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Change is inevitable. Growth is optional. Which do you want?
I was going through a backlog of non-urgent emails when I found this:
I truly believe that everything that we do and everyone that we meet is put in our path for a purpose. There are no accidents; we’re all teachers — if we’re willing to pay attention to the lessons we learn, trust our positive instincts and not be afraid to take risks or wait for some miracle to come knocking at our door. ~ Marla Gibbs
It was just the right thing at the right time.
I’ve been working through an “interesting challenge” over the past week. I’m not yet ready to write about it in detail, but this quote…let me just tell you that it’s spot-on.
For the past week I’ve felt like the Universe is asking me how much I mean what I’ve been saying about how I want to live my life.
This challenge has been an opportunity to help me get clear on so many levels: articulating my core values in my business, the expertise I bring to my clients, what I will no longer tolerate and the type of clients I really want to work with.
In working through this challenge I have shown up for myself like never before. I’ve looked through a wide lens and a long arc lens to put it all in context. I have used the full array of resources that I’ve cultivated over the years: my personal development frameworks, my spiritual toolbox, energetic awareness, and my emotional and physical and mental processes.
As issues have come up for me, I have processed them through writing and talking it out with trusted resources. I’ve sat in meditation. And I’m in my body with it: not just exercising (because that’s a given, anyway) but really noticing where it shows up: the tightening in my hips and lower back, migraines, the base of my skull, the spot just below my ribs.
I’m learning some powerful lessons about what it means to stand in my truth and honor my value. I’m learning that sometimes saying yes to myself actually means saying no to what my mind (i.e. my fear and ego) wants so that I can say yes to my heart and soul and my health and well-being.
And seriously, just that last bit —recognizing that there are two parts of me that can want different, opposing things, and being able to see them both and hold space for both without making one of them “wrong” or “bad” — represents so much immense progress in my evolution.
And I can see that.
I can see it.
My progress. My evolution.
This is huge.
This is everything.
Years of personal excavation and personal development and spiritual teachings and energy and physical awareness and meditation and noticing and learning.
Learning how to be with what is while also seeing what’s possible.
I’ve had no tears for the past week, but now they flow again.
Not from sadness or loss, but from a breaking open. Another layer peeled away as I get closer to the truth of my core.
This is what it means to grow, not just to change.
That “life will never be the same” is a given. Change is inevitable.
That we will evolve and grow is not guaranteed. We need to choose growth. It takes work. And effort.
It takes a willingness to look for the signs and seek out the lessons; a willingness to distinguish the head from the heart, and courage to stand in the resolve of which one you will allow to control your decisions, actions and destiny.
The signs and lessons are all around us. They are within us.
We need only to open ourselves to them and listen.
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