My Dirty Secret

Now that you’re drawn in…

After my last few posts, I received a handful of messages via facebook, text and email, stating how my continuing positive outlook during all of the upheaval has been inspiring. My first instinct was to stand tall and give myself a nice pat on the back. I am truly an enlightened soul!  But after some moments, guilt began to bring a slouch to my proud  and cocky spine, as the words of this blog’s “About Me” section flashed across my screen. It seems that I am not staying true to my vow to share “complete and unedited honesty”.  To those who really know me, it comes as no surprise that I am actually quite a negative person.

Sure, I usually walk around with a friendly, (hopefully warm and inviting) smile. So, not negative in that regard. But I have developed a mechanism of so-called protection, which causes me to always expect the worst. I would like to blame the two tragedies in my life that knocked me off my feet in shock, but it’s possible this was in effect long before either of them occurred.   My rational is, that if I conjure up the worst possible scenario, I can somehow be prepared for it. Obviously there are serious flaws in this way of thinking, not to mention the profound effect it has on the ability to fully engage in the beauty that is NOW.

My father once said to me “Emily, when you worry so much about losing the people you love, you don’t enjoy them while they are here”. An excellent piece of wisdom. I’m only slightly bitter that it was imparted a month or two before his own sudden and unexpected passing.  But, although I spent countless hours of my life in panicked worry over how I would survive the loss of one of my parents, I don’t believe I was any more prepared for it when it actually happened.   A lot of energy wasted.

So, I am working on this piece of myself. I truly am. I am aware of it and am setting in motion a daily attempt to reprogram and open myself up to being shocked by life’s curve balls, rather than compile a list of all the balls that could possibly be thrown.

But, as far as my attitude this past month, I can honestly say we are doing really well!  Until someone says “You’re here! Oh my gosh! What you have been through! I’m so sorry!”, I forget that things have been a bit awry.  The strange thing is, we struggled so deeply in Los Angeles, but on a different level. We have friends there whom we cherish and the weather is nothing to cry about, but we felt so misaligned with where we belonged, that although we had operational vehicles (2 in fact), a job, and an organized home with working utilities, we were literally brought to our knees with anxiety and sadness.

I can say now, that I am thankful for that extreme place of discomfort.  Not only did it birth this blog, but more importantly, under no other circumstance would we take the terrifying leap of faith across the country, to start over with no employment. If things were even “just OK”, I believe we would have stayed put to play it safe.

So, although we have had a hilariously difficult past four weeks, and are still unclear of what lies ahead, we are feeling more alive with faith, excitement, and purpose than ever before.  I think it’s a huge testament to the validity of our decision, that we moved to the Northeast in the dead of winter, from Southern California, have had mishap after mishap, and yet STILL feel all of the things just mentioned! Both of us, with all of the stumbling around, feel at home, where we belong. All the other stuff is just silly noise.