream and my hope for you, and my goal in this life.

My dream is that you live a life full of love, meaning and fulfillment. I want you to live a life that excites you when you wake up in the morning. I want you to reach for a kickass existence of learning and growth, of giving back to your community and loved ones, and to those you interact with each day. My dream for you is connection – connection in a world where people are becoming more and more detached from each other. I want you to feel connection and warmth and on fire for this life you’ve been gifted.

There are so many people who are caught up in being right, in being vindicated, in their own selfish pursuits, and in doing so they’re losing each other. What we need most is CONNECTION – to a higher purpose, connection to spreading goodness and light, and connection to moments – to moments that create deep impact, that create strong bonds, that form and build unity and love - and make each moment count.

I want to share with you a journey that I’m on. This is a journey that I avoided for a very long time. For many years, I doubted my capabilities, my contribution to this world, and I questioned my self-worth. I was living many years of my life hitting the snooze button. I lived thinking that a day would come where everything would be just right…but not yet. I compared myself to others, compared my knowledge with theirs, and I made lists. I listed all the ways I wasn’t good enough. All the ways I lacked in some way. And even as I did so, I knew that I needed to stop. That it was tearing me down, pulling me into a dark hole of judgement and depression.

I continued to do this until little by little I couldn’t take it anymore and decided I had enough. It wasn’t an epiphany moment like many others have noted. Rather, it was slow-moving, like lava flowing out and swallowing things in its path in an ever-expanding wave. I slowly began to realize that I was dependent on external validation and giving up my power to others to feel anything about myself – whether good or bad.

Some who read this know my background in Domestic Violence and Rape Crisis work. I started out my early career working with women and children who were going through serious emotional and physical trauma. I had this vision for myself that I was going to change the world for the better. I wanted to help people when they were going through the worst moments in their lives, and I wanted them to know that someone had their back. That there are people out there supporting them, cheering them on, wanting them to realize that they deserve true happiness – that life would get better and has so much more to offer. I was extremely idealistic and ready to tackle it on, but the longer I did this work the more it weighed on me.

Seeing people dealing with pain, fear, and hopelessness daily was very painful. I saw so much evil in this world, and instead of feeling like I was helping – I felt hopeless. It felt like there was this overwhelming darkness in the world, and the light I wanted to shine wasn’t even making a dent. I fell into depression, had anxiety attacks and my relationships with my family and friends began to suffer. When my loved ones were negatively impacted, when I was no longer myself with them, it was then that I decided to quit. And in quitting I felt like a failure. I felt that I failed myself, my clients and the world.

For many years after leaving, I refused to look back at that time and instead lived my life on auto-pilot. I noticed that I was playing it safe. I was ticking all the boxes of what a happy life should look like – a secure job with benefits, a loving husband, a home and mortgage to go along with it, and a young daughter.

And yet.

Where was my joy? Where was my passion and my fire for life? Why didn't I feel fulfilled?

I wanted to know if it got any better than this.

I looked at my young daughter and wondered – is this the kind of life she must look forward to? Did I have the capacity to make it better? Was I being the model that I wanted my daughter to look up to?  

I decided that “not yet” was no longer going to cut it for me. ‘Not Yet’ needed to become ‘Right Now’. I began to work with someone who helped me to dig deep into my subconscious and reprogram the negative stories I was telling myself. I began to explore and understand my desires, my likes and dislikes. I chose to embrace myself and practice self-love by no longer apologizing or comparing. And through this process, I slowly began to come alive again.

I began to “wake up”. I began to realize that I have so much more to offer. I’m just a small part of this amazing life and I’m connected to everything that’s in it. We’re all made up of energy – these tiny atoms and molecules that make up the space around us, the chair you may be seated in…the stars in the sky. It’s our perception of the world – the lense with which we see through that tells us we’re separate from the rest. This may sound hokey or philosophical in some way, but my point is that all of our experiences in life, all these connections, has lead us to this moment in time, to connecting with me, to reading these words that I hope spark something in you, and that is truly amazing.

So, getting back to my journey. I have a calling in this life – a calling to help people to connect to their lives in a more meaningful way – to help people find what sparks that fire, and I want people who I interact with to leave me feeling so much more hopeful and alive.

I look back at my experiences and realize I haven’t failed – if I could talk to my younger self I’d tell her that her dream of helping people has always been a reality. I may have stumbled a bit, but I made my mark on those people I worked with early in my career. I was there for them in some of their darkest days to tell them that I believe them, that I support them, and that they are whole despite what others may have tried to destroy.

And so, I share with you this quote that I read by a wise woman, “If you feel conviction in your soul that what you are doing is powerful and important, then you are being given a charge and a calling. Stay focused! Stay true to yourself! Maintain your personal integrity and remember your why. The universe will give you the gas for the car, you just need to get in it.”

If you have yet to find that calling, then start searching for it today - do whatever you can do to find it.

Discover it, play and experiment with it.

Discover the world and the beauty it holds for you through experience and love.

You hold magic within you – your own personal flavor of life. What has always been your dream? What sparks passion in you, what makes you feel the energy coursing through your body?

Don’t miss your chance to create the life that you desire, because you’re worth so much more. The impact you’ll make on yourself will seep out into the world and inspire. It will spark passion in others, and will create a ripple effect. It will spread into the darkness and make it light again.

It will bring connection where there was only separation. It will spark energy into those that are still sleeping, and it will slowly awaken them.

Open your eyes and wake up to the wonder of you.