I found myself wanting to explain what I used to do. I wanted to explain what happened and justify my reasons for moving on. I recognized how badly I wanted to label myself as something I thought was cool. I felt embarrassed that I was babysitting at 30-years-old, instead of just getting a job with regular hours. Then I felt bad about that, because I liked taking care of babies. I didn’t want to feel ashamed for following my own path. It may not work for other people to have the unpredictability of random temp jobs, but for me back then it was exactly what I needed.

Series Introduction: Wonder

When I was a young girl, I wondered about a lot of things. Who I would be when I grew older. What I would do for work. Where I would live. What car I would drive at 16-years-old. My first kiss. My first love. My first heartbreak. In my 8-year-old brain, my future self seemed so out of reach, it didn’t scare me to imagine my life. After all, I still had so much time to figure out who I was meant to be. So, when I’d wonder about my future, it felt like a daydream—like magic. As I have, in fact, grown older, the magic has undoubtedly faded with time.

Even at Rest, You are Still YOU

Day after day of chaos has me pleading for quiet moments. All I want is to stop for a minute or two and do nothing. I dream of having the sleep and lack of responsibility I had as a child. Taking naps and staying still, I hope, are the rewards of the constant moving and striving. But the moment I stop in one place, the fear creeps in. What will I miss? What opportunity will pass me by while I rest? What if I never move again? What I longed for becomes more scary than the taxing and brutal reality of always working to achieve. I can't let go because I might fade away. People might forget my name, my actions. It is a nearly paralyzing thought.

Believing in Your Own Potential When it Feels Like No One Else Does

Knowing your true potential and the kind of person you want to become can be difficult. But once you’ve unlocked that side of yourself and figured out exactly where you want to end up in life, it’s the best feeling in the world. Knowing your true potential is so important in our modern culture and with women being given more opportunities in the workplace now more than ever, it is the time to shoot for the stars and make your biggest and best dreams come to life. But what do you do when people around you try to put you down? What happens when people try to make you feel less than and doubt that potential? What about when the people putting you down are the women who should be lifting you up?

Making Peace with Mornings

For years my method for waking was hitting the snooze button until the very last possible minute. Rolling out of bed and throwing on the nearest clothes and rushing out the door with the philosophy that I can get anywhere in Flagstaff in five minutes from my house, no problem. It was never true and I was almost always late, edgy from not eating and drinking only coffee. I didn’t plan lunch, so I’d get cranky and shaky until I’d finally rush to Subway or Taco Bell, or go home and make an American cheese and mayonnaise pickle sandwich. Mornings aren’t my favorite time of day.

Current Blog series: Purpose