Body, Mind and Soul

Well hello Blog.  How are you?  I know, I am sorry I have neglected you so.  None the less I am here now and I have missed you as well.

Who has two thumbs and turns 30 in 12 days?  This girl!!!!!

What a sad, strange, amazing, enlightening year it has been.  I think 29 held more emotion, discomfort, pain, joy, elation, discomfort, discovery, insight...man I could go on for days.  I think the biggest lessons that came out of this year for me were:

• Change takes time, and patience and both of those things are my friend
• No matter what happens, I know that I can and will be OK
• No matter what is happening, I am right where I need to be, experiencing what I need to experience to learn and grow
• If you look hard enough and want to, you can see the beauty in anything
• I have the capacity to love like I never knew
• Loving myself and believeing in myself are immensly important
• We all need to be kinder to ourselves
• I am grateful

I guess I could really go on and on with these as well, but there is such comfort in really starting to grasp some of these and put them into practice in my everyday thoughts and life...

When I started this blog I really expected to be a "whole new woman" by the time the 30 birthday came around, but as I have learned....change is a process, a slow one.  My intention was to be at my healthy goal in Mind, Body, and Spirit.  Let's just say that the Mind was the first thing I tackled and I'm still a work in progress.  And that's OK.  A couple books have found their way into my life (I love books) and I was thinking of dedicating the first month in my 30's to these to start the Body, Spirit journeys on their way and to REALLY put effort forth there.

I continually look forward to learning more and more about who I am and who I am intended to be. 

I am ever so grateful (to the extent I am in teary eyed right now as I type) to those who have shown support in every way to me over the past year and currently.  At the risk of sounding like I am accepting an award I would like to say thank you to the Perry family, I have no words that would adequately express my thanks.  Tine, for reaching out with things I needed to hear right when I needed to hear them.  The peeps at the Diner who have lent their ears and been so supportive.  My family, seriously.  Where would we all be without one another right?

Anywho, it feels good to write again.  I have missed it.  I must return and do it more often. 

The Journey Continues....

“The best day of your life is the one on which you decide your life is your own. No apologies or excuses. No one to lean on, rely on, or blame. The gift is yours - it is an amazing journey - and you alone are responsible for the quality of it. This is the day your life really begins.” Bob Moawad

Every Little Thing Is Gonna Be Alright....Duh

So much change is afoot and it has me wondering why it's so hard to deal with the unknown.  Why can't I just let the unknown unfold effortlessly?  It will come as it is meant to anyway, and I know this in my head but it is still my gut instinct to worry......I want to work on that.  I will work on that.

I need to just let it be, let it come moment by moment.

Turning A Corner, Shutting A Door, Opening A Window, The Fork In The Road

So much has happened since the last time I posted/wrote.  The life skills class I am taking is truly making a difference in how I deal with people, places and situations....for the better.  I only hope that the class is working it's magic still on how I view myself....that still needs a little work truth be told...man I am hard on myself.

I was actually admitted to the hospital very early Monday morning with appendicitis.  I am thankful for my bodies instincts and my good fortune that my brain decided to pay attention to them and go to the ER.  I did have an appendix doing it's best to rupture and while diagnosing that they found a 3 inch cyst that needed removal as well.  So as much pain as I am in now I am thankful that all the bad stuff is out of there.  Just need to heal now.  To heal and to pray on a daily basis to the health gods for mine and Hailey's health....apparently i haven't been doing that. I had my gal bladder removed when I was seventeen and this recovery feels very similar.  I take my core muscles for granted all too much and hereby vow that when I am physically able to start I will start the Whittle Your Middle Challenge posted by my colleague Kila.

So, doing my best to improve who I am on a daily basis, to be a better mother and just a better person.  Also doing what I can to speed this recovery process from the surgeries.  Cheers to being on the mend.

And.....I am in a relationship now.  It is good, nay, great.

So there is a big part of me that with all this positive momentum, I can truly shut the door on my past.  Shut the door and leave it there.  Not to be forgotten or regretted but not to be dwelt upon.

I like the way this new door, the one to these next chapters of my life, is looking....

Here we go....

LEAVE THE DOOR OPEN FOR THAT WHICH IS NEW

Is That Me In The Mirror

I think it's fair to say I have felt some "unrest" in the past, oh 4-5 years of my life.  I have gone through a lot. I am  not necessarily in a place where I can say I have "gotten over" all of the things that I have been through but I am a work in progress and am ever so grateful to be an active and engaged part of the process.

