We Found Our Camera!

I began a journey about a month ago.

It all started with my annual physical.

My doctor came into the room and found me sitting on the table, notebook in hand. It was my first day of journaling my food and exercise. I had grown weary of feeling yucky, of having a dizzy head, having a headache, feeling tired, feeling irritable, feeling not well. I had enough fight left in me to decide to start writing it all down. What was I eating? What did I do for exercise? I wanted to get to the bottom of it and I had to start somewhere.

My doctor was intrigued. She said it was a great idea, but she didn't stop with diet and exercise. She told me how sometimes she grows weary of Western medicine (she is from India). She told me that most people don't really want to heal the root of the problem, they simply want a prescription to get rid of the symptoms so they can keep going.

She continued to ask questions about things I had never thought about, things about my past, things about my present. She talked about breathing and emotional health. She talked about her own journey and what she did to heal herself and to put herself on a slightly different path. She encouraged me to slow down, to evaluate, to try some different things, to not be afraid if no one else thought it made sense. She told me to embrace my femininity and love myself and then after 40 minutes of chatting, she did what a doctor does at a woman's yearly physical.

I left in a bit of a fog.

What the heck just happened? What did she say? Embrace my what? Love myself? What about my workouts? Should I eat grains? Should I go Paleo? Should I be Vegan? Strength train? Cardio? What? She didn't really say.

Love myself.

Embrace my femininity.

Hmm... I'm still not exactly sure what she meant but I'm intrigued and I believe I'm on a slightly different path.

I"m liking it. It's slower here, kinder, and it doesn't hurt as much.

It's new for me not to compare myself with others.

It's different to tell myself that even though I see a fault in myself (like scary white Iowa winter legs) I'm still lovable and loved.

I've even gone so far as to walk back through some regrettable memories and put my today self in the picture and tell my then self that it's okay. You are going to get through this. You are safe. You are loved and one day this thing that you regret, simply won't matter because of where you're going to end up.

It sound's hokey doesn't it?

I know. It sounds hokey to me too.

I like to say things like, 'push through it', 'get it done', 'try harder', 'get it right'.

I'm not about to put those words away. They will have their time and their place. I'm just trying out some new words. I'm trying softer. I'm trying gentle. I handling with care the fragile parts. I'm saying things like, 'you are good', 'you are lovely' and 'it's okay'.

I"m not going to lie - I'm a bit weirded out by even writing those words down.

It's new. It's a different. It's time.

So if you see me and I seem a bit lost, you'll know what's going on. I'll have my journal because I am still writing down everything I'm eating and my exercise output. It's amazing how I watch what I shove down my mouth because I know I'm going to have to write it down.

You can walk with me if you like. You don't need to have a journal.  We can take lots of pictures 'cause I've got my camera back. Who knows where we will end up.

I'm positive that there will be lots to see along the way.

See ya out there!


P.S. The family and I spent Memorial Day at Backbone State Park. We had never been there. Simply gorgeous!