I am still a zealous convert to the Church of Our Lady of Decluttering. I love the feeling of lightness after discarding useless kitchen gadgets (RIP electric mango peeler) and hideous articles of clothing that I’d like to think I bought while under the influence of psychedelic drugs (nope, I just had reeallly bad taste). And I almost never regret getting rid of things.

Except when it comes to my writing.

Some pieces are easy to hang onto. The screenplays I think are worth a damn and may someday get made. The pretty poetry that I wrote as a child. College essays that still make me smile with their snarky humor and tendency toward clunky overstatements.

But there are also the messy, raw, who-the-hell-wrote-this-sh*t pages that make my stomach drop.

The parts of me that I don’t think are fit for public consumption. Musings on thoughts, feelings and situations that I don’t want to own or acknowledge because they scare or sadden me. Or maybe both.

When I was in my mid-20s and still living in Southern California, I found myself in the midst of the perfect storm. My brother was hospitalized with viral encephalitis and not expected to survive. My mother flew out right away, and almost immediately began suffering what we thought was gallbladder-related pain. She was admitted to the same hospital as my brother and ultimately diagnosed with bone marrow cancer. Mom began chemotherapy and I moved out of my studio and into a small condo that we would share for the next year and a half while she went through treatment.

I was also starting a brand-new relationship (with the man who is now my husband). While I was happy and excited, this love brought its own set of stressors to the mix.

I tried to hold all the facets of my life together, but was wildly unsuccessful. I couldn’t eat, sleep or focus on anything to a reasonable degree. The pressure of my tightly coiled anxiety was relieved only by periodic bouts of crying that rapidly became more incapacitating than cleansing.

Because I was living with my mother, it was impossible to hide my behavior from her. She worried about me, and I kept telling her I was fine. Thankfully, she ignored my protests and got a reference for a therapist from her best friend. At her insistence, I made an appointment to see this woman. And she changed my life.

What I thought was going to be a session or two to help me cope with caring for two sick family members turned into a relationship that lasted nearly three years. My therapist was a professional through and through, but she was also one of the most compassionate and generous people I’ve ever met. Instead of just having me sit in her office for 50 minutes and then signing off until next time, she encouraged me to write out whatever I was dealing with and drop it off at her office so she could read it before our next session (this was before email was in full-swing). I always felt better having gotten things out of my head and down on paper, knowing we would hash them out later.

Eventually, I stopped seeing her for therapy, but we remained friends. And after Paul and I moved to Arizona, she sent me a beautiful crystal butterfly to symbolize how far I had come (I still have it on my dresser to this day). But she also sent me something else.

A box full of the letters I had written to her during our work together.

I was awed by the sheer volume of pages that I’d turned out. Line after line of angst over things both important (“I’m afraid my mom is going to die.”) and inane (“I wrote Paul a poem. He must think I’m a total cheeseball idiot.”). I read through it all, and while amazed by some of it, I was mostly horrified by what I perceived as missives written by a needy, terrified, broken lunatic who brought obsessive-compulsive thought to a whole new level.

I kept the docs for a while, but then worry took over. What if someone found them? What if I died and this pile of craziness was how I was remembered? So, I waited until Paul wasn’t home one day and I shredded the whole batch. And I felt relief…at the time.

But now, I so wish I had those letters back.

I could tell you that I want to see them again to generate writing ideas. Use the situations I’d been through for story fodder. Glean emotional insights for character development.

But the truth is, I want to see a glimpse of my old self again. To tell her that she was stronger than she gave herself credit for. That real feelings aren’t something to be mortified by, but rather to marvel at.

Today, I could look at the young woman who wrote those pages with compassion and love instead of judgment and disgust. I would congratulate her on a journey from being the girl who would analyze the nuances of a casual phone conversation for six days straight to someone who rarely loses sleep over the multitude of questionable blurts that tumble out of her mouth on a daily basis.

But those physical remnants of her are gone. So, there is only one thing left to throw away.

My regrets.

I wasn’t ready to accept my imperfection back then. But now – thank God – I embrace it. Though I’m not saying that’s always easy (my inner critic is still alive, well and mouthy AF). But the only alternative is to hide from the world until I can tick all the boxes on some sort of mythical Fabulosity Checklist.

And I don’t have that kind of time or patience.

I hope you don’t either.

Your gifts reside in your brilliance, but also in your brokenness. Love them equally. Let the world see both.

