Thankful.....

I guess its time for me to start reflecting on this last year and make sure I'm not overlooking things in my life that I should be truly grateful for. Its been a roller coaster year to say the least but I think I've moved from gripping the bar in fear and feeling sick to raising my arms and feeling the rush. It's been a year of growth and learning, ups and downs, rights and lefts, black and whites, and I'm left with:
NOW.... TODAY, RIGHT NOW, THIS VERY MOMENT IN TIME... because NOW, is the only time that really matters anymore.

NOW is what I determine NOW is going to be, and only I can decide that. That decision frees me up to create a new future and let go of an old heavy ugly past....

I'm very thankful for my trials right now, because they have brought me to this time in my life right now, where I just opened up my whole life in front of myself, as well as a life and future for my kids.

I've made a lot of decisions.... neither good or bad, neither right or wrong, just decisions.... Whatever people interpret them to be is up to them.

I've loved, I've lost and I'll love again... nothing is ever really gone if you've ever really loved it. That never goes away no matter what emotion you try and wash it away with.

I choose my kids.... I always have and always will... they don't complete me, they are not a 'part' of me. They are individually individual and full of life and possibility. They will not turn into anything but themselves. I don't have to be afraid of their genetics or their experiences because they will turn out, exactly how they turn out, and good or bad, right or wrong, up or down, they will blame me for it anyway, and I'm ok with that as long as I can say I did the best I could in the situation I was in, with the tools I had at the time. What they decide to do with their lives is their choice, not mine... and I love the possibility of that not being my responsibility. I'm here to guide, to coach, and to love the people that they are creating.

I'm grateful for the ability to learn, to be in a frame of mind and of being that I accept new information, new ways of looking at things and new experiences. I love the fact that I am a human being and therefore am imperfect and always will be, and that's ok and I'm ok with it being ok.

I'm so thankful for friends that look past my smoke screen and see me. I don't make that easy for people. I put up the front that I'm tough, that I'm independent or that I'm not and need someone and they know me anyway... when I say leave me alone, they stay and when I say stay, they go... and it's always exactly what I need it to be. I am so thankful for old friends and new friends, having both gives me the confidence that I've done something right somewhere because these amazing people out here care about me and trust me and I them....

I love my family, the family that's not bioliogically my family but is no less than. They have been the spice in my life, that added flavor I didn't even know I needed but love and couldn't do without now. In my heart we were and will always be family even if we don't know it or acknowledge it.

I am grateful to my parents for having me, for raising me, for coaching me, for all they did and didn't do... for everything they were and everything they weren't.

I am so fortunate to have the air i breath everyday, to have the ability to do what I need to do despite my desire to do so or not to do so. I'm fortunate to have my free agency and the compassion in my heart that I have.

I have been truly blessed with the ability to go through my trials with an open mind, or at least come out of my trials with an open mind and the desire to assign positive meaning to them, to be teachable enough to use these trials and hard times as lessons that will hopefully someday not be in vain but to be collected, refined and used to benefit others, if even just one person, it will all have been worth it, especially if it's one of my children.

I've been oddly enough blessed with my past... I know that sounds crazy, but I chose it and I accept it, and now I am inspired by it.

I am finally at a point in my life where I am ready to accept myself for myself, the everything and the nothing... and there's nothing wrong with me. I'm perfect, whole and complete just the way I am. No I haven't lost my mind, no I'm not on drugs and the kids haven't hit me in the head too many times but for the first time in a long time I'm able to see and feel with clarity. The coulds have lifted and there is so much more to see out there than I ever even realized.
I had limited myself, my relationships, my family, my children and my dreams to such a little space.... and I don't have too... there are endless possibilities.... everything is possible with nothing ahead of me, especially the past.
I'm glad that I made it to November, so I could be here in my now. I didn't know in March that I wanted to be here, but I do... and thank God I am.