.beauty in alignment

Sometimes the growth pains of life/transitions are so strong and occupying that you seem to get lost in them until you wake up to see that in fact you have began to grow into your new self. You have learned how to be in this newness - this transition is now. 

If you are feeling like things aren't "working out" then you just aren't in the right place.
Open yourself to the Universe and the journey it holds for you.
Because things DO work out.
Life is beautiful, everyday.

I have written before about how my support pillars were shaken in the past few years. This forced me to step back and look at WHAT that meant and WHO that made me and WHERE I belong. I sat in that for awhile and then I took a step. A little step but it was what I needed. That step lead me to the next step - forward. Big changes are coming to my life, quickly. They are coming with such beauty and ease - I am right where I need to be.

So much gratitude for the growth pains and for the beauty in alignment.

.live your questions.

“…be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and to try to love the questions themselves like locked rooms and like books that are written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them.

“And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you win then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer.”

~Rainer Maria Rilke from Letters to a Young Poet

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pictures from a trip to the north cascades a few years ago. swoon. i love the north cascades.

.words to live by.

"the power of life is always greater than any force of oppression."

-Dr. Patrisia Gonzalez

.birth.

I came into the room late. The baby's head was peaking out but Mama was stressed and possessed, I thought it was her first baby due to her resistance, thrashing her body around on the bed. I had to take fetal heart tones and was sure she was going to end up kicking me in the face. Grabbing the bed posts screaming "no puedo,  no puedo" and then bouncing her body up grabbing her thigh where she had a cramp. Her belly was small and I wondered what her story was, what is she letting go of right now - nervous erratic like she wasn't ready for her baby to meet this world. 

She gave another push and there was the head and it seemed like instantly the baby was born. And in that very moment the high energy evaporated and a sweet subtleness fell on the room. She exhaled loudly and held her baby. Her face soften and she immediately started thanking everyone in the room. And then she said "es una nina, no? una nina?" and the Midwife said "mira a tu bebe" so she picked her baby up from her chest and exclaimed crying "es nina". The Midwife checked her for any tears and more softness settled into the room and she started telling her daughter how she was almost born in the car, crossing the border. 

She lives in a town an hour and a half from the border with no family in El Paso so she didn't leave home until contractions started. This was her third baby - so you never know how much time you have. She said the contractions came fast and strong as they were waiting in line to cross over. She kept holding her breath and telling her baby not to come, but babies know when they need to come. So looking back at her very physical birth - it was just her trying tell her body that it was safe to relax and let the baby come. It was now time. 

Oh the love of a Mama - is unbelievable.
Birth.

.weary strength.

last night i cried. a hard cry. i haven't cried for a while (or at least since I hugged my sister goodbye on the crib in front of the airport in my pajamas). my emotions have been sitting heavy on me these past days. i cried to let it all out. i cried even past the point of thinking i shouldn't be crying anymore.

birthing the acknowledgement of loss (of things of which I have been in denial for a while).
the frustration (that things are/and will continue to constantly change and in ways i don't understand or like).
the confusion (of making a big decision and realizing that it isn't all i thought it would be).
the complexity (of life that nothing is yes or no but more a hope and a gamble).
the loneliness (of forging ahead without my pillars and trying not to look back).

and i woke up this morning calm.
reinvigorated.
strong in myself.
confident in my abilities.
despite all those heavy emotions still very much alive and thriving inside of me.

but i realized that in these transitions, births, moments of facing the now - there is great beauty in my ability to shine. that moments of weariness will become my moments of strength.

mantra:

i don't need the answer right now.
i don't need to figure it out.
i don't need to smile it away.
just breathe.

.breathe.

Nobody is who they are based upon one decision, one day, one path, one chance, one relationship, or one anything else.

Every day is brand new and opportunity never stops knocking. 

.stepping into darkness.

experience the fall

embrace the fall

laugh in the fall

give gratitude for the fall