who I am

Ten years from now, make sure you can say that you CHOSE your life, you didn’t SETTLE for it. – Mandy Hale

Ten years ago today I sat down at my computer and wrote my very first blog post. Back in the dark ages of blogging, there was so much connection and blog reading that I managed to get eleven comments on my very first post. Now I am lucky if I get one. All you had to do was go visit someone, make a thoughtful comment, and they would visit you back. That is why I started: connection. I wanted a place to write, but mostly I wanted to reach out from my world in an isolated fishing village and find my people. In the words of 2006 blog-speak, I wanted to resonate with my tribe (chuckle).

Back then writing on our blogs wasn’t about making money or teaching anyone anything or even saying anything profound. In fact, the more open and honest and vulnerable your post, the more people would respond. I hate to sound like an old-timer, but I think things were a bit better then. Back in my day we weren’t yet comparing ourselves to each other’s perceived enlightenment. I didn’t feel like I lacked anything – in fact, every time I entered this world I felt like I gained something – a friend, a connection, a moment of being seen or heard or understood.

Ten years ago I lived in a tiny fishing village on the Atlantic Coast of England (well, technically on the English Channel). Ten years later I live on the Pacific Coast of Costa Rica. In the years in between I have: gotten engaged in Rome, gotten married, written and published a novel, let another novel go, gained and lost weight, gathered with blog friends in Seattle and the Cotswolds, ran a half marathon, worked full time, painted in Italy, circled with women near Glastonbury, fallen desperately in love with my two nieces, been diagnosed with celiac disease, eaten gelato in Italy, tasted nutmeg in Grenada and fallen in love with St. Vincent, danced under many moons, helped grieve my father-in-law, camped and cottaged and often Christmased in Canada, spent countless hours in airports and airplanes, seen psychics and shamans, lived through my 30s, began living with my mother-in-law, and moved to a new country.

And what have I learned? That comparing myself to other people’s sunlit, filtered, styled, prettified online personas is a one-way ticket to crazytown. That if I had followed other people’s rules and truly wanted what other people had, I would have lived a much smaller life. That the people I was searching for and the connections I wanted are – ironically – harder to find now in this noisy online world of selling ourselves as our porduct, but that when you live and write and create from your heart, you can find each other.

I have also learned that when I stay in the moment and let my heart lead, magic happens.

So as I embark on the next ten years of me and my blog, I intend only this: to be connected to my heart and the present moment as often and as long and as much as I can, and to live in that magic – always.

So for you, dear reader, thank you for being here.

And to my little blog ~ Happy Anniversary! And thank you for everything.

I love you.

xo