The Hometown That Held You

You know two things about the place you were raised, you love it.. and you hate it.

You hate the trapped feeling it gave you in your teenage years, like you’d never get out, like you’d be shackled to this place forever. You hate how the people here seem like they never change, like they never grow. You hate watching everyone who got out live a new life in a new place when you’re still here, waiting on someday.

You love the security of your comfortable patterns here. You love the feeling of knowing all the back roads and where to get the best burgers. You love that your friends are only ever 20 minutes away from you and you love that you always know what to expect from the people that live here.

Someday comes.

Here you are, not shackled anymore but the truth is, you’re still tied. Tied to this place by heart strings and memories. This is the place that made you from scratch. The place that built you up, and in some cases tore you down. Be grateful. Grateful for those tear downs, because without them how else would you have learned to build?

We think we hate the home that held us, the easy breezy back yards we’ve played in since we could walk. You think you want new back roads and Sheetz instead of Wawa.

As you move on you’ll miss your once too small town. You’ll miss the people who reapted the same jokes. You’ll miss being able to go anywhere and see someone you knew.

Once someday comes, yesterday is gone. Tomorrow takes your breath away as you build a new life in a new place, but it doesn’t have the warmth of home… not yet. It doesn’t hold you when you cry anymore, it expects you to get up dust yourself off and get on with it.

All the love you have in the place you left will pull you through. You’ll know it’s possible to build here because you were taught how to do this before. Don’t let missing those comfortable patterns trick you into turning around. Stick it out through the days that are tough on your heart, be grateful it’s still beating. Be grateful it can feel something, even if that something is pain.

You will go into the next phase of your life unaware of what it will bring. Newness might go easy on you, it may sweep you away in a feel good feeling. It may be hard on your heart, the change it brings may unsettle your soul. Either way the good will always loop back around to pick you up.

Someday is here, it’s always here. Someday you’re going to get where you’re going, and you’re going to go where you’ve been.

Just remember that in all this coming and going, home is where the grateful heart is.

xS

The Strength of the Sunflowers

To my saddened town, my hurting friends, and those in the shadows,

Losing someone to suicide cuts deep. It’s a jagged knife through a soft heart, undeserving and overwhelming. I know you’re bleeding out.

Everything changes now. You count out too many plates at dinner and then you lose your appetite because who can eat after this? You hear the door handle twist open and you picture their face, tears well up in your eyes when it’s not them. Graduation comes, and all their friends put on their caps, they walk single file towards their future, a future without their friend.

The days turn into weeks the weeks turn into months and you get further and further from the last time you saw them.

But here’s what happens, you never forget them. Their voice will ring in your head in all the right moments. Their laugh will echo in your dreams. Their name will be on a street sign as you drive through a town you’ve never been to. Their life will go on, through yours.

Look for them, they’re always around. Their picture falls in the hall as you pass by. Their dream car pulls up beside you at the stoplight. The song they sang till their lungs filled with laughter comes on the radio as you drive by their little league field.

You’ll feel them when their spirit stops by, keep your eyes open let it hurt, change, and heal you. You won’t want to miss any of it. They’re not gone. They’ll never be gone. Not as long as they have you.

And to you, the one who’s feeling like it’s too hard, like this life isn’t worth the struggle.

It is.

They say it all the time, things won’t always be like this. It’s true. The anxiety you feel about the future is tricking you into thinking you won’t make it, you will. The fear you have about asking for help is tricking you into thinking nobody cares. We do. The hate you have for your life is tricking you into thinking it would be better to just give up. It won’t.

You need to have hope. I hope you find the strength to stay. Not for your parents, not for your friends, for you. The you that will rock someone’s world. The you that will grow up change and build a life. The you that will bring something valuable to the table. The you that will make someone’s heart feel whole. The you that won’t always feel this way.

I know you’ll find love that fills you from the tips of your toes to the top of your head. I know you’ll fall into friendships that will pump your heart with so much love, that it will feel like it’s bursting in your chest. I know you’ll be happy in a life you built from a struggle you survived.

I hope you can be someone for someone.

I hope you can hold steady through the storm.

I hope this life goes easy on you, and I hope when it doesn’t that you can find strength in the sunflowers.

All my love, S

Good Bones

Building a life is hard work. There are missteps, miscalculations, and misunderstandings. Issues will arise for the entirety of your life, but it’s how you build that life that shows if you’ll withstand all the winds that are bound to blow. The key to construction is to have good blue prints, a good crew, and good bones…like a house.

