The virulent sky passes over me, alive and moving much more quickly than seems possible.
I stand in the dimming evening light, the wind blows around me. I am beautiful. I am brilliant and joyous and feel much like that evening sky. Life is changing and folding into itself and reshaping much too fast.
A year ago, at 41, I remember thinking that life was halfway over and I had missed it, that my chances were gone. And as I followed that path of personal disappointment, I landed on one image, a pen.
You see, I didn’t need a degree or a job or a rocket ship for my dream. All I needed was a pen and paper. That’s all that I needed, and I didn’t do it. I hadn’t done it. And I didn’t know how to fix that. Forty-one years of not writing (unless under so much sorrow, or duress so unbearable, that if you read what I wrote at those times, your toes would curl).
Somehow, armed just with the shock and despair of hating the life I had created, it started to literally unravel around me. And I just stood there, tossed like the wind, steadfast in my resolve to create a different experience for the second half.
I started writing again, and before I could even completely figure out what I would do or how I would do it, I had three clients. And the whirlwind had begun.
All I ever wanted to do was write. And so now I am writing. And having discovered that anything is possible if you want it badly enough, I started looking at a whole lot of other things that I was too afraid to begin (or finish). I had no idea how to get from here to there, but I was excited to try.
And around that time, I started reading a monthly ezine from Laura Fenamore. She talked about why we DON’T claim the bodies we deserve. She talked a lot about losing weight forever. (Like half of our population, I had lost and regained at least the size of a small family.)
And as things continued to unravel exactly as they should when we stay out of their way, Laura became my mentor. She is literally a Body Image Mastery Mentor, but I think she’s a lot more than that.
I feel like Laura has the signposts to where I’m trying to go. Sometimes she’s just got an arrow (pointing into some bad neighborhoods, like unresolved relationships and pockets of avoidance and denial that must be crossed). Other times, she will stand quietly and hold up a sign that says, “Caution.” There are a load of signs in Laura’s bag of tricks: Too Fast and Too Slow, Do Not Back Up, and Rest Area up Ahead.
Everyone needs this in their lives, an objective mentor to remind them that the road ahead may be less traveled, but it isn’t an unmarked path through chaos. There are roadblocks and there are building blocks, but every step is one step closer to accepting the phenomenal woman that I suspect I may have been all along.
If you need some help building bridges and finding your way, you can call Laura Fenamore at 415-464-1234. www.LauraFenamore.com
Mary Agnes Antonopoulos
I stand in the dimming evening light, the wind blows around me. I am beautiful. I am brilliant and joyous and feel much like that evening sky. Life is changing and folding into itself and reshaping much too fast.
A year ago, at 41, I remember thinking that life was halfway over and I had missed it, that my chances were gone. And as I followed that path of personal disappointment, I landed on one image, a pen.
You see, I didn’t need a degree or a job or a rocket ship for my dream. All I needed was a pen and paper. That’s all that I needed, and I didn’t do it. I hadn’t done it. And I didn’t know how to fix that. Forty-one years of not writing (unless under so much sorrow, or duress so unbearable, that if you read what I wrote at those times, your toes would curl).
Somehow, armed just with the shock and despair of hating the life I had created, it started to literally unravel around me. And I just stood there, tossed like the wind, steadfast in my resolve to create a different experience for the second half.
I started writing again, and before I could even completely figure out what I would do or how I would do it, I had three clients. And the whirlwind had begun.
All I ever wanted to do was write. And so now I am writing. And having discovered that anything is possible if you want it badly enough, I started looking at a whole lot of other things that I was too afraid to begin (or finish). I had no idea how to get from here to there, but I was excited to try.
And around that time, I started reading a monthly ezine from Laura Fenamore. She talked about why we DON’T claim the bodies we deserve. She talked a lot about losing weight forever. (Like half of our population, I had lost and regained at least the size of a small family.)
And as things continued to unravel exactly as they should when we stay out of their way, Laura became my mentor. She is literally a Body Image Mastery Mentor, but I think she’s a lot more than that.
I feel like Laura has the signposts to where I’m trying to go. Sometimes she’s just got an arrow (pointing into some bad neighborhoods, like unresolved relationships and pockets of avoidance and denial that must be crossed). Other times, she will stand quietly and hold up a sign that says, “Caution.” There are a load of signs in Laura’s bag of tricks: Too Fast and Too Slow, Do Not Back Up, and Rest Area up Ahead.
Everyone needs this in their lives, an objective mentor to remind them that the road ahead may be less traveled, but it isn’t an unmarked path through chaos. There are roadblocks and there are building blocks, but every step is one step closer to accepting the phenomenal woman that I suspect I may have been all along.
If you need some help building bridges and finding your way, you can call Laura Fenamore at 415-464-1234. www.LauraFenamore.com
Mary Agnes Antonopoulos
1 comment:
Wow
Thanks for sharing the brilliance of your own inspirational example with us all.
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