Sometimes your Friends are Right

   Years ago I was lamenting to a friend about my relationship with my mom and how it was really hard to deal with her when we'd go places like the mall. My friend (I really wish I could remember who it was) said things would be different when I moved out. I didn't believe her, because I couldn't see past the circumstance and situation I was in at that moment and I didn't have any genuine faith that I'd someday be able to put any distance between myself and my mother. Even in the last 6 months I've moved yes, but I work with her everyday and everyday I am stuck in a place that I feel is holding me in. It's difficult, to say the least, to think about having some sort of life where I am fully removed from my parents. I think most people would tell me to enjoy this stage where I'm out of the house, but still completely connected everyday. I am trying to, but it's been hard.
   Fast forward to last weekend. My mom and my Grandma came up to visit me! It's a small miracle because I didn't really expect either one of them to show up but they both did. We proceeded to have a wonderful day together. Shopping and lunch filled with laughter and love. It was really nice and I realized in the middle of it that this was some very different. It was the exact thing my friend was telling me about I could enjoy myself because I wasn't burdened by always being surrounded. It gave me something I didn't expect...an aspect of life I haven't fully gathered since I moved...which is peace.

    It seems there's always something I'm worrying about...I know I need to be at peace, but I'm always wondering and stressing about something or other. Last weekend helped me to see that I need to be at peace with the decisions I make (good or bad) and what life is now. An unbelievable joy! Sometimes overwhelming, sometimes underwhelming...but either way it's a joy and a blessing.

   It was good, it was fun and it was peaceful. I look forward to more weekends like it.

   Until Next Time.
   ~m

Happiness

  Yesterday morning I was sitting on the train when a foreign, yet comforting thought popped into my mind.
 
  I'm happy...

  After a giant row with God over this very subject and me just coming to the conclusion that there was no use in throwing a tantrum, I decided to just let go and let God. Its been difficult, but I've discovered some things and have be shown others. Those small things have made a big impression and have allowed me to put some of my issues to the side. Instead of focusing on things I cannot change...I need to focus on what's important my relationship with God.
  I now know I need to sit back and embrace the train rides, the getting up early and working at my job because that's where God wants me to be. So instead of getting up and hating life I need to get up and be thankful for the life I have. I also need to let go of the worry I have over whether or not my job will become permanent. God wants me there, so whether that means I'm never made permanent or if I'm made permanent today I need not worry because God will take care of me.

  Charlotte York from Sex and the City is my spirit animal...so its only fitting that the first thing I thought of upon my realization that I was happy was a quote of hers. In the first SatC film Samantha asks the girls how often they are happy in their relationships. Charlotte says Everyday. When pressed she clarifies..."not all day everyday...but Everyday". The first time I heard it I knew it was a big answer, most people wouldn't answer that way because most don't look at all the good things in life, they only focus on the bad. I'm learning to focus on the good things in my life, when I do that, when I see that overall I've had more blessings than heartaches and more joy than disappointments. It puts it all into prospective and makes me question why I would ever be unhappy. 
  I am product of a society that tells me that if I don't look a certain way, have certain things, lots of money and I'm an unmarried mid-30something woman I must be unhappy because I don't have anything to be happy about. Also, for the most part, I've spent my life surrounded by unhappy people who've done nothing but try to make me as unhappy as they are, so I'm predisposed to be unhappy. But as I look around I see that I have too many good things in my life to be unhappy.
  To know that in the basic small taken-for-granted things in life I am abundantly blessed makes me happy. Because despite the wiring of society I know those things are enough...more than enough. I am blessed just by the country, state, city I live in. So instead of focusing on the "problems" I have I need to focus on the blessings and then I will be happy everyday. But because of the curve balls life throws it may not be all day everyday, but it will be everyday.

   Until Next Time,
   ~m

Is it that simple?