Start with a strong foundation. Self-love is like concrete, sturdy and buildable. It sets the stage for all that comes after and is the deciding factor on whether you build your life for you or make your life a cookie cutter for someone else. Everything you build, with self-love as your backbone, is made to last. It makes room for improvement and if your foundation cracks, you have the tools to fix it. So, before you jump into this life take a moment to reflect on what you want it to look like. Make detailed blueprints and always have a backup plan backed by self-love.

Build yourself up from there, a house is steady when it has good studs. Surround yourself with people who will stand tall and strong when the wind blows. The structure may sway but that’s the leeway you need to bounce back.

The walls are your boundaries, don’t let hate or hurt cross them, and be mindful of the people you let past them. Some will love you deeply, others will scar your heart. And like the holes you make in the drywall when you’re spiraling out of control, scars can be hard to mend. Save yourself the hardship and only let the love in.

Make the guest room a place for your troubles, because they can’t stay forever and decorate with passion. Add rich colors that hold your head when you’ve had a long day. Decorate your life with texture and excitement. I hope you re-paint every once in a while, when you feel you need a change, and you never let your life get boring.

Your house like your life, should be built with room to grow. It can change, and it can adapt, don’t be afraid to make additions and add rooms.

Your life can be big and boisterous, it can take up space like a mansion in the hills. Or, it can be small and quiet, it can make room like a rancher on a dead-end street.

Whatever you want your life to look like, be sure to build it with good bones. A house with good bones won’t fall, and neither will you.

xS

The Friends You Make Here

When I went off to college I was devastated. I had built a life in my hometown where I knew everyone, and everyone knew me. I was safe in my routine. The world told me how great college would be and for the first few weeks I didn’t believe it. Now that I have settled in, I realize why people look back on their own experiences so fondly. They say you meet your best friends here, and I couldn’t agree more.

I got lucky, I found mine early, and this week I had to leave them. Leaving for the summer is so bittersweet. On one hand, I am happy I get to go home and see my family, start working again, and have my dog around all the time. On the other hand, I know I am going to desperately miss the people who have taken up most of the space in my life for the last nine months.

What makes college friendships so wonderful is that you spend your time with people for no other reason than your connection. The friends you make here you make because you have something in common and you completely enjoy their presence. You don’t have to keep up appearances like you did in high school, out of the fear that your parents will invite your friends’ parents to the back yard cook out. You don’t have to play nice with everyone just because you live next door to their grandma.

My home circle is tight, and I adore the kids I spent most of my life with, but there is a certain experience you get when you go away to college alone. The friends I made here were handpicked, by me, and I like to think I did fantastic job. It’s a refreshing change to have friends that I didn’t grow up with. Friends that don’t live next door to my grandma.

The people you meet in college change your perspective on life. My friends here are different from me in many ways. They have different stories. They grew up in different places. They love different music. They do different things. Thanks to all the ways they are different from me, I am able to grow in ways I couldn’t have at home.

I came into college nervous that nobody would ever be able to hold a candle to my childhood friendships. Boy was I wrong. My friends here have warm hearts and kind souls, they have made me a nicer person. They filed down my rigid edges and made me see the world in a brighter light. They love me purely, for who I am, and nothing else. They chose me like I chose them, because they saw something in me they liked.

In a school of fifteen thousand kids it’s easy to decide who is and who isn’t on your level. You can pick out people you connect with pretty easily and distance yourselves from those you don’t. We may all be together on the same campus for a few years, but college gives a lot more room for personal space than high school. We make time for each other here. Here you have to make the effort, you have to call people and tell them you want to see them. You don’t have the option of seeing them in homeroom, you can’t put off plans till eighth period. Everyone here is busy beginning their lives, you’ll know for sure who wants you in theirs.

So, if I have anything important to say it’s this, when you get a chance to run take it. Don’t tie yourself down to old routines and easy friendships. Put yourself out there and be a little uncomfortable for a while. The change you will see in yourself you will pay forward to the world. I hope you find people willing to love you for exactly who you are. I hope you find people you have on spot connections with. I hope you find people that teach you and help you grow. I hope you find people like mine. It may not have been the easiest road to take, but it’s the road I’m most grateful for traveling. I never expected to have friendships that were so pure and so real. I never expected to find my people, but here I am, full of love for my friends and the place that brought us together.

You’ll know when you find your people, because sometimes new acquaintances feel like old friends, hold onto them.

xS

 

 

 

The Protection of Peace

It took me almost 20 years to create a space for myself in this world. I was chained to a bleeding heart and a need to have a tidy little life. I was unable to use the word No and I made sure I reacted to EVERYTHING.

