I feel so ashamed it’s been such a long time since I’ve last posted. My life has been filled with exciting happenings and a few new stressors I’ve never experienced before. Outside of working as Education Coordinator and CrossFit Coach here’s what I’ve been busy doing on the side:

Teaching Writing Skills

Training for Power Lifting Nationals in October

Working on updating my IL teaching credential and getting it transferred to a CA credential

Working on wedding planning (here and there)

Carving out more time to see my fiancé and working on making him more of a priority amid a busy day to day schedule. This includes traveling once a month for a weekend.

In addition I’ve been seeking opportunities to grow in both coaching and teaching and have some upcoming projects I’m psyched to work on!

All of the above is a standard level of busy-ness for me (minus the wedding planning).

What has caused me huge amounts of stress recently and stifled my ideas for writing is feeling the threat of having to give up a very meaningful dream I built for myself moving to San Diego seven years ago.  For me, marrying Larry, having a home and a family someday, is a DREAM come true. But I’ve always viewed it as a dream: Great if it happened but I would not feel like a failure or live an unhappy life if it didn’t.  In my past relationships, I grew increasingly restless because I knew I wanted a different lifestyle. After years of my boyfriends coming first and lifestyle second, I I finally got the confidence to go where my heart was telling me to go, and everything I had manifested came true. My life clicked into place and I felt happy being on my own.

I spent over half of my childhood as a Navy brat moving and being new in school. I couldn’t wait to be in charge of my own life and go where I wanted to go. I was fortunate to see the entire country and live in every region but the south while growing up and it helped me determine the lifestyle I wanted to lead as an adult.

My life is not glamorous, it’s not even impressive on paper but it’s everything as an independent woman I’ve ever wanted. I built it and continue to build on in it. I am only a short drive from my extended family and now my mom.  I’m not doing so well with a traditionalist mindset I get met with when people ask me when I’m moving away. It makes me feel like I have no say in the matter and suddenly I’m expected to move away and that I’m a selfish wife if I don’t. I am not betrothed to Larry with a dowry and a cow! This is 2015!  Judge me as selfish, as a bad future wife, but I truly don’t agree that a change in status (going from long term dating to marrying) means I immediately, upon marrying, leave my life behind.  I’m not sure what coming together looks like, but I know in my heart we won’t stop being creative with it and when we do live together again I hope we never take it for granted. Maybe it’s gradual, maybe it is splitting time (50/50 or 70/30) between locations. Of course, I miss Larry every day and wish our lives were simpler, but I also didn’t want to stifle his personal ambitions and dreams. I have always encouraged them because that’s what I’d want from the person I love.  I’m proud of our trust, communication (even when we don’t see eye to eye), and commitment to each other. I come from a line of strong ladies but the downside to this is I’m uncomfortable processing sadness and fear.  I hope that by coming clean I continue to feel the urge to write and in turn be able to access my emotions and really FEEL: feet on the ground, face towards the sun.

 

My Action Steps:

1. Putting time and energy into work projects that will benefit me for the long term and saying “no” to commitments that will not.

2. Not acting so tough all of the time. Allowing myself to be sad or feel lonely and not view it as a sign of weakness. Allowing myself to feel the range of emotions humans feel and observe them instead of suppressing them.

3. Guarding myself against outside opinions of what a new marriage should “look like.” So long as my fiancé and I are okay with our plan that’s all that matters.

4. Enjoying and being grateful for every single imperfect day I’m apart from Larry because when we do live together again it will be that much sweeter.