Where I've Been and Where I'm Going

Photo Credit: Eva Lin Photography

Maybe you've noticed my absence on most of social media. Maybe you have not. But apart from a post here or there, I have largely spent time away from Facebook, Snapchat, Instagram and my blog. It's no coincidence that my last post was about a book that I said was changing my life. It truly did. It has. It still very much is. Present over Perfect made me step back - from social media, from my clutter, from the everyday frantic chaos I have created and lived in for the majority of my life and has made me re-evaluate. Re-evaluation of one's life is totally overwhelming, anxiety-inducing, question-producing, and frankly, kind of hard. But it's what I've been doing. On top of it all, I've been unexplainably sick. Sick to my stomach, exhausted, debilitated, nauseous, dizzy, with vertigo-like symptoms that have knocked me out and left me in bed for much longer than I've admitted to anyone - conjuring up memories and similarities of when I was diagnosed with an auto-immune disease years ago (one that has been largely in check for so long). To feel a downward spiral in my health lately is emotionally taxing to say the least, on top of the physical symptoms that persist.

So I apologize - for my absence, for my unpredictability and unresponsive nature. Maybe it is no coincidence that I am experiencing these overwhelmingly physical symptoms at the same time that I am experiencing a turn in my life professionally and mentally. My love still remains strong for my wonderful boyfriend, my family, and my friends closest to me - but there needs to be a change in some aspects of my life, and I am in the process of transitioning from one venture to another. No wonder I'm feeling dizzy and exhausted, right?



The majority of us growing up in the middle class are taught, for much of our lives, by so many people that the path following high school is to get into college, pick a major you think you like, graduate, get a job that offers benefits, stay in that job forever, save for retirement as you work, get married, buy a house, have some children, put them on the same path, eventually retire, do all the things you couldn't do while you worked your job with benefits, and grow old. It's awesome in theory. It sounds great on paper, but I don't need to even say to those of you my age, that life doesn't look like that for most of us. Gone are the days of quickly finding a job in your college-degree field and staying with it until retirement, let alone receiving benefits right off the bat. But that is neither here nor there. You know that. I know that. But what if that was never your path? Clearly it was not mine - although I tried hard to make it work, even when my parents suggested a potentially different path for me as I approached high school graduation. And so I did what everyone else was doing - I followed the crowd to college and then went to college again, and so on and so forth. But it seems, that even when I stopped doing what I thought I was supposed to do and as I now take a windy, less taken road, I still find my internal GPS urging me to get onto the highlighted route - the one that I learned about in school and college, and after college - the route that will lead me to secure retirement, the one that I am SUPPOSED to be on. And my heart keeps dragging me back to the woods - the path that is admittedly more work, the one that's obstructed at times, with detours, and closed roads. And so there is this constant battle, between head and heart.

My head has led me to two college degrees, one in Public Relations, and one in Graphic Design. My heart has led me to become a licensed Esthetician (skin care professional) in the state of Pennsylvania. My head led me to become a Certified meeting planner - one of only 300 at the time, in this state. My heart led me to become a registered yoga instructor. My head led me to the corporate world for many years, climbing the ladder in the event industry, eventually achieving benefits and a fair salary, waking at 4:30am to drive an hour to work each day, living for weekends and a week's vacation. My heart led me to start my own business, to quit the corporate world, to bartend to make ends meet, while teaching yoga and building Solshine. And that has been my path for 2 years now. But here I stand again, somehow at a new crossroads - wondering what road I am to take, only knowing the corporate world is not for me, and that my current path is crumbling under my feet and no place to make a home.

