One of my favorite songs is Into the West by Annie Lennox. The lyrics are, at times, gut-wrenching and most often leave me with tears streaming down my face. It's haunting yet beautiful. I put this song on last Saturday as I aimlessly walked around Encinitas by myself trying to settle on the fact that my Roo was no longer with me.
Read MoreI've come to the conclusion that I am quite lousy at relaxing.
And it's never been more apparent than on this trip.
Even with my deep desire for a life that is simple, I find myself wrestling with my inability to just sit and be and how much I feel the need to do all the time.
But I need life to give me some answers to some things that have been heavy on my mind lately. And I know what I have to do to get those. Even when it means discomfort to get them.
Read MoreLast May, my longtime friend Katie and I almost bought a camper. It was $1500 bucks and had a retro blue strip down the side. It was pretty much a done deal.
We were having a few cocktails at a local bar and a bit tipsy, both literally and figuratively. We were coming down from the high of spending the night in a tiny little cabin in the middle of nowhere Joshua Tree. We spent about eight hours in the car trying to get to this little cabin where we spent a total of fifteen hours there due to a miscalculation of timing and Friday Memorial Day weekend traffic.
Read MoreLately, I’ve been in this interesting emotional place. A lot of stuff from my past has been resurfacing. Stuff I believed, I had long ago put to rest.
It's not that I'm in a dark emotional place, however. It is more like things are coming up so that I can finally shed them and release them.
Lately, I've been waking in the middle of the night, shooting out of bed from a dream of a person from long ago I hadn’t thought of in years and the feelings it brings up linger for days. I know it’s not about the person. The person is just the messenger. It’s about the feelings.
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What I know about beginnings and endings goes a little something like this.
Beginnings are euphoric. They hold a mysterious quality that feels like an opportunity. Anything is possible. Your imagination goes wild and the world is your oyster.
Your heart flutters, you walk a little bit lighter, you smile bigger, your optimism is palpable and it’s as if you could take on the world.
Beginnings are full of life. They make your blood pump and your palms sweaty. You feel unstoppable. You feel, alive.
Endings on the other hand, often feel like a death. For many of us, a deep mourning sets in and we wait and feel and sometimes, we can’t figure out why we feel the way we feel or how we even feel for that matter.
And we even go to great lengths to numb those feelings that start to surface.
The ending, or death, of a relationship, a job, a friendship, a lifelong dream, a hope can impact us all the same.
We must say goodbye to something that once was a beginning. Sometimes it's bittersweet, and other times, it hurts. A lot.
Here is the thing I’m learning about endings; there is an exponential amount of learnings that you can take and bring forth into the new beginning that is right around the corner.
That is not to say that endings are not excruciating and you can't always see or are even ready for that growth. Especially when it involves saying goodbye to someone you loved deeply. I do know from my own experiences, and what I have heard from some people closest to me, that eventually, with time, you start to wade through the fuzzy waters of pain and start to see beginnings again.
It does come, eventually. I promise.
And you can’t have a beginning without some kind of ending and you can’t have an ending without some kind of beginning.
That's just life. It's cyclical. Look at the span of a year and the beginnings and endings that come with each passing season. You not only can see if physically but you can literally feel it within you.
This one little notion has helped me wade through some pretty dark waters. After my divorce, even though it was my decision and felt like an empowered one, I was struck by a grief so thick and so unexpected, at times I could barely scrape myself off the playroom floor which was my temporary bedroom. It was one of the most confusing times of my life and some of the most excruciating pain I've ever been through.
And coming off the year I just had, again I found myself in the depths of so much heaviness and fear, at times I didn't know which way was up and which way was down.
As I felt my way through the darkness, I eventually saw a glimmer of light that gave me hope.
And then, there it was. A beginning...
But I've been wondering lately if putting that much meaning and weight and waiting for beginnings and endings actually create more suffering? Wouldn't life be more peaceful if we learn to find more balance in the in-between places?
It seems to me we are in love with the beginnings and deeply fear endings. When we are so focused on either, or, aren't we missing the beat all together? Aren't we missing what life is truly about...LIVING.
Ask anyone who has lost someone by death or someone who they themselves are dying and they all pretty much say the same thing; I wish I would have lived more in the moment, especially with those I love. I wish I would have held their hand longer, watched more sunsets with them, forgiven sooner, let go of more and held their gaze longer. And I definitely wish I would have said I love you way more.
For me, my current lesson is letting go of expectations that come with new beginnings and not fear unavoidable endings. Because again, life is cyclical. Beginnings and endings will always be apart of all of our lives.
I'm learning, every day, to just live right where I am at. And it is not easy. Believe me when I say this. As someone who struggles with horrible anxiety, I have to remind myself of this so many times throughout the day. "Just sit with this Amanda. Just be here right now, Amanda. Take a big breath Amanda You will be okay Amanda."
I'm learning, slowly, to appreciate every person and experience for what it is teaching me. To trust that whatever is meant to be in my life will be. And not fear those things that feel are coming to an end.
Because... there will always, and forever, be another beginning right around the corner.