For me, I felt that not reacting to things would leave loose ends in my life. I thought people needed to see and hear how I felt for them to get me. The truth is, they don’t need to get me…or know me. Now, as things get messier and people’s true colors are displayed on the canvas of life, I’ve come to realize not everyone deserves a reaction. Not every situation needs an attached feeling. Sometimes things just are what they are, and they can’t be changed.

I’m a HUGE believer in the concept of karma. The idea that what you put into the world is often what you get out of it is so appealing because, it means that regardless of the turmoil around you, if you create peace you will receive it. You don’t have to make every feeling known and you don’t have to explain yourself to everyone. Some pictures are better left unpainted.

Sometimes, we get stuck in situations that don’t reflect our own karma, and this, is because the universe is testing you. We can’t control the things that happen to us, or the things people say to us, but we can control our reaction to it. Your karma comes from how you react to situations. Do you scream and yell? Or do you create a solution? That solution can be anything from resolving a situation, to just straight up blocking someone from all aspects of your life. When a person finds a way to infiltrate your peace, it’s your job to suppress their influence.

I reacted to situations in ways that made me nasty. So, I stopped reacting. I channeled that energy into laughing with my friends and telling someone I love them. Sometimes in your most negative moments you just have to completely change your focus. Drop the entire situation, text your friend that you appreciate them, take any opportunity you have to erase a bad feeling and fill it with kindness. Maybe not kindness toward a person or situation that bothers you, but kindness toward something. Take that energy that you would have put into the world in bad taste and reverse the whole idea. Drop the black paint and pick up yellow. Start painting your life with love, in bright colors.

You never need to defend your existence to anyone, especially those who aren’t even capable of stabilizing their own. People will do their best to step into your life and make space for themselves. They’ll take up room in your thoughts and will fight to make sure you hear them in the moments where they couldn’t be more wrong. Looking out for your own peace will make it possible for others to understand how they’re disturbing their own, by trying to uproot yours.

My life has tested me in the most extreme ways and because of that, there are so many negative things that can’t reach me. I’ve found that lately my peace is almost untouchable. I know who I am. I am a fierce friend, and an even fiercer opponent. My heart is soft but selective. My circle is small but strong. And thanks to these qualities, my peace is safe and sound.

I made my life my art and painted yellow with a wide brush over everything. I’ve learned not everyone deserves to be a part of your picture, in any form. Not in darkness and not in light. You can exist on your own wavelength while they exist on theirs. Parallel lines that never touch.

Make your peace your prerogative. Take control of your canvas. And paint your life in colors that complement each other.

xS

No Map Necessary

In the age of social media, it’s far too easy to get caught up in what everyone else is doing. It makes it effortless to trace the steps of others in the hopes of achieving the same success. I’m here to say, that’s not how it works.

Life is a series of twists and turns, of ups and downs. We don’t all move the same, so all our paths are different and difficult in their own way.

We often get stuck in the mindset that we have to conform to society’s timeline, and we forget that we don’t actually exist in a straight line. The world claims that to be an acceptable member of society you need to have a specific track record. The major stops on the road to success are listed in a time order and if you do it any other way, or not at all, somehow, you’re wrong.

Go from high school to college have several internships while you’re there along with a paying job. After graduating, get a job while getting your masters, then engaged, then married. Kids who play t-ball, ballet, or soccer. Grandkids. It’s so hard to time these things just right, and that’s because society is just setting you up for failure. How do you know you will fall in love enough to get married in your twenties? What if you don’t want kids? Can you go back to school as a working mom?

The short answer is, life isn’t a strategized race to an end point. The long answer is that people have probably whispered to their friends about how you must have made a bad choice along the way to be moving this slow on the timeline, or not be on the right track at all. The truth is, if we all do it the same, our success loses its value. If we are all equally successful in the same way, we are all equally boring.

Some people could benefit from a gap year between high school and college, you don’t have to have it all planned out at eighteen. Almost everyone I know is in massive debt and half of them have no idea what they want their life to look like. Some of us are just in college because our whole childhood we were taught that this is where we we are supposed to be at this point in our lives. They said that if we didn’t do it now we would never get it done, as if it was a life requirement. You cannot pass go and collect two-hundred if you don’t pick a university right now!

The world is down our throats about our future, our plans. How do we respond when we hardly have a clue?

I know people who went to trade school, had kids, and own a home now. They didn’t get stuck in a rut because someone told them they’d never amount to anything without a college degree. Other people went on to have pet kids that they send to doggie day care while they go to community college and save up. Some moved across the country and interned for amazing companies or hiked mountains for a few months. Some are couch surfing while they figure it all out.