And don’t leave us hanging. We need what you’ve got. 

And while I am exceedingly grateful for the life I live, I gotta be honest: this is the emotional limbo I’ve been in for the past few weeks. I had imperceptibly slid down the proverbial rabbit hole of thinking that just maybe I could be okay with less than I’d dreamed of.  I mean, life is about compromise, right? Even Mick Jagger said, “You can’t always get what you want.”

But because God has a sense of humor (and I have satellite radio with a Broadway channel), I was given a much-needed moment of enlightenment via a flying witch with a five-octave range.

My favorite musical is Wicked, the prequel to The Wizard of Oz that tells the story of Elphaba, the nice girl who turned into the Wicked Witch of the West when society couldn’t accept her for the unique being that she was. I love the idea that she unapologetically flew (literally) in the face of what was considered appropriate.

After a particularly uninspired morning of slogging away at writing something that felt like a cross between a term paper and a tech manual, I decided I needed a trip to the Holy Land (aka Starbucks).  I got in the car, turned on the radio, and the first thing I heard was my favorite emerald-skinned rebel singing these words:

Something has changed within me,
something is not the same.
I’m through with playing by the rules
of someone else’s game…

Touché.

As I listened, I realized that a huge part of my problem was that something had changed inside of me, but I was still behaving outwardly as if nothing was any different.

I had been actively embracing the truth that you can truly be, do or have ANYTHING in this lifetime that you desire. And for me, that included accepting the fact that I am a passionate multipotentialite, with interests ranging from creating healing essential oil blends to filmmaking (with about 14 things in between those two).

But somehow my hard-wiring for “be/do/have it ALL” had short circuited into “be/do/have what seems reasonable.”

Conflict much?

But I realized that feeling this nagging unrest was actually a blessing. If I was numb to the fact that I was so off-kilter, I’d continue cantering along like a one (or two) trick pony and completely miss my destiny.

And apparently the wicked one agreed with this assessment, because the next gem she belted out was this:

Too late for second-guessing,
too late to go back to sleep,
It’s time to trust my instincts,
close my eyes and leap…

I had been second, third and fourth-guessing myself right out of the person I was meant to be. Just because I saw people around me choosing one thing and dutifully staying in their lanes, there was no reason I had to go along lockstep with that program. My soul knew this, but my human brain was hitting back with the one-two punch of fear and resistance.  So, I decided to follow the next musical directive:

It’s time to try defying gravity…

We aren’t taught that defiance is healthy. That it’s part of our built-in spiritual protection mechanism to keep us on course with the purpose we were given when we first donned our earth suits. Sure, guidance and advice can be helpful…and even life-saving at times. But ultimately, we are the only ones who can read the blueprint that lives in our divine DNA.

We alone create our futures. Why is that message so hard for us to receive? Because it’s easier to say “I can’t because…(fill in the blank with the person/thing/circumstance that supposedly holds you back).” And it’s often daunting to realize that we may disappoint people because we aren’t doing what they want us to.

But what are we so scared of? Why do we believe that someone not liking us or declaring our chosen path to be stupid or sacrilegious is going to be the very death of our souls? In fact, it’s the opposite. Choosing to follow our own light is what gives us freedom, and inspires others to pursue it, as well.

And no matter who or what we lose along the way, nothing can ever replace the God-given desire to be exactly who we were created to be. Nothing more, nothing less.

Dare to defy the doubts – your own, and those of others – and nothing can keep you down.

Maybe not even gravity.

Our recently completed move to Cleveland, Ohio had me in that exact space. And quite frankly, still has me there on more days than I care to admit.

When we made the decision to move, I knew logically that there were a lot of wonderful things to look forward to. My husband Paul’s great new career opportunity. Living on Lake Erie. Being closer to my Midwestern and eastern friends and family. But there was still the deep sadness of leaving a life of 20 years that we built in our beloved adopted hometown of Scottsdale, Arizona.

And I allowed that – along with the overwhelm of all that had to be done to get us from the desert to the tundra in the middle of winter – to paralyze me for a good portion of every day.

Instead of using the experience for writing fodder, I would sit down at my laptop and immediately have an anxiety attack over all the things I should be doing instead. Like packing boxes. Arranging for utilities. Or making sixteen trips to the vet to discuss how to keep our three cats safely medicated so they were calm during our travels (and didn’t “serenade” our fellow cabin passengers for four hours straight during our transport flight).