  i've been feeling light on my feet today...i felt that way all day yesterday as well. but today i started to think about how my outlook and my inner feelings have shifted from anger, bitterness and sadness to....dare i say, happiness? i've been thinking about it, trying to process it all since i arrived at work this morning and i think i've finally discovered what it is. i'm at peace, settled and though i don't know how all things are going to work themselves out, i do know that everything will be fine.
   as of the last couple of weeks i've just been feeling hopeless. i didn't know what to do with myself and where i was going to end up. i felt like God wasn't offering anything but more tasks for me to complete and hoops for me to jump through. i was truly at wits end! looking back at it, it may have had a lot to do with the circumstances that i've put myself in over the last month. they just made me jumpy and irritable, but it also had a lot to do with my mindset. i focus on the negative and overlook all the good things i've got going on. the uncertainty of my job and the frustration caused by my roommate have also added to my mindset(not in a good way). so i've just been a grump.
   i'm not sure when but sometime over the last week i decided to change my mindset, to try to be more positive and not worry (or over analyse) the small things because that just makes me crazy. i decided that if God was asking/telling me to do something i needed to stop fighting it and figure out a way to do it. that's where it started...with a simple decision about what i needed to do.
   then this weekend arrived...busy and happy and i enjoyed every piece of it, then it ended the way i wanted it to with me spending my birthday alone without drama! yesterday arrived, back to work and I received surprises from people i didn't expect surprises from. i had a wonderful day and felt loved. i'm carrying the happiness from yesterday into today. but that's not the complete reason i feel this way.
   i spoke to Maria as i ate lunch yesterday, earlier in the day i told her i felt that God was telling me that this is the job He wants me at and that i need to just settle in and work the way i have been. and that i need to accept it. she went on to tell me that God told her a little more about my work life and where i'd end up. to her it was unexpected (i think), but when she said it to me it was a confirmation of something God already told me.
   i, like most, want to know everything. i don't want to walk out on a limb blindly searching and stepping...i want to know what the path is and i, in my best whiny baby voice, ask God regularly to show me what's coming. then i get mad when He doesn't. that happened in this case. He showed me something 6 to 8 weeks ago and i just thought i was over thinking, i thought it was me daydreaming and longing for something i wouldn't have (i even prayed that God take it away from it wasn't from Him). turns out, it really was Him. that's why i'm in this place and head space, because i have been shown a glimpse of where God is leading me. it's a place i wouldn't expect, but it's a place i feel He's getting me ready for. and because of that, i can rest easy. i can move smoothly and know that even if the roommate is irritating, even if the job is uncertain and the commute is long, that these are the things i need to endure in order for me to be who/what/where he needs me to be before i move on to the next steps in life.
   until next time,
   ~m

My Royal Obsession...

Part 1...

  The British Royal Family.

  I have few memories from my early childhood...I remember the 84 Olympics because they took place in my hometown...Mary Lou was tiny and wholesome and a winner (and on the Wheaties Box) and Lionel Richie closed the whole thing with the song "All Night Long"...we watched on TV but were close enough to hear the music playing live if we went outside and we all stood on the porch to watch the closing fireworks show. I remember moving from the apartment building into my great-grandmother's old house and I remember this....

   Lady Diana Spencer walking down the aisle in her big beautiful puffy gown with the long train. I was almost two, but I remember this...this was my introduction to the world of the Royals (and coincidentally weddings) and I was hooked. Diana became the ideal Princess and the person I secretly wanted to be, although I was young and not much into it all of the Royal doings, I was...a fan.
   I also remember Andrew and Fergie's wedding...the birth of Prince William...and the rapid decline (as I saw it at the time) of both A & F's and C and D's marriages. Although it took longer for Charles and Diana to actually end, I remember her interview and her book. I watched the craze her son caused for every teenage girl and I remember quite vividly the night she died and watching her funeral. In all of it, I was fascinated and wondered why only that country had a royal family (little did I know then). After High School I got completely invested in myself so I didn't really follow much royal doings...besides without Diana, with William going off to college and Harry going through his "not so cute" phase my interest, although still there, wained greatly. Que October 2010
   In October 2010 a series of tabloids started to put Prince William and his long term girlfriend Kate on the cover claiming that an engagement was imminent. I didn't really think much about it because these stories popped up every so often since they left college. But through the month it became somewhat of a media blitz on these two and their suppose engagement. Finally in November, what turns out to be a week before the announcement, I picked up a magazine to read during lunch and thought the whole story was rubbish...but between that mag and the engagement announcement I was back on the Royal Train again!
   I got back on with both feet and hung on for over a year! I watched the ceremony (and all the hoopla leading up to it) and I've followed the royal family closely since. What I learned as I fell more and more in tune with the BRF (British Royal Family) is that it's NOT the only one in the world. In fact, it's not even the only one in Europe...and that's where my obsession for all things royal really took a turn!
   I'm not so sure who I became aware of first...but I grew very interested in the Crown Princesses of Sweden, Denmark and Norway very quickly...and for a time the BRF took a backseat while I learned all I could about the rest.

   The Brits were just the beginning...

It really is the smallest things

  

that can make you the happiest.
The tiniest, randomnest but most thoughtful things that can give you all you the reassurance you need.

Ventura I'm Here!!!!!

   I can finally say it!
  
   I can finally scream it!
  
   I can finally declare that I've moved to Ventura!
  
   That's right, all the cryptic posts have been leading to this! I've moved up to Ventura after 10 years of pining, whining and wanting. I'm living in the place my heart calls home.
  
   There were times I thought this dream would never come true, but as I sit here in my new home I can't help but look back at my journey to this place with wonder and joy. I know now that I wasn't ready to leave all that was holding me back behind me...not until now. Now, I'm not only ready, but I've been ready...and everything has fallen into place seamlessly...
  
   God orchestrated this whole thing, he made it all happen. He put all the pieces in place and swayed any and all egos. He's given me a home for my body and a home for my heart in the form of a fantastic church. I'm so happy and so ready to begin this adventure in front of me.
  
   My life has been forever changed and I feel like I can take on the world!
   
   This is AMAZING!