I have been learning A LOT lately about myself, what I've been through and really where to go from here.  and that in and of itself is so liberating.  It's so simple some of the things I am learning, but it puts a whole new perspective into focus.  Amazing.  And I think it is so true what people have told me, that as you gain more clarity on your past situation(s), and then more control over how you handle your current situation WITH your new understanding more and more healthy and pleasant situations come into the light.  And you are more well equipped to handle them in a "big girl" fashion.  Dare I say.....I think I am growing up. 

Things are good, and feel like they have never felt before in my life.....peaceful.  It's a different style....this peacefulness.  can't say I recognize myself in the mirror yet with it on but I'm liking the way it fits and I am in no way ready to take it off.   I keep looking in the mirror to make sure it is really me, make sure this is really possible in MY life......and all signs point to yes......I'm digging the new look, I'm rockin the peacefulness.

And then It Was Done

I have written about my Grandfather previously here on my blog.  I won't rehash the whole family situation, but in the spirit of working through things...I write....

So my family situation on my Dad's side is strained.  Grandpa disowned all of us after marrying the devil which walks the earth with the name Jeanie.  Grandpa and the Devil are selling the Hylton home.  The home my Grandfather, my Dad and uncles all had a hand in building.  All of us lived there at one point and it was the center of the family, the gathering place for all birthdays, thanksgivings and famous Christmas brunches.  The best pies in America were baked in my grandmothers famous oven.  Many laughs, loves and tears were expressed in that home.  Many arguments too, I won't pretend we are anything near perfect. 

My Grandpa finally reached out to his sons, asking them to come over and go through things before the devil and he sell the house and move to Kentucky.  as my Dad put it....all of that is just "stuff" but my grandfather, and the essence of what our family was....is gone.

Somehow though, the news that my Grandmothers stove would be sold off or sold with the house devastated me.  I cried....twice... while talking to my dad.

But, this is really it.  The dismantling of the Hylton home.  The picking apart the ashes of my deceased grandmother and her wishes.  My Grandfather has allowed this.  I know each generation wants better than the one before....so with this, I hope we Hylton's learn from the mistakes that have gone before us, allow this tragedy to draw us closer together as a family and pave roads to new traditions and bonds.  All we have is each other and a lifetime more of memories to build. 

I may be the last "Hylton", the only grandchild, but i won't let it end there.  We have had two amazing women who have now married into the family and another grandchild to add to the mix.  My daughter is not a Hylton per se but may she experience what we Hylton's can show her about what we were a part of for so many years....in that home.

I raise my glass to the Hylton's.  Olds, belle, Jim, Charles, Dwight, Yolanda, Charya, Lorena & Hailey.

"Call it a clan, call it a network, call it a tribe, call it a family: Whatever you call it, whoever you are, you need one."

The Rapture of Being Alive

Excerpts from Broken Open by Elizabeth Lesser

"Rapture is not a selfish emotion.  It is pure gratitude, flowing freely through the body, heart and soul.  Gratitude for what?  For breath, for colors, for music, for friendship, humor, weather, sleep, awareness.  It is a willing engagement with the whole messy miracle of life.  The world suffers more from unhappy, stifled people trying to do good than it does from those who are simply content with themselves."

"I have a card stuck on my refrigerator that shows a woman standing in reverence before an open freezer door, saying, "Amazing! Perfect ice cubes again."  That's the kind of simple rapture I am talking about.  I realize we are not put on this earth to stand around open freezer ranting like idiots about ice cubes.  But a good question to ask yourself is this: If perfect ice cubes or an evening sky or an old song on the radio has not made your heart flip-flop lately, why not? What is keeping you from feeling rapture?  I can assure you, you won't find the answer in a lighted room.  What stands between you and a full-bodied life can be found only in the shadows.  What wants to live in you may be waiting-as it was for me-at the end of a long loneliness"

Rapture: Ecstatic joy or delight; joyful ecstasy

 

 

 

 

 



I Just Feel Good

I've spent a lot of time the past week near the water, driving the coast and soaking up the sun....and I just feel good.

There is something about the water....so peaceful and centering.  The sun, so soothing and comforting.

I feel alive.  I feel things inside, the wheels are turning and change is occuring.  I will lay out the welcome mat....

"Don't ask what the world needs.  Ask what makes you come alive, and go do it.  Because what the world needs is people who have come alive."