But eventually, everything got done. All our stuff arrived. The lights were on. We didn’t get banned from Southwest for having the loudest felines in airline history. (Actually, the three-year old screaming about his malfunctioning iPad six rows up would have drowned out even their most robust vocal stylings.)

The bottom line is, if I had opted for the “one bite at a time” approach, I could’ve made the whole moving escapade much easier on myself. But that didn’t happen. So, all I can do now is try to apply a more sane methodology to the process of settling in.

Slowly.

I won’t make a bunch of new friends overnight. But I can get out of the house every day and try to make contact with at least one other human being. Even if it’s just a “hello”…it’s a start.

I won’t instantaneously know where everything is in a new city. Granted, my sense of direction is the stuff of legend (not in a good way), but damn it…I found a place to get my hair done without accidentally ending up in a neighboring state.

Our house will not be vying for the cover of Architectural Digest any time soon. We love the place; however, like any house, you’ve got to make certain adjustments so it feels like your home. For example, replacing valances that have trumpet playing monkeys on them:

Or re-doing what we have dubbed the “Little Mermaid” bathroom:

I think the shelves are supposed to be seashells. But it looks more like a giant crustacean that is trying to burst through the walls and kill you while you’re bathing.

But these things are minor. And it’s okay if we chip away at the fixes, rather than doing an extreme makeover in one fell swoop.

I’m not one for New Year’s resolutions. But whether you choose to make them or not, it’s worth considering approaching 2019 – and all that you want to accomplish within it – with a more relaxed feel. The book you’ve always wanted to write starts with one sentence. A series of small successes at work can morph into the coveted promotion. Fitness happens (literally) one step at a time.

Be kind to yourself. Take credit for every advance, not just the major milestones. Tiny triumphs will lead to bigger blessings than you can imagine.

I am not trying to be flip about the importance of self care. Common sense dictates that bodies are made for movement more strenuous than captaining the remote control, and patterning your eating habits after “Super Size Me” is probably not a bright idea. But neither is living in a constant state of freaking out over every bite you put in your mouth. And the anxiety induced by trying to keep up with the constant flip flop of health information is often times worse than just uttering a defiant expletive and diving face first into a vat of Ben and Jerry’s Chocolate Therapy ice cream.

Having lived long enough to see nearly every popular food regimen go in and out of fashion at least twice, I have come to the conclusion that the only thing that the warring factions of the Great Diet Empire agree on is that fruits and vegetables are good for you.  Everything else is up for some all-too-heated debate: Red meat will kill you. Red meat is an important source of iron. Bread is the carbohydrate Antichrist.  Bread is good, as long as it’s whole grain.  Drink wine.  Don’t drink wine…and on and on. About the sanest “diet” advice I’ve ever read is from Krisha Young, a self-described “perfectly imperfect nutritionist.”

And what might her sage wisdom be?

F**k Dieting.

My sincere apologies if the language offends you. But whether or not you approve of periodic usage of the f-bomb, I think the sentiment is worth exploring.

Think of Kirstie Alley and Valerie Bertinelli jumping on the Jenny Craig bandwagon a few years back. Both of them starved down to bikinis: Val on the cover of People and Kirstie prancing around on some talk show. And as of this writing, they’re both back where they were pre-diet. I’m not making fun of them. My heart actually aches for them (and others in their same boat), because they will never get where they want to be by staying on the crazy train of calorie restriction, counting “points” or eating pre-packaged, overpriced diet meals.  And living in a constant state of self-deprivation sucks, period.

But it’s easy to see why the weight loss gurus aren’t in any hurry to encourage their devoted flocks of diet lemmings to think for themselves when it comes to health and nutrition. Americans spend billions of dollars every year trying to get thin and stay that way. So, there is virtually zero chance that the reigning diet czars are going to step down from their incredibly well financed thrones.

But imagine the societal impact of everyone getting out of the Zone, sailing away from South Beach and just eating whatever they like, in quantities that aren’t measured in metric tons. No new diet book hitting the stands every month. No more pseudo-miraculous “fat burning” pills that incinerate dollars faster than they do adipose tissue. No more condescending infomercials hosted by Z-list soap stars insisting that you desperately need all of the aforementioned items if you ever hope to see your abdominal muscles again.

Our entire economy would probably collapse in about fifteen minutes should the diet industry ever shut down completely. But nationwide financial ruin just might be worth it if I never have to hear another vegan vs. paleo debate ever again.