“Do not fear failure, but be terrified of giving up”. – Unknown

She had been in her nice life long enough to get comfortable, and that was what made it dangerous. Her whole life she has done what she was “supposed to” because she thought what she dreamed of, was too far out of reach. So, she became comfortable. Day to day, day in and day out, same old, same old. For years.

And then she got sick. Like really, really sick. When the light bulb went on, it exploded! Within a few years she left her job, left her loveless “like living with my brother” marriage, and essentially walked out of what had become her life.

For the first few months, she cried a lot. Change is hard, even when the Universe sends you crystal clear signals that it’s time to move. In time, she found her feet, and her purpose, and what gave her joy. And then she went out and lived it.

So often we know our truth. We feel the deep ache inside of what “could be” if only we had the courage to try. But we get comfortable. We get a job, a spouse, have some kids, buy a house, and suddenly, we surrender the dream and go to sleep inside. Until something wakes us up; maybe it’s illness, maybe it’s the loss of a loved one. For me, it was a divorce. But something comes along and knocks us for a loop and says “wake up!”

Courage is still important, and often hard to come by. It’s easy to get into our head and let our fear mind, the same mind that told us we couldn’t go after our dreams in the first place, and convince us it’s still not ok to go for it. Despite all the feelings of desire inside, we still have to justify our dreams, or validate to others why they make sense and are achievable.

Courage does not imply there is no fear, courage says, “do it anyway, even if you’re afraid”. That’s why it’s called courage, because adversity is a passenger in its car. Courage is that part of all of us that dares to say yes when other people and parts of ourselves, say “you can’t do that”.

Yes, you can!

I beg you – don’t wait for some crazy life changing event in order to go out and give your dreams a run. Here’s the deal, try it. Just try it! Maybe it will work and be amazing! Maybe you’ll work it a bit and then decide that was fun and choose something else. Whatever happens, you will be changed forever! Once you push the boundary of what you can do, you can dream and you can give life to your dreams, and you will always push for more. There will be more dreams, more possibilities, more options, more Life! Once you muster up your courage and take it for a spin, you will never go back to being the same person again. You will know your fear more closely, you will know your courage more intimately, and you will know your inner faith more deeply, than ever.

Here’s the deal. My client passed away. Sad, yes. But she left this plane of existence knowing she had given to her dreams a life that they had never had before. She gave them life, and they returned life to her. She became a source of beauty and grace for everyone who came to know her. Most never knew her previous life. They only knew this beautiful woman who was giving, and generous, kind, funny, smart, and a million other incredible traits. It wasn’t that her dreams made her millions of dollars, or famous or anything that most people would think was worth everything she walked away from. All her dreams made her happy. The happiness was super contagious, and it spread to everyone who knew her.

She gave up everything that was nothing to her. To find the happiness that was everything to her.

And so, she truly lived.

Forever the journey,
Anne
In memory of J.B.