Like Super Glue...

It's a new year....aaaannnnd....if you haven't already noticed, I've been playing catch up since October 2011. Pretty sure it all stemmed from my little trail mishap before the Tough Mudder, which forced me to slow down (just a bit) and realize I was taking on WAY too much. No big surprise there; that's the very story of my existence.

I. just. can't. seem. to. stop.

However, I have found some overdue perspective, and since I am constantly trying to be the best version of me, I am going to give in and jot down my first resolutions in...well...ever. But, since I am totally against resolutions because they seem so temporary in most cases, I am going to call these my "Super Glue Resolutions" because dammit, isn't permanency the whole point of making a positive change in your life?

So, without further pomp or circumstance, here they are:

1. Write, write, write with no purpose but for my own sanity.
I kind of lost my way here for two months or so. I started this blog, so I could get back into the habit of writing again and to learn to love it the way I did before life and responsibility and adulthood took over. It's my exit from the world I love but sometimes need a respite from. Yet, it's also my quiet entrance into a world of imagination and creativity and honesty I crave so deeply and need so violently it aches when I don't visit here often.

Every person has that outlet. Perhaps they give into it and find the time to do it. Perhaps they don't. I took on freelance writing and layout and design work the past few months in an attempt to bring both worlds together; however, I realized much like my time working with newspapers, it just wasn't the creative outlet I needed. So, I'm back to where I started. And, damn, it smells like a fresh start to me, and I'm sinking into it like the very meadow I once hiked through on a warm summer day in a pristine foothill of Colorado, a tucked-away place most people only dream of, but I had the sheer (though brilliant) luck of stumbling upon.

2. Teach for the mere purpose of changing someone's life for the better.
If you look down my family's line, you'll find two things: teachers and soldiers. My mom always told me teaching runs in my blood just as my father always told me to cultivate my warrior spirit. The women in my family are teachers. The men in my family are soldiers. I happened to come out with both traits bubbling in my bloodstream, just waiting for any opportunity to prove to me exactly what I was bred to do.

There is nothing I love more than helping people, particularly women. I have spent my life being told I'm not good enough or pretty enough or strong enough or just enough, but I have taught myself to love who I am no matter what I'm told, no matter what I see around me to convince me otherwise. I want every woman to feel the same about themselves, to feel they are more than enough. They are perfect. I want my daughter to never question her perfection. Imagine what we could do in this world if all women stopped worrying about what they should be and started focusing on what they are.

So, I teach, and I combine all the things my mother taught me about connecting with what my father taught me about soldiering, which is you go forward with no fear and look back with no regret and leave no teammate behind. Not a bad way to approach life, huh?

3. 10 pullups.
Need I say more? We all carry a crutch. It's that something you THINK you cannot do, so you don't attempt it. Yet, that crutch seems to shadow you over the years no matter what you do or where you run to escape it. The truth is you can't escape a crutch; you eventually just have to face it and conquer it.

It can be something trivial like pullups. It can be something dramatic like deciding to lose weight and get healthy. It can be standing up to someone who has abused you or standing down from a fight not worth your time. It can be controlling a bad temper or learning to express your anger instead of suppress it.

There are so many types of crutches, and we usually have several, so it's always best to focus on one or two at a time. I am currently working on reaching my pullup goal and learning to tune out negative people rather than react to them. Walking away has not always been my strong point, but at some point, we all learn to walk, right?

4. Follow my dream.
It's a cliche, and I hate cliches. Yet, this one is just so damn true. If you are patient enough and determined in your path, eventually an opportunity will come to you. All I can say is I'm feeling quite optimistic right now about so many things, and I'm thinking this is going to be one freakin' awesome year, and I've been one patient girl. Enough said. : )

Here's the thing about living your life perfectly...you have to be ready to search for that untouched meadow, discover all the things you can offer the world, reach for that last pullup no matter how daunting it seems and follow a foggy path with patience and fortitude with the certain knowledge that one day the skies will clear and the world will open up to a view you've only seen in your sleep.

Now, that's a pretty perfect resolution worth sticking to.