Awesome!

It’s been a question that’s been on my mind a lot this last year, how come I cannot get back in the game? Usually, the answer to a question is so simple that we overlook it. This was no exception.

Most of my life, stress hormones were racing through my body, creating a downward spiral in which I felt progressively stressed, powerless and tired. Most of my stress was concentrated around the things I believed I had to do and how I had to do them. I had no self-confidence, which manifested in extreme fear of failure, which I tried to mask with perfectionism (which, by the way,  I did perfectly), and eventually it stopped me from doing anything. Today, I am a different person. Gone is the stress, gone the fear and gone the perfectionism. I feel great, I am relaxed (most of the time), I am at peace and feel comfortable in my own skin, and there is little to nothing I feel I have to do. I love my life. Yes, I want to do things, but even there I am pretty relaxed; I just haven’t figured out how to go about it.

The answer to my earlier question is easy. For over a decade, I have actively sought a way to be happy. In my mind, being happy equaled being at peace, which to me was being without stress. Having finally found that, the absence of stress feels so good physically, that no horses can drag me away from here. Unfortunately, my mind is conditioned to relate stress to action and peace to very little action. Yet, over the past year, I have discovered that while being happy equals being at peace, being at peace does not equal being without stress. To get back in the game, I have to recondition myself to react differently to stress. Stress is part of this physical environment. If handled healthily stress is a good thing, it leads to strength, growth and resilience.

Having arrived at my destination (happiness), and having discovered what it looks and feels like, I really want to get moving again. To do that I have to redefine my destination. I am heading for a new destination, it’s called Awesomeness! Every day, I will ask myself, what do I have to do today to feel awesome tonight? To me, awesome feels like joy, ease, flow, health, abundance. It feels like  moving, doing, exploring, writing, speaking, contributing, and adding value. Every day,  I will say to myself that  I AM AWESOME! and sing to myself that I fucking did it! (check those videos out, they’re worth every minute of your time). These are my new affirmations. And I can’t wait to see how they will enrich my journey.

Like everything in life, happiness is an ever-evolving concept, it will be different tomorrow than it was today. The essence of happiness is being able to evolve right along with it. That is the game.

photo credits go to my awesome daughter