Welcome to My 1st Ever Blog!

My intention for this blog is to share with you different ways I live my best and most authentic life every single day!

This has been an extremely hard year for me for many reasons.  Some circumstantial and out of my control, some things I’ve been running from for as long as I can remember.  A man I was in a romantic relationship with said to me “I can’t love you until you love yourself” and it sparked something in me I had already known.  I knew I needed to face myself, finally.  So naturally I did what any one of us nowadays does when we have a problem we have the slightest idea of how to tackle, I googled “how to love yourself”  Many things popped up, but then I got to thinking….

My sister went to Sedona a few years ago and had a reading done.  In that reading she asked about me, when I would finally be happy.  The person doing the reading told her “she needs to get out of her own way”  I’ve thought about that almost daily since she told me that and knew it was time I get out of my own way and make myself happy. So the next thing I googled was ‘Love yourself retreat, Sedona Arizona. Sedona Soul Adventures popped up, I sent them an email and went about my life.

Within a day I spoke to an angel guide named Christine and felt an instant connection.  We talked for over 20 minutes and she said she’d get back to me with some ideas of specific therapies that would make up my retreat.  She called me back with a list of about 7 therapies. After explaining all of them individually to me I said “I’m in, I think all of them apply” She was surprised as she thought I’d only pick a few of them but there wasn’t one of them I felt I didn’t need. I happened to have 5 days off of work the following weekend (which I took as a sign) and they were able to coordinate it accordingly (another sign) so I booked it 9 days before leaving. This was great in so many ways.  I didn’t have too much time to think about it or give myself an excuse to back out.  I also could keep the momentum and feelings of excitement I had after talking with Christine.

Sedona was a life changing trip! It was my first solo trip ever.  I’d be faced with eating in restaurants alone and not having anyone to talk to or share this trip with, a first for me.  (I’ve since been on a few more solo trips including Mount Shasta, Peru, and South East Asia)  I was both excited and terrified, but also knew it was time!

I had a spiritual awakening.  I was getting to know my true and most authentic self for the first time maybe ever.  I was able to start the process of healing old wounds I had held onto far too long.  It was a new beginning in my life.  I was 33 years old which everyone kept telling me was very significant.  The number 33 is an awakening to Jesus’ energy they told me. I was raised Catholic, but hadn’t felt any religious connection in years.  I’ve always believed in God, but I was discovering a new way of believing altogether.  *** side note this is not a religious blog, but I do have a very strong spiritual connection and belief which I will most likely touch on.

During an intuitive therapy session (my favorite session of the retreat) Lisa told me a story that changed my life.  She said she went to a workshop where the leader asked everyone to write five things they love to do.  She wrote: Giving, being a mom and a wife, being a friend, gardening and cooking, and being a natural athlete.  The leader asked her, how are you at receiving? I asked myself this same question.  I was raised to be superhuman and give all of yourself but never ask or ‘receive’ anything back.  After Lisa told me this story she asked how it made me feel… I said it was spot on to how I feel and became choked up and very emotional.  This story allowed me to pinpoint exactly what it was about myself I needed to change.  I needed to give myself permission to receive, which allowed me to move into the openness of that.  It has changed my life completely.  I am open to receiving all sorts of things now and will share with you some of the tools I’ve learned along the way in order to do so.  Since realizing this I have received so much more than I ever could have before! In so many fun and different ways!

Many of the things that block us from receiving are tied up in Ego.  The biggest example of this for me at the time was the fact that I was a Pediatric Intensive Care nurse.  My Instagram handle was @nurseamanda20 for gosh sake.  So much of my identity was wrapped up into being a nurse, or a Pediatric Critical Care nurse to be specific, because it made me feel good to say that’s what I did as well as how people looked at me because of it, aka Ego. Peeling back the layers of ego and the things that add to it would be my next step.  Not having this be my identity, but figuring out who I really am, not just what I do. This is where the real work has come in, and I’m still actively working on it now.  I went to Sedona in April of  2017, so it hasn’t been that long.  Since leaving Sedona I started a new job in a new department, moved to a new apartment in a new city, as well as ended the most significant romantic relationship I’ve had yet.  My entire life has changed since I got home from Sedona.  It has been the hardest transition of my life, but I also know it’s been the best one and is shaping me into being my most authentic true self!

I will continue to share with you insight of my journey.  I will not pretend like I have the answers, just share with you things I’ve figured out along the way or am actively trying to figure out. Maybe some of it will help, maybe it won’t, only you will know for yourself.  I am just trying to add to my authentic self by sharing a piece of myself with you.  Stay tuned and thanks for reading!

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