For when I meet my asshole self again.

.......

I look around and see a series of thoughts on endings and beginnings. 

Some speaking of the transition from 2018 into 2019 as the end of a tough year, of relationships, of suffering, of what no longer serves them. The ending, the past as truth.

Others have a lens of a beginning, fresh start, guiding words, resolutions, they see possibility and want to believe in something different coming. The future as truth.

.......

As the year switching digits seems to beckon us towards choosing one or the other, I'm practicing something new.

The idea that I need neither.

There is a 99% chance I will be sleeping as the year moves into the new one.

I'm inside of a new ritual of asking myself what from the past I'd like to bring with me into my next moment. Into my next breath.

Not what do I not want to bring. Not a story. Not a shaming.

Just like if I was packing my bag to go to NC, because I love NC, and I could only bring what I truly knew I loved, what is going in that bag?

Not shopping for something new, not wishing I fit into something I didn't anymore, not dreaming about being a minimalist or feeling bad about a pile of laundry that is sitting there, waiting for something I am making up.

Just what I know I truly love.

I'm not planning on starting a new year with a new word or goal or blaming my past for anything.

I'm going to in this moment claim what I already have, what I already know, what feels like the truest thing that ever was.

Into this I will sink deeper.

Into this I will be grounded before a new year comes.

Into this I already am.

Into this will be my home.

Into this I am safe.

Into this I am pure love.

.......

Into my suitcase, (my soul?), will be kindness, adoration, appreciation, forgiveness and devotion.

Each of these already living in me, me living in them. Stumbling a hell of a lot of the time, but I know them to be the truest things I've ever known.

Kindness has changed my life. There was a little time there when I tried to outrun it, but that was exhausting and self destructive and felt like shit. And so cleverly not kind to run from the thing saving your life.

Adoration is simply, of self. Not sabotaging, not blowing shit up, not claiming some new big thing, not hurting another to soothe my pain. I adore myself. I adore you.

Appreciation of this breath, of the blue sky (or the gray sky), of tears, of a cup of coffee, of my knee in pain, of struggles and of joys. I appreciate you. So damn much.

Forgiveness. Just that. For me this is freedom.

And finally, devotion, sort of like the final layers to a perfect outfit that I know I love. After the leggings and tight tank dress. After the wide leg pants and jean jacket. It is what pulls it all together and makes it me. The chunky belt, the leather necklace and earrings, the rings, the beaded bracelets. The decision to be seen, truly seen, not as a character morphing herself into someone else's story, just truly as herself, myself. That devotion is what breathes life into kindness, and my circle is born. My suitcase is packed.

I'm not going to say fuck you to the past or worship the future in some endless loop of expectation.

I'm going to say I don't know, a lot. I don't know what is next, I only know what is now.

Having clung on to what is next as life support only served to pull me away from the truth of what I know.

And in the truth of what I know, I'm going to admit, I know nothing. 

.......

When my knee got bad I had to stop wearing my cowboy boots, the piece of my identity I could hardly move past. That is who I was. How could I be anything other? I spent hours looking at shoes online to try to find something that could feel like me and allow me to walk.

I found nothing. I was holding so tight to my past self and trying to vision a future shoe that could fix what I didn't want to feel. 

There is no shoe to fix a body whose knees have been taken out.

There is no shoe that will let me feel any way I used to again.

There is only the knee. There is only this step. Or not.

Just as much as devotion can be all the final layers of jewelry and belts and shoes, it also can be taking it all off. Stripping down. Asking what is true right now. Who am I right now? An asshole or a beautiful being? Practiced at both I have evidence on every vision board I've ever made that being an asshole isn't part of my soul's desire. But the beauty? The beauty abounds.

Many years ago I had a photo of a woman sitting at an outside cafe wearing bright blue leggings with moccasin boots on a vision board. I searched the planet over looking for leggings in just that color blue. I couldn't find any, I remember the sense of frustration. Eventually I must have let it go and moved on, falling into the next thing I was obsessed with.

The other day I noticed what I was wearing. Moccasin slippers which are perfectly flat for what my knee seems to need and bright blue leggings, purchased years ago in some online sale. I flashed back to that photo memory hidden somewhere in a file labeled beauty. 

I'm not saying fuck you to the past, only thank you. I'm not going to dream of something that isn't in the future.

I'm just sinking into this, this moment, this feeling, this body where nothing needs fixing or numbing. 

Into this place where nothing needs to be solved.

Into this place where shoes are optional.

Into this beautiful being, forgiving the asshole self, because when we meet again I want her to remember I see her, I appreciate her, I adore her.

What is true right now?

Into this is where I'll be. And from it, everything that lies ahead will be the most beautiful of surprises.

I see you. I appreciate you. I adore you.

And so it is 2018 and 2019. Thank you.