It is important to note that I loved my corporate job - or well, that I loved my co workers and the company and the skills that I learned. I often toy with the idea of finding a way back in, just because I miss the people at times, but I know that is not my place. It was a small company, one that people rarely left - and there was no job above me to move into barring some crazy circumstance that forced my friends above me, my bosses, out of their positions - and that was unlikely. I wasn't going to be paid much more because it was a non-profit, and on top of it all, I was stressed - mentally and emotionally, trying to work with my salary, and drive an hour to work, and leave my dog at home for 13 hours alone. Quitting was a tough choice, because of how much I enjoyed where I worked, but I quit my corporate lifestyle for some very specific reasons:

• I knew I didn't want to work for someone forever. I wanted to build my own business and make it work.
• I knew that Ryley's time on earth was not long in the grand scheme of things and that leaving her for 13 hours by herself was not always a good option. It worked when I was married because my ex's schedule allowed for her to be with one of us for much of the day, but now that it was just me - this no longer cut it. And frankly, I wanted to spend time with my most favorite soul.
• I knew that mornings were my miracle hour - the time when I got the most done for myself, the time when my personal business work really was fulfilled. Working a full time "normal" job meant my mornings, and the rest of my day really, was taken up working for someone else. 
• I knew that waking at 4:30am each day was draining me physically and leaving me a zombie at night - living to just get into bed. I spent more time in hospitals and in doctors offices, driving hours to the Cleveland Clinic to be seen by a doctor, treating me for Lupus, for the majority of my corporate life. 

If my health alone wasn't a red-flag that this life was not for me, then the emotional toll it took on me to leave Ryley each day was. So I quit and I picked up bartending, opting for a schedule that gave me more time with her and mornings for myself. But I couldn't help but feel a little like a failure, as I quit the job that people applauded me for when I answered the usual "so, what do you do for a living?" question that we opt for when we don't know what else to say. My head told me I failed, my heart was saying I triumphed - and the two have been at war ever since. So, to placate my head always trying to steer me back to "the highlighted route" in a corporate job, I piled on job after job, eventually adding a second bartending gig to the mix, on top of teaching yoga, and running Solshine. This worked for a minute, and shut out the voice of failure. The cost of quieting that voice was my sanity. I quit my corporate lifestyle for the overall reason of bettering my health, having more time for friends and family, and to exploring this life with my sidekick, Ryleygirl. But here I sit now in this chaos I've created, of multiple jobs, and multiple bosses, and meetings and time clocks and alarms and uniforms, and trainings finding myself depleted again. I am lost, anxious, dizzy, exhausted, sick, and constantly saying goodbye to the older, whiter face of a golden retriever that stares at me with sad eyes as I close the door. I am in bed. I am not answering texts or messages or phone calls. I am slower, in more pain, aching in places that haven't hurt in forever, pretending that I feel good when I'm at work and in the presence of those I love. I am lying to myself, pulling the covers over my head - literally and figuratively, and constantly praying to feel better. It is clear something is not working - many things are not working.

I know that this is not what I intended when I made the biggest decision of my life to quit my corporate job. I know that this was not the good health, peaceful mind, and loving life that I saw for myself two years ago. And so I sit, on the edge of something new, scared to leap, and scared to share, but writing and making, and creating change that will make my heart happy and maybe my head too. Changes that will bring more peace into my home, one that I share with not just some four legged souls, but one that I am beginning to share with another 2 legged soul as well.

I hope that as I work over the next month to shed some of the layers I have clothed myself in, and  labor to create this new life and business (yes, another one!), that you will be with me. I hope that as I painfully let go of some of the things that are no longer right for me, to make room for the people and fur balls that I love with all of my heart that you will follow along. I hope that as I find ways to tend to myself and my health, creating a self-care practice that I so desperately need, that maybe you'll do the same - because goodness, don't we all need some more self-love?! My hope in sharing this potentially rambling, confusing post, is that you will first understand where I am, where I was, and where I hope to go - and that you will not only support me, but that maybe you will accompany me in shedding and rerouting and quieting the head and listening to the heart. My hope is to help illuminate the non-highlighted route so others have a more clear path when they ditch their GPS, too.

Thank you for sticking with me and for not hating me and those sometimes unanswered texts. I vow to get better.