I want to write this out before I have a baby and get all emotional and weird.
I keep hearing that is going to happen lol, and then it can be too easily written off as new mom bliss or massive sleep deprivation. I want it out while I’m still functioning and credible =P
I deeply believe we are all exactly where we need to be at any given moment. I don’t believe in would have, should have, or could have.
It was meant to go exactly the way it went, because it’s by design.
Every moment of my life has prepared me for this one.
Living in the past, or regretting things, doesn’t make any sense. If it was 5 years, or 5 minutes, ago, it’s over and it was another step on a path you are meant to walk.
I will often consider my ex husband and I think, wow if was willing to grow and learn, the way I have been with Snow, I bet we’d still be together.
I “could have” made that relationship work if I had the tools I have now.
But I didn’t have the tools.
I didn’t have the people, the experience, the foresight, the emotional intelligence, the vulnerability, or the vision.
I didn’t have them because it wasn’t time for me to have them yet.
Going through pregnancy with my husband has been a constant reminder of what I want in a man, and how much I didn’t have in my first marriage.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not talking shit at all, I’m just saying the contrast is stark and it hasn’t slipped by me.
This is just one example of something that “should have” been different, but was exactly what I needed.
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I look back and I wish my female role models in life would have loved their bodies more, so I didn’t have so much hatred for mine so young.
I wish I had joined the drill team instead of taking a 2nd job in high school.
I wish I had went to college like a normal person, not working 2-3 jobs at a time, and taking 9 years to finish.
I wish I had a healthier understanding of relationships, both with others,and myself, so I would have sabotaged so much.
I wish I had found personal development, Benchmark Courses, and EMDR therapy about 20 years sooner lol!
I wish I had a better value in myself when it came to work, beyond my net worth, and much more I could do than others.
I wish I had a desire to connect with the coaches, and challengers, more deeply, and the openness to do so.
I wish I had never moved out of CA.
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The results of this very very short list of examples, have been some very hard times.
I spent years being bulimic and many more massively binge eating in private.
I missed out on a lot of deep female friendships in highschool.
I never really gave anything “all of me” in college, I was always just fitting it in.
I have had very few ride or die friends, and I had an ex husband already in my 20s.
I was negative, cynical, depressed, suicidal and lost, for years.
I built what could have been an incredible business, only to emotionally dismantle it immediately.
I found myself lonely, tired and missing my community.
It is easy for me to look back and say “If only…”
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The thing is, the results don’t stop there. Those same experiences, those things I wish, they did a lot more for me than that.
I have the ability to understand, and empathize, with women who struggle with weight issues, at a very deep level.
I learned how to work hard, and I made incredible friends at my jobs in high school. I learned what I am made of being emancipated, working two jobs, and still pulling off my 4.0 in school.
I wouldn’t trade my college experience for ANYTHING. If I hadn’t joined AKPsi right when I did, I would have had different pledge bros, different brothers to serve with, ugh I don’t even want to think about it!
The memories we made in college were amazing and the years I spent serving on the eboard there shaped my leadership, through good and bad, more than anything I’ve ever done.
I am so glad that I had some failed relationships, that I can take responsibility for, because I learned exactly what I don’t want.
I learned the mistakes I don’t want to repeat, and I know the cost of NOT growing, learning and being vulnerable.
I have the skills to tell my husband what I need and how I feel, like a grown up lol. How would I ever have learned that otherwise?
Every single message, course, and therapist, came to me at the exact time that I needed it. I have never read a book or been to a course, where I didn’t hear the exact thing I needed to at that moment. Even if it was the same course!
I learned the things that were best for me, in the order that made sense for what was unfolding in my life at that moment, and it has served me well to grow in steps.
As I got better, I was ready for more, and there it was.
If I hadn’t gotten burnt out so many times with jobs, and found value in myself beyond how much I can do, I would have ended up a (very drunk) workaholic that had an empty life.
I would have kept going after the most prestigious looking success, and never found what fills my heart and frees my soul.
I’m meant for entrepreneurship, but I would have sold my soul for the external validation of praise and a paycheck.
Letting my business fall apart was the best thing that ever happened to me.
I got to face 3 things that changed my life forever. The way I spend money, the emptiness of working, and succeeding, alone, and living a life outside of service.
Nothing has been more rewarding than rebuilding my coaching business as a totally different person, with a totally different take on life. Things are so much clearer when you are on the right path.
Living in Austin, and traveling with just Snow the year before, connected me with so many people. I spent time with my sister, my grandma, and people I didn’t even know.
I found my way to God, and have amazing sisters in Christ, and I got to watch my husband fully blossom into this hard working man, with a huge heart, right in front of my eyes.
We’ve never been closer and there is no way we’d be ready for parenthood if we hadn’t been through this.
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As I had all these experiences they shaped me in ways I never saw coming.
I am such a softer woman as a wife.
I not longer have the anxiety of needing to be in control, or know what’s next.
I am open to so many different views.
I understand the value of a good friendship.
I know what home feels like.
I feel deeply for the people I help.
I know what I want, and I know what I don’t.
I will make a far better mother now, than I ever would have before.
Every moment of your life is FOR SOMETHING, I promise you.
Instead of painfully begging for it to be over, or numbing yourself so you don’t have to experience it, I urge you to consider growing through it.
You’ll look back some day and your life will look completely different.
You’ll be able to easily connect those dots and feel peace with where you are.
Every moment in my life has prepared me for this one,and so it continues on, preparing me for the next.