I recently posted on social media giving an update on things and new perspective with the new year.  The last 3 or so years I’ve picked a word for the year that’s stood out to me, so I asked what others had decided for their year or if they had any suggestions for me.  Always cool to hear what others words are for themselves but also to see their insights on me and my journey.

Many suggested resilience for me and I’ve heard that over and over from others as they learned of what I was going through this past year.  So I wanted to touch on it for a second.  I didn’t end up going with it as my word for the year, I went with RELENTLESS.  Last year my word was unstoppable and the year before that unapologetic.  Notice a theme there??

Anywho, let’s get back to resilience.  So I am super resilient.  Through all I’ve gone through, you can definitely say I’m resilient.  One said I was one of the most resilient people she knows.  …but my thinking on resilience is it’s a skill.  You can build your resilience.  Yes, you may have some resilience already but when life throws things at you…that’s when you really are tested.  It’s not that I’m more resilient than the next person but I chose, after years of being broken and not resilient or at least not thriving.  I was merely surviving.

Until one day, after crying my eyes out several times to a therapist and being so depressed, thinking how much life sucked and how I’d lost myself.  The only joy I had was in my precious little babies faces and dancing around with them… I decided to pick myself up and start living life differently.  I decided to see life through a different lens.  I decided to look for the beauty in even the humblest of circumstances.

I began working on my mindset a little at a time.  I read books, listened to videos, went to seminars all to help re-train my brain to see the good, to see the hope, the beauty and be happy in my circumstance no matter what.  Even if life was super sucky at the moment, I could still find joy and happiness somehow someway.  And that’s exactly what I did.

As my situation began to improve in many areas – not all, I strengthened my mind to be more and more resilient.  It’s like a muscle, just like self-control, will power, discipline….

Life will always happen, good and bad.  That’s just life.  It’s up to us to decide how we react to it and how we carry on, how we move forward.  For me, I’d much rather live life this way than let things happen to me, live in a negative, bitter, ugly world.

You’re the only one in your headspace, you decide what goes in and what goes out, what stays.  You are the gatekeeper.  Guard and protect your mind, your heart but at the same time learn to live with your whole heart, love without conditions and expectations.

All the love for you!  I hope 2020 is starting off to be a great year.  xx, Alicia