The truth is, we have time. Everyone thinks by twenty-one that you should have already made huge successful steps toward a future that you have made up your mind on. You don’t. As people, we are in a constant state of change and growth. What is right for one person at this time could be catastrophic for another.

What I’m getting at is that it’s okay if your life doesn’t look like everyone else’s, now or ever. We are all learning and deciding for ourselves what sparks our joy.

So, when you’re deciding on life’s next steps, small or large, don’t use the map. Pick a path that looks interesting to you, or don’t follow a path at all. Your existence should be completely unique and built by no one but you.

Choose your own battles, climb your own mountains, and of course…pick your own sunflowers.

xS

The Here and Now

Most of us exist in a fast paced world, and if you think you don’t, I hope you’re right. The rat race tends to get the best of us even on our good days. We hardly ever take the chance to sit on our porch and breathe in the day, because we spend so much time preparing for tomorrow. This life has taught us that if you’re not working or moving, you’re not living…you’re not taking the right advantage of the time.

I came across a quote this week that explained this need humans have to always be looking toward the future, and worrying about the next step they need to take in building their lives…

“Most humans are never fully present in the now, because unconsciously they believe that the next moment must be more important than this one. But then you miss your whole life, which is never not now.” – Eckhart Tolle

In a world where the next thing is the best thing, and enough is never enough, can we find peace?

Yes.

It takes a while to understand that you only completely exist at one point in time, right now. Yesterday you were your past self, tomorrow you are your future self, but today you’re you.

If we accept that we fully exist in this moment, emotionally, physically, and spiritually, we can actually experience life in real-time rather than experience it in a serious of past memories and future dreams.

Laugh about it now…and later….but definitely now.

Today you can be everything you weren’t yesterday and everything you want to be tomorrow. All it takes is a change in perspective. There are so many past moments that we get hung up on, and so many future moments that we anticipate. Yesterday you were excited for today, so enjoy it…you don’t always have to be thinking about tomorrow.

We are so busy  filling our calendars that we forget to enjoy where we are. Sometimes it’s nice to just relax and watch the wind blow by. Be sure to stop and smell the sunflowers, wake up one day without a “to do” list. Go with the flow once in a while.

Obviously, you’ll never move forward if you never think ahead but, think about now too. Enjoy the goals you’ve accomplished, and the pursuit of new ones. Take in every moment of your life while you’re living it. Life is so beautiful it’s worth looking back on and remembering but, be sure to live in those moments while you’re in them.

Try not to tarnish what will soon be the past with the plans of the future. Don’t mix up time and life, you’ve got a whole lot of life… just not a whole lot of time. You won’t be able to remember it all, and you certainly won’t be able to prepare for it all…the only thing you can do is live it all. Make sure you embrace and enjoy right now, because it will join the memories of yesterday all too soon.

Never forget to cherish the journey, it’s just as important as the destination.

xS

Friendships With the Half-Hearted

When people leave our lives, it can hurt. Some people leave and it’s a quick burn, like grabbing onto a frying pan when it’s still too hot. Others leave an ache in your heart that is lasting and constant. In all of these departures, friendly and unfriendly, there is always disappointment.

We are always striving to do more, to be more, and to give more. But, we hardly ever hold our friends accountable for letting us down. We often forget to examine our friendships in the same way we examine what kind of friend we are. Are the people in our lives meeting the same standards we have for ourselves?

We hold onto people because of our history with them or because we feel like we need to take care of them. We hope that there will come a time when the friendship is no longer half-hearted or that they listen to understand and not to respond. Sometimes, it just can’t get there.

With these one-sided friendships there comes a point where you have to let go of people who were never holding onto you. When they decide that their time and attention would be better spent elsewhere don’t take it as an insult, take it as a chance to widen your circle and replace the energy.

Our view gets clouded by people who are only in our lives for their own benefit, it makes it hard to keep up with other friendships when you don’t see what the rest of the world sees. In your own time, you will master the art of weeding out the dead flowers. There’s no sense in wasting water on them.

There is a teaching in buddhism about how an evil friend is worse than a wild beast, “wild beasts wound your body, but an evil friend will wound your mind”. Having  even one draining friendship only holds you back from finding people who will last in your life. People who will give as much as they get. People who will never take advantage of you or your story. People who will build with you, not just because of you.

I struggled for a long time before I understood that there can be good in goodbyes. I took every failed friendship like a shot to the chest when in reality, it was dead weight being lifted. Sometimes it takes a while to realize some people just aren’t for you. Their energy will never match yours and their spirit will never inspire you. That’s okay.

Focus your attention on those that bring you peace, people who you can rely on in your worst moments.  The climate of your life is not fit for all flowers, even the ones you take care of year after year in the hopes that they’ll bud. Surround yourself with friends who never make you feel used, and water relationships that you know will grow.

