[Emerging].

"Courage is to speak one’s mind by telling all one’s heart.” – Brené Brown

I’ve heard many teachers and gurus say words to the effect that it is through our struggle where we will find peace, that there is a gift in the challenge if we can only find it.

Today I had a conversation (via text, I know, don’t judge) about perseverance and struggle of people and how they deal.  Sometimes life asks a lot more than what you think you have to give, and so far it has demanded me to embrace courage. I wouldn’t have got through these past years without it. I know I’m a strong person but embracing courage has given me a quiet kind of strength to keep going when I don’t think I can, a courage that comes from within, rather than me using the strength of others to pull me through.  I truly believe there is beauty in the struggle, in a way I couldn’t have understood without going through it directly. 

Through it all, I feel like my journey (life+love) is allowing me to uncover more and more gifts in my struggle, like there is a magnificent purpose to it all. 

There is a balance in writing such a personal blog, and I often wonder if I step over that line between sharing what perhaps should be kept private and intimate, and sharing what is personal yet hopefully empowering to others. Yet ultimately I wear my heart on my sleeve, it’s how I’ve always been so here I am digging into my courage and pouring my heart out on this blog. These past ten months have been so up and down emotionally (in an awesome, exciting way), it has been more like taking a ride on a centrifuge than a roller-coaster. I have been through such an extraordinary range of experiences and emotions which don’t fall into a neat little blog post, but I suppose that’s the way life is; at times you feel like you can’t quite catch your breath from the guilt/shame or joy/happiness of it all.

I believe we are far more than our bodies, and when we start to love and embrace every part of ourselves we will start to awaken to our own magnificence and the amazing things we can experience and do with our lives. So when I said that I was starting to see the gift in all my struggles, I truly believe it is a gift. The gift is that I see I am worthy/enough and beautiful just as I am, right now.

Beauty is what happens when we truly embrace, love and accept ourselves; it is not a physical set of criteria, but the shining of your own essence when it is fully realized and embraced. That I can embrace myself with true love and compassion is the best gift I could ask for. There is so much beauty in the struggle; like that of a butterfly which has to go through its own challenges to break free from its cocoon, but it is this struggle that makes it strong enough to fly. We are all beautiful emerging butterflies, and I for one am soaring high.