Okay, here we go.
If you've read me before, you may have an inkling that I don't use words without emotion.
Well, unless I'm in a triggered state of mind.
Then, I'm 100% in preservation-mode and
cannot focus on any emotion except my unsafeness.
Alas, again on this beautiful,
January
Florida
winter
Sunday morning....
I am feeling vulnerable. I am full of emotion.
Here's the thing.
I find myself attracted to women.
Not just today, but for most of my life.
I'll rest here a bit while you digest that sentence.
There are a handful of you
who have known me since
my first kiss or first encounter with a boy.
You've heard me brag.
You listened when I talked about boys.
But also, at 12yo, one of you asked me why I kept turning to look
at this girl in the back of our Mormon chapel.
I knew it was unacceptable.
I could not say the truth.
(Self-preservation is strong in this one.)
So I said I was looking at her brother.
Case closed.
The rest of you might be thinking:
But you were married to a hetero man for 28 years.
How does that work??
Well, apparently it doesn't, because we're divorced.
I CELEBRATE the family Steve and I created.
I HONOR both of us for caring for each other like we did.
He is a great man.
I am a great woman.
We created a great family.
I am so PROUD of us.
AND
after living separately for 16 months,
I found myself flirting with a woman.
Like, really flirting,
like...I wanted to kiss her.
Today's Deep Breath: here's a practical juju nugget, a collective Next Best Decision.
All of this:
publishing my story and writing my truth,
the end of my marriage,
the blog and website and
becoming a certified life coach...
stepping out of what culture told me
was my duty and
my role as a woman,
that nothing else mattered as much as managing our home and family...
All of this started with me and a pen.
Dangerous, right?
TRUTH: Each human,
male, female
and every color in between and outside,
has an inner voice that has all the answers.
You can call it: the still, small voice,
intuition,
your soul, or
being in alignment with your true self.
"Who am I?
What do I want?
How can I serve?"
(From the chapter: Soul Questions, by Deepak Chopra,
The Seven Spiritual Laws of Yoga, 2004.)
When I picked up my pen, I was working towards these first two questions.
Look--
all of us are going to build a life,
either by intention of what we want, or
by default of what we're told, or
in basic reaction to what others want.
This is my work.
I do this work for myself, every day.
I help others do this work for themselves.
In order to have more integrity in my work with others and with myself,
I need to integrate all of my parts
into all of the sections of my life.
I need to be truly honest.
So,
family, friends,
all my Mormon friends who don't really talk to me anymore
but follow me on socials,
all the girls who I grew up with
(no, I didn't have a crush on all of you!)
THIS IS ME.