My stoic yet generous father called me up the other day and asked me what I wanted for my birthday. (Mind you, this is very unlike my dad.) I took a long pause and finally said “Nothing, Dad. I really have everything I want and everything I need.” It’s taken me 29 years to realize that I kind of always have.
Ah, birthdays. Per usual, the nostalgic in me comes blazing out. I truly believe that a birthday is your own personal New Year. Not when the American calendar tells you it is, right after the manufactured highs of the holidays and into the crash of shitty January. Nope. The real New Year is the day of your birth, your own personal day of renewal, no matter what part of the year it takes place in, and looking at it this way causes a different kind of reflection… Well, at least it does for me.
So much changes in a year. So much. It’s actually amazing to think about. My entire foundation, social circle, maturity level, emotionality, personal goals and perspective changed. When I think back to where I was this time one year ago… I was just so fucking sad. Shattered, in fact. Angry. Unhealthy and unhappy. I wasn’t sleeping, I wasn’t eating and I spent most of my days crying. I had to force myself to go out. I had to force myself to smile. Everything besides feeling sad felt like an effort. There’s not a smidgeon of that description that comes close to defining my place in life right now.
My point is (because I always have one, don’t I?) is that time not only heals, but it lifts you up and opens up your life. You just have to let it. Sometimes it takes a grave experience like the loss of a love to find that gratitude and that space in your life for joy, but I look around at my life now and I truly feel so completely blessed. I know I’m going to sound like a total hippie-dippy, over- emotional sap here, but, ummm, have you met me? Sometimes I have so much happiness and love in my heart for the people in my life that I literally feel like I could burst. I’m serious. I literally feel overwhelmed at times with the abundance of blessings that come in the form of friends, career opportunities, my parents, my brother, my love…even my doorman who greets me with a “What’s up Jay-Z!?” every morning makes me smile to my face hurts.
There was a period in time when I thought I would always be heartbroken. I thought I would forever be lonely and resentful and sleep deprived and pissed off. Yep, right about when I was turning 28. So as I write this somewhat rambling of a blog at 12:04am three nights before my 29th birthday, “a full circle moment” couldn’t be more apropos. I can truly say that I am so unbelievably happy, with my beautiful new relationship, with my business, with my health, with the relationships I’ve built with my family, my glorious, ridiculously awesome and beautiful friends and most importantly, with myself. I need a new word for “happy.” That’s how I happy I am.
And to all of my Cheekies out there who follow my blog (as inconsistent as it is…I’m sorry!) I would just like to take a moment and say thank you. Thank you for listening and hearing me and hopefully relating somehow. My gratitude is sincere: I know I’m not Buddha.
And I wish you all the happiest, healthiest New Years of your own (whenever they may be). Because, one thing that took me a whole entire year to learn, apart from the fact that we mostly all have what we really, truly need, is that we all deserve to be happy.
Yes, even me.
