I have been counting down the days until the end, then resetting and counting down again for so many months now it's hard to believe it's really the LAST WEEK!

We're not quite sure what's next and that is a bit unnerving, but it doesn't touch how exciting it is to be saying goodbye to something that just didn't feel right. We're doing our best to hold on to the unknown and not to fill the spaces immediately... the goal is to leave room and discover along the way.

Come Friday, I'll be spending time with my ENTIRE family, celebrating my parents' retirement and swimming in my own new freedom to create/work/dream/garden/write/cook away!

New Things

As we live more of our days out in the same fashion, the same rhythm, the same pattern - it becomes increasingly harder to deviate. Doesn't it?

Saying yes was once so easy - yes to hikes, drives, cliffs, unknowns. But the older we become the less we say yes.  Now I'm not sure if that's because we have less time or more responsibilities or if it's as I assume, merely we're out of the habit, but it's a widely accepted fact that the older we become the more risk-adverse we become in our choices and behaviors. 

Can I just remind you all - trying something new is so damn refreshing? 

It's scary and it will likely reacquaint you with what it feels like to be bad at something. But that's okay, because it's your first time!  And how glorious is it to remember what a "first time" feels like?  So maybe today, try something new.  Eat a food you might not like.  Read a book in a genre you've never touched.  Take a drive, schedule a class, buy some paintbrushes or sit outside a coffee shop and talk to someone who looks totally different from you - ask them something about themselves.  Maybe join a group, join a march, I'd say join a conversation - but for most of us, I think we talk plenty - what we need is to do something, do something completely new.  Something fun!  Something scary!  Something that reminds us we are still explorers.  And that we might not yet know ourselves as well as we thought.  We may have in fact changed into someone new in all those years we've spent living out a life of rhythm and pattern. 

The Importance of Goodbye

I think we can all agree that goodbyes are the worst. No matter how small, or big, saying goodbye to a favorite person, place, pet or even pastime can quite literally break our hearts and leave us aching for years to come.

But the only thing worse, is not getting the chance to say goodbye.  A sudden end.  I've been contemplating this on a number of fronts lately and it has me thinking about the value of goodbye.  Just skimming the surface here, but a few of my thoughts:

Goodbye shows you who a person really is.
With nothing left to gain, and little to nothing left to lose - how a person chooses to treat another when saying goodbye speaks of nothing but who they really are - loving, kind, patient, or not.

Goodbye shows you who a person really is to you. 
Relief or sadness, perhaps fear or insecurity - when we cut ties, our emotional response tells us a lot about what we looked to that person (or thing) for, and who they became to us.  Sometimes it surprises us what surfaces.

Goodbye shows you who you are. 
It's not a summary of your being - but you're bound to learn a few new things whenever you say goodbye - you'll learn about fight or flight, about your perspective of yourself, and about what you really want.