And as always, make sure there are a few sunflowers in your garden, souls like sunflowers can grow anywhere.

xS

Refocusing

After almost a year hiatus, I’m back.

There’s a lot of truth to the saying, “you can’t pour from an empty pot.” I spent last summer as an empty pot. Not sure where I was headed, what I wanted or, what I needed.  I helped start a club at school, and dropped out of it to work more. I lost the motivation to go to the gym or see my friends. My life was all over the place and I couldn’t manage to keep myself focused on one thing. I was constantly distracted by people and things that were draining me, being pulled in every direction by people who needed this and wanted that. I forgot to step back and take care of my own life.

I emptied my tank picking up everyone else without stopping for gas.

I needed to learn how to gauge people’s ability to accept and reciprocate, or at least appreciate the energy I gave them. Putting that undervalued energy into people, who will not grow because of it, results in nothing but waste.  What I learned was this, it is our choice as to who and what we put our time into, so make it count.

I found one of my biggest stressors and also a major time waster was my social media. For me, it was full of people who I didn’t connect with in the real world, and whose outlook on life didn’t align with mine. The scam of social media is that you never know what’s true and what’s smoke and mirrors. I found myself feeling exhausted by all the drama and the over exaggerations of people lives. You can’t get caught up in comparing yourself with people who hardly exist outside the confines of an algorithm.

I started to limit my time on social media and un-followed pages that didn’t spark joy. Sometimes we forget that even our social media is an energy exchange. Being up till 1am reading people’s thoughts on Twitter or Instagram can be extremely wearing. So, if you’re going to spend hours a day flipping through pages and pages of other peoples lives, make sure their lives make you excited about continuing and bettering your own.

I stopped putting my energy into the wrong things. I was spreading myself thin trying to keep up with the demands of the world when I should have been the one demanding once in a while. So, I quit letting the idea’s of how I should exist write the rules in my life.

I went on this year with a fresh outlook and a no-nonsense attitude. I changed my major instead of learning to love my old one. I managed to score a position on the board of a club at school, and I started using the word no. If something wasn’t going to help me move forward or feel better it was a no go.

Be confident in your ability to know what is best for you, and what you need to do to for you. Focusing your energy on yourself is an important factor in becoming the best person you can be, for yourself and those around you. You can’t pour a cup from an empty pot.

Put good energy into the world, and where it matters.

xS

 

Stuffed Chicken Recipe

In the age of weight loss and meal plans it can be easy to get swept up in ridiculous, and expensive dieting plans. One thing that holds true through all the bullsh*t is that, if you eat good you feel good. If you don’t like to eat good because it doesn’t taste good there’s two things you can do.

For one thing, you can train your taste buds to prefer healthier foods over McDonald’s and brownies. Yes it’s true, if you expose yourself over and over again to carrots you will eventually reach for the carrots not the cookies. Over time, your body will guide you in a healthier direction, you just need to give it the option.

Another thing you can do is, try my stuffed chicken recipe. It tastes good, and it’s a healthy option for dinner. The ingredients are pretty basic, and it’s fairly easy to make.

Ingredients:

• Chicken breast
• Feta Cheese/spinach/roasted red peppers
• Eggs (2 or 3) and breadcrumbs
• Coconut oil

How to:

• Clear off your kitchen counter top (I know its covered in junk mail and coupons like mine) and lay out your ingredients.
• Prepare two bowls, one with bread crumbs and another with two eggs mixed with a bit of milk. (use your judgment, but not the kind you use on Facebook)
• Cut off the fat of the chicken, while doing this have your spinach steaming.
• Mix three equal parts of spinach, feta cheese, and roasted red peppers in a bowl.

3 parts before

3 parts mixed

• Cut down the center of your chicken to make a pocket, and stuff with the mixture.
• Put tooth picks through your chicken to hold the mixture in. (kind of how you hold in your work frustration)
• Cover the chicken in your egg and milk mixture, then breadcrumbs.
• Put the chicken in a pan with a thin layer of coconut oil to fry. Fry each chicken until it begins browning. (like right before you get sunburnt at the beach)

eggs and bread crumbs

quick fry

• After the chicken has browned put it in the oven for a half hour at 375 degrees. Check, with a thermometer, that the temperature of the chicken is 165 degrees before serving.

bake at 375 degrees

finished

This is my all time favorite thing to both eat, and make! Worth the tooth pick hassle.

“I’ll have the chicken breast, hold the chicken” – Michael Scott (The Office)

Put good energy into the world, and put good food in your body.

xS