Welcome to it. Day 30 of 30! The final day. I have enjoyed this series a great deal and I’m a little sad to be packing things up, but it’s time. Really. I definitely got out of my rut. I didn’t see my family much nor get much memoir stuff going but … this final quote below is really such a boom!

To love someone fiercely, to believe in something with your whole heart, to celebrate a fleeting moment in time, to fully engage in a life that doesn’t come with guarantees – these are risks that involve vulnerability and often pain. But, I’m learning that recognizing and leaning into the discomfort of vulnerability teaches us how to live with joy, gratitude and grace.
― Brené Brown, The Gifts of Imperfection: Let Go of Who You Think You’re Supposed to Be and Embrace Who You Are

It’s like sailing. It’s like dancing. It’s like trust: you lean in, you let it take you somewhere, you give up all your fears, for just that gust of wind, for just that song or just that singular moment and it’s as if you could fly.

This quote excites me. It reminds me of those moments when my boys were little and they would run at me with their arms wide open and I’d hunker down in a squat, open my arms wide too and put my weight on the fronts of my feet and they’d come in for a landing and we’d huuuuuuuuug and huuuuuuuuuug so tight! I would press my face to smell their heads and squeeze them tighter.

I don’t know if it was their energy, the wind, the sun, their fearless love that made me fly or my unbridled love for them and the feeling of “everything is SO all right” in that, in those fantastic moments, but whatever it was: I wanted more of it.

This is a level of euphoria that I don’t think people could subsist on constantly because we need to get stuff done, but to me, it is those moments that help me keep going when I get distracted by the transition of not being grateful or feeling the feelings. Showing up, being real, letting it all out and saying, “Here is my emotional spleen!” (that’s the ’emotional pain’ Brown is talking about) and not sweating the repercussions nor worrying about the “oversharing hangover.”

Who knows what will become of our goals and our dreams if we give it all we got and we keep on giving? Most likely success! But we know what will happen if we do nothing: nothing.

It’s in those moments when we share with those we trust and love that we feel safest. When even though we might feel a hint of doubt, as if to wince upon the final syllable or after sharing, we are living. It’s as though we are standing at the precipice of hope, letting the uplift of air, cool and exhilarating or warm and enveloping, as though it were buffeted by the rocks below, that we are in our moments of truth.

“Take me as I am, world! This is all you get!” We shout from the edge, alive with defiance and dreams.

And then we can exhale!

Open one eye, look around.

For we have done it!

Open the other eye!

We have lived. We have risked backlash and we are still standing. We might be alone, but we are no longer afraid.

And that is living.

Welcome to your life. This ain’t no dress rehearsal; this is real. This is it. People are born and people die every day. If you’re struggling with something, lean into it. Grab it by the short hairs and get in the dirt with it. That’s where you will find yourself.

Thank you for joining me on this little Brené Brown journey.

This completes our program. Think about what 2013 has done for you and think about what 2014 can do for you.

Make a vision board, be audacious! Plan one with your kids or your spouse. Make your goals real. I bet you’ve gotten more done in 2013 than you think you did.

Thank you.

Ps. A little reminder of how life is so fleeting: