Beginnings bring me awareness. Starting implies presence, wakefulness, grounding and some sense of knowing. We are able to acknowledge/appreciate beginning only when we are aware and able to acknowledge/appreciate that something else is ending. The idea of that is engulfing, for me.

Instinctively, there is balance there. With ending beginning, with beginning ending.

During my 10-day trek into Residency I became intimately aware of myself. Seven to eight hours of driving daily (for 10 days) into an intense eight to nine hour lesson/rumination on writing and living an authentic writer’s life gives you that sort of space and access into yourself. It is grueling, to be honest. But, not for the expected reasons.

I became intimately aware of my fears, limits, boundaries, strengths, joys, dreams, obstacles, and supports. During those seventy to eighty hours I believe I felt the full range of human emotions, as I was forced to work through every phobia, fear, weakness of mine daily.

Now home, with distance and perspective I realize that I endure it because it is clarifying.

Already, I have grown taller.

I can only equate it to a fast. A fast into myself.

Mental toxins, weight/baggage, limiting beliefs and thought patterns, corrosive habits surface. Only my own inner strength, mental fortitude, courage to thrive and grow can pull me through.

For now on I will refer to my next three Residencies/journeys (and the past three) as mental fasts.

If I had to attach a theme to December’s (2013) fast it would be courage. Everyday I was pushed to rise to my own capabilities. Most days I was not specifically afraid of failing, but someone, something, or myself failing me. My assumption was failure.

The car would quit. The tires blow. I’d become lost. An accident. Illness. Fainting. Becoming stranded and starving. Anything that would cause me to fail essentially at writing, because writing is what this journey is about.

Logically, bathed in all those defeating thought patterns, fears (and their respective emotions) I’d experience panic, anxiety, difficulty breathing deep.

There were also moments of peace: Studying color in the rising and setting sun, Edward’s constant voice of support/comfort, learning to breath through fear, joyful singing, deep praying, sunshine on my face, feeling the gratitude of home, writing breakthroughs, discovering patience, successfully navigating, surviving.

What I realize today is everyday I succeeded.

Instead of New Year’s Resolutions I choose a word/theme to cultivate in my life and outline tasks, practices, habits and goals that will foster the theme in my life and actions. Last year, aware that I was stuck in a cycle of fear, I chose Brave.

I realize now that I am and have always been brave and courageous. Confidence, however, has prevented me from realizing and acknowledging it within myself and my life—more specifically, a lack of trust, faith, and a weakened belief system.

Even when I succeed, I choose to focus and acknowledge where I’ve fallen.

I’ve learned that this isn’t balance unless we allow ourselves to fully acknowledge and appreciate our successes. Without success, our failures lack perspective, depth and deplete our innate trust, faith, and belief.

Unbalanced confidence is boastful, insecure, and ungrounded; likewise, unbalanced humility is fearful, anxiety-filled, and ungrounded.

To begin my year of trust I chose to transform my art studio into a space of writing and breathing. As I set out a week ago to clear the fabric, painting supplies, and various craft materials I began to become mournful. It is only when I decided to breathe and write myself through it that I realized it all was a distraction. I’ve outgrown that phase of my life and refusing to let it go is preventing me from seeing myself as I am today. Distractions because I’m operating on an assumption of failure.

I have new goals, new ways of expressing and experiencing myself and this life; I no longer need to hold on to those ways of expressing myself to be myself.

Soon it became clear that trust would begin with my own acceptance of who I am today and not who I have been, who I have wanted to be, and who I have let go of becoming.

With a clear path I have listed some tasks, practices, habits I believe will help me reach my goals.

Twenty + Fourteen

Trust

I. Daily:

• Write deeply with intention
  • Start Tanka/Haiku Diary
• Eat something Raw
• Breathe deeply
• Read—always choose books
• Smile and laugh.

II. Honor:

• Writing’s space in my life
• My own breath
• My successes
• Rest

III. Cultivate:

• Balanced confidence
• Joy
• Continued attitude of gratitude          

IV. Abandon:

• Judgment
• Perfection
• Labels

V. I will:

•  Garden year round
•  Limit Social Media and use it responsibly; seeking not to contribute noise, but add  value
• Give more.
• Cry when needed.
• Land, not fall or fail
• Aspire, aim high, but take joy in the landing, wherever it is.
• Celebrate with a full heart.
• Notice abundance.
• Create boundaries
• Nurture healthy friendships
• Bake more (healthy) bread.

My hope for you and me is living fully grounded in ourselves with intention and purpose this year and all the years we are gifted with these lives. What ever your journey, purpose or cause, I hope that you will embrace it and seek to fulfill it.

I’ve created a worksheet for myself and my family to help us get clear and purposeful with our year, I’d like to share it with you. 

2014 Live With Purpose Worksheet

Wishing you a year of purpose, joy, health, and prosperity!

Ki