Hitting Bottom + Rising UP for 2015

There’s something I’ve been avoiding doing…something I love dearly and yet, it’s been like pulling teeth to do it.

It’s this…it’s sitting down to write to you.Creating for you.

I want to share a little bit as to why, not only as a way to explain my absence, but also because I think my struggle could really help shine insight into your own life, especially at the beginning of a new year.

Recently, right before a much needed family vacation cruise, I started thinking a lot about my business, my coaching practice, and how much I had been “showing up” for it, especially over the last 6 months of the year.

When I took an honest look, the answer was “not that much.”

A handful of clients here, 2 blog posts there, a few workshops and video content I put together for outside sources, but compared to my usual steelo, I hadn’t really been putting much of myself out there or serving my community the way I really love to.

Sure I was exploring other aspects of myself via acting, but mostly I was just trying to keep myself together. As you probably know from a previous post a few months ago, my summer wedding never happened, my fiancé and I split up, and he moved back to NYC. To say I was devastated and heartbroken would be an understatement.

So really the only thing I could commit to after he left was keeping my head above water and doing whatever it took to bring back joy to my life. Very little room to give to anyone else but me.

Especially when essentially I was just beginning to rediscover myself now that an almost 6 year relationship had ended. Who was I now? What lit me up?

It has been one of the most challenging times of my life.

Sure, a lot of growth, but when something is growing, it takes energy. And time to rest. And time to cleanse, to reevaluate.

I didn’t want to do it..I wanted to keep trucking on…but my heart and soul didn’t give me a choice. I had to listen.

So without really “officially” doing it, I put my business on the back burner.

I stepped back.

I went wherever I felt most called to.

Sometimes that was punching the bag (I’ve really become quite the boxer). Sometimes it was dance class. An audition. My performances. Late nights out. Early nights in. Baking. My yoga mat. A friend or family member’s shoulder to cry on. An extra hour of sleep. Texas. Long conversations with a beloved soul. Solitude. Curling up in a ball and just weeping. Laughing and dancing all night. And most recently, the Caribbean with my family.

The truth was as much joy I was experiencing was met with equal parts grief, sadness, and utter confusion. I would break into tears at the farmer’s market, the thought of him, or a random memory. And when I thought I was doing so much better….WHAM! Another level of grief would reveal itself. I might have cried every day between Thanksgiving and Christmas….and I actually skipped Christmas altogether. There wasn’t one drop of one of my favorite holidays in my house.

No matter how much I wanted to, my pain would not let me fail to acknowledge it. The truth ain’t always pretty.

One day in December, when I was feeling utterly hopeless, I called two of my closest friends, who also happen to be amazing coaches. I wanted to snap out my funk already. I wanted to be the coach I knew who was busting out new content and getting things ready for the new year, but outside of my daily sweat sessions, all I really wanted to do was…cry. They encouraged me to ride the sadness all the way to the deepest end, to feel it all, including the uncertainty.

I felt paralyzed. And it freaked me out.

As always, the Universe provides what you need when you need it most. Our family cruise came at the perfect time. It allowed me to be loved up, supported, bask in the sunshine, to remember my roots. And to really search my heart.

No, I hadn’t created much content or coached much the last six months of the year, but I did give myself back to myself and I did give heartfelt thought as to what I wanted to create in the coming year and to ask an uncomfortable question: Did I still really want to run my coaching practice? Or had the last 6 months taken so much out of me that there was nothing left to give?

At first, there was just space. And the questions…and letting go…

And then…

I arrived at YES, I really wanted to keep serving through my coaching, workshops, online content.

AND… that the way it will look in 2015 might be totally different than the way it looked ever before. Because I had changed, my life had changed, and I cannot NOT talk about what is happening in my life NOW.

Bottom line, I hope you will stay part of my tribe. I’m ready now to give you my all again because I let myself feel it all and took a break. And I feel so ready to create new content and experiences for you and our community.

But just know that it might look a little different. It will probably more “holistic” than ever, because I want to talk about it ALL….food, movement, adventure, love, dating, friendships, family, living your passionate purpose.

Because what’s up for me now is finding love again, finding myself again, experimenting more, starting over.

I have to have the freedom to write and create in this way because as I have learned and seen time and time again with my clients, it is the only way to create the kind of change and the kind of life we really desire.

We want to compartmentalize our lives but each aspect influences the other. It may sound cliché but the love you create in your relationships, the passion you bring to your career, the authenticity you bring to your life dramatically effects your weight, health, food choices, and quality of movement….and vice versa.

In 2015, I want you to have it all. I want you to be a Well Fed Soul.

As you start this new year, I encourage you to sit with the important questions. Be willing to be uncomfortable. Be willing to let go what no longer works. Be willing to cry, laugh, scream, ask for help, go to the bottom and really get curious as to what you need in the now.

Thank you for sticking around while I got my head and heart together. (And if you read this whole post, an even bigger thank you!) If you stick around with me, I promise to serve you in an even bigger way in 2015.

Look forward to:
Monthly workshops in LA, downloadable content, mind blowing honesty (including writing pieces under the subheading “Redoing Single”), free calls, private coaching, recipes to fuel all the ass kicking you will doing, and a whole lotta love.

Appreciating you like you wouldn’t believe,