Five Things I Learned Last Year

I have been longing to write, but I have not been sure what I should write about.  And then it hit me!  I am too focused on what I SHOULD be writing about rather than what I WANT to write about or what my heart needs to feel and release.  

The past few weeks have revealed to me just how blessed I am.  There are several people who love and care for me.  I have a wonderful apartment.  I love living in California.  I do more of the things that I love.  I am alive.  And it is good.  

But what have I learned in the past year that I want to take with me into the new year, into this new chapter, new portion, new me?

1. Confidence of Self

I learned that I am good, whole, constantly renewed.  I learned that I am worth something, and sharing myself with others has led to good things and beautiful relationships.  I deserve to live the life of my dreams, and I am taking steps to do that!

2. Do What You Love

From my confidence, I know that taking caring of me is crucial, especially doing more of the things that I love that make my heart swell and excited for life and giving and love.

3. Relax

Relaxation and play is so important to our overall health as humans.  NEVER underestimate it or guilt yourself for partaking in it.

4. Make Good Choices

What I do today reveals who I will be tomorrow.  And today I choose to eat well, exercise, go outside, read, think, plan, meditate.

5. Community Is Crucial

Having people to support you along your journey is very important, especially as a young person.  Moving to the other end of the country where I only knew one person really revealed to me how much we as humans need one another to encourage, inspire, and uplift us.  I hope to be that for those around me every single day.

May your year be ever focused on the good, the beautiful, the best things to make you the best version of yourself.

relax

I'm all about the new beginnings.  The new opportunities to leap, search, grow.  It's pretty intoxicating when you accomplish a change or notice a difference in yourself and your quality of life.  I want that for myself in this new year, 2014.

I want one main thing for myself this year, though, to learn to relax.  And enjoy relaxing.  I don't want to get caught up in guilt for sitting down and feeding my soul with a good book or that sinking feeling while I'm painting that I should be doing something else.  Those things cannot wait.  My heart and mind and soul and life cannot wait.

Each year of my life I have striven to be better, stronger, smarter, etc.  I work so hard in many areas of my life, except for relaxation.  The phrase, "Work hard, play hard" has never applied to me.  I get so worked up in being perfect as I do it all, too, that I do not even enjoy much in my life.  I am so worried and stressed and anxious about doing it all, doing it perfectly, and doing it best that I have lost that sense of awe for the world, for the beautiful people in my life, and for the little things.  I want to let it all go and relax and enjoy what I have around me.

Even as I sat down to write this blog post, I thought about writing it with letters uncapitalized and without punctuation, because I am so often concerned with those things.  But I couldn't.  All I could do was not capitalize the title of this post.  Even that is a small victory for me.  But I did it, and I'm letting it go and laughing that this is really all so hard for me.  I hope one day that I look back on this year with gratitude for what I have and a cultivated sense of relaxation.

Happy 2014 to us all!

I'm off the relax.

A Blog, Revisited

So here's the deal.  I've tried countless times to blog and blog well.  To reinvent this sad, little blog, and I have failed.  Each and every time.  

When I realized that today, I began to think about why that may be.  I realized something really powerful that many 20-somethings are struggling with: I wasn't being myself.  I was wandering around figuring it out, though.  And when I finally found it, I had to take some time to process and digest what I found.  

Sometimes life isn't as beautiful or perfect as I thought it would be or should be, and I had to accept that fact and learn to live anyways.  And that's really what this journey is all about.  I could let a million things keep me from being the best Anna or living the life of my dreams, and, trust me, I have been letting anything and everything control me and the path that I have taken.  

On the other hand, this time of my life is about me.  About my discovery, joy, simplicity, and a flourishing into me, Anna Christine.  

And let me tell you, I am proud of me.  Although, I kind of choke on the words as they go down.  But I'm learning to be proud of me, and that is the real truth.  That is the real message of my life and where I am.  That is really what I want to write about.  

In this blog, you may find things that you don't like down the road, but, maybe, just maybe, give me a chance.  God knows I had to give myself a chance.  And what I found afterall was something really worthwhile and beautiful worth expressing and writing about.  

Finding my voice after all these years?  Priceless.