Tag Archives: Encouragement

Is This What Crazy Feels Like?

Good morning!

I told myself, when I decided to start this new blog, that the only way that this would be beneficial to anyone, including me, is if I agreed to be 100% totally honest, and use my absolute authentic voice. No more “everything-is-perfect-all smiles-all-the-time” blog posts for me! So here goes nothing…be brave…be brave…you can do it…

This morning I awoke from a really bad dream, my second in two nights. It was one of those dreams that leaves you shaken to the core, because unlike the nightmare from two nights ago, which was obviously caused by stress going on in my work life, this one hit too close to home. I watched one of my younger sisters fall to her death. UGH!!! Ok! Now, I know it was just a bad dream, and I am sure my lil’ sis is just fine, cozily snuggled up in her bed, fast asleep, but this dream may have been the final straw in my realization that my inner child’s needs are not being taken care of!

You, see there are a lot of areas of my life that I have been settling for second best, or even completely ignoring for far too long; areas like my work, health, finances, fitness, friendships, contribution to my community, commitment to my personal growth, and even my free-time and play has been suffering! And because I have not been honoring my authentic self in quite a while, my inner Chrissie is starting to throw a tantrum! You know the kind of tantrum I’m talking about? The kind that we’ve all seen kids throw, on the floor in the middle of a busy grocery store aisle, the kind where mothers of the offending child embarrassingly and yet innocently turn around and say, “Who’s child is this????”, as if it couldn’t possibly be theirs!! 🙂

I am learning that my inner Chrissie has a tendency to throw her own tantrums when she doesn’t get enough attention!

I can’t possibly be the only one who has ever experienced this, can she???

To top that off, there is a long history of mental illness in my family, and my biggest fear in life – and I mean bigger than my fear of being abandoned, or even my bigger fear of spiders (and anyone who knows me knows that THAT IS HUGE!!!!), my biggest fear is that somewhere along the path, that is my life, I am going to run right smack into mental illness, like it was just waiting all these years for just the right moment to strike, like a cold germ that was just waiting to be caught. This morning, after I awoke very shakily from my nightmare, my first thought was…

Is this what going crazy feels like????

I told my uber-sweet and ever supportive husband, “I think I am having a nervous breakdown”, and, without missing a beat, which was shocking because he was still half asleep, he reached out to hold my hand and very lovingly told me, ‘Well, you better get it over with quickly.” He was so serious, and yet so cute when he said it, I couldn’t help but laugh. “Thanks, love!” 😉

I know he meant it in the nicest way possible, but what he was really saying was we don’t have time in our schedules for your to be having a nervous breakdown right now, so please, get it over with quickly enough so that we can get you out of the house and to the office on time! LOL! 😉

As I am sitting here, in bed, typing this (yes, I know a laptop in bed is not good bed etiquette, but desperate times calls for desperate measures!) I can’t help thinking, “Ok, little Chrissie, I hear you, how can I get you to happy so we can sleep with sweet dreams again?”

The answer to this question is why I am here. That is why I created Beautiful Creatives AKA This Beautiful Life. My goal in this journey is that I can help myself, and in turn possibly help others get unstuck in their lives, and get from where they may find themselves, unhappy, unhealthy, unfulfilled, un-whatever (I’m just talking from my own experiences here), and get to where their souls are longing to be – mine included! I have a girlfriend who is a psychology professor, and she likes to say that you become what it is you need in your life, and right now, that is what I am hoping to do. I need a life coach, a mentor, a cheerleader, someone to hold my hand as I walk through this journey that is called life, I need resources for time management, stress reduction, overall getting-my-crap-together-ness. I want to use my personal experiences to help motivate and inspire others to stretch out, baby step by baby step and live life on purpose and to live life both deeply and widely! We were never meant to be one-dimensional beings!

I am not exactly sure what all this is going to look like, but I am going to keep my eyes, ears, and heart open and see what comes my way!! I hope you will join me, and I look forward to sharing more of my life with you, and creating a fun, and beautiful sisterhood of love, support, and encouragement!

Here is to living beautifully!

~Christina 😉

Gratitude!

Good evening!

Jason and I had a long garage sale today, on a day that was much too hot to be standing in the sun all day, and with not much foot traffic. We are both very tired and ready to close the house down for the evening! So, I am going to try and keep this post nice and short.

First, I thought I would start with an update from yesterday’s post. I am happy to say that Jason and I are doing much better today. One of our friends said to me, “17 years is a lot of one-day-at-a-times”.

It was what I needed to hear.

Somehow Jason and I had forgotten that every relationship is about dealing with the one-day-at-a-times, and not clumping all of the would-a, should-a, could-a’s and lobbing them at each other.

With that reminder, the decision has been made. We are going to do our best and work it out. At the end of the day, the scale tips much heavier towards good days than bad, and we are going to chalk yesterday up to one of the not so pleasant days. I know that we will both be missing out on A LOT of happy tomorrows together, if either one of us give up now. So, for us, we decided that we weren’t going to let walking away from each other be an option – we have been through too much to let all of this go because, in a moment of exhaustion, we argued about something petty! (and in all honesty, I don’t even remember what started it!)

Before I leave you this evening, I wanted to say “thank you”. Truly. The outpouring of love, prayer, and support that Jason and I have received has been overwhelming. I am so thankful that we have the kind of support group that seems to just come from everywhere to stand by us, laugh with us, cry with us, pray with us, and simply love us. For all of the words of encouragement we have received from friends, and family within the last 24 hours, I am truly grateful! I truly hope that we can return the favor some day when you are needing a pick me up!!

Thank you!

Tonight, I can HONESTLY say…

Have a FABULOUS evening!! 😉

Finally Friday!!

Good evening!!

I wasn’t sure that this day would get here, but now that it is, I am soooo thankful!! I really need a break from work!!

My sweetie and I spent some time down at Borders this afternoon, and of course, I bought a little too much!! HOWEVER, all of my purchases were well thought out and pre-planned, so I don’t feel guilty!! 😉

Oh, and before I forget, I wanted to make a correction to yesterday’s blog!! The person who left me the “Smile” note and the paperclip was my other co-worker Julie!! Who knew that they BOTH had perfect handwriting!! LOL!! (Julie AND Chris!!) I am going to have to work on my penmanship!! Thank you for the VERY LOVELY note Julie, YOU REALLY made my evening, and I am still smiling just thinking about it!!!

THANK YOU!! THANK YOU!! THANK YOU!!!

Now that I am trying to find the art in everything, I wanted to share a few pics of things that have inspired me in the last few days!!!! I would like to thank both Chris, and Julie for letting me raid their desks to get some of these images!!! 😉

I am just GA-GA about this color this season!! This orange is such a HAPPY color!! 😉

This little wand was from my niece Megan’s birthday a couple of years ago, and EVERY TIME I see it, it reminds me of how much I love that little girly of mine!! 😉

This is the top view of a really pretty paperweight I have on my desk at work!! This green has always been such a calming color for me, so thankfully, I have this color EVERYWHERE on my desk!! 😉

This was from Julie’s desk, and it EXACTLY matches one of Chris’ pictures on her wall! I just thought that was funny!! Most women who share an office “cycle” together, not us – we all seem to dress like triplets on accident!!! 😉

How could I POSSIBLY leave out my Eiffel Tower??

This is a little pottery box of Chris’ that I am almost CONSTANTLY playing with because it is just SO CUTE!! 😉

I have always LOVED glass paperweights, and this is the one that is on Julie’s desk! If I remember correctly, she actually MADE this!! SO IMPRESSIVE!!! 😉

I am sure that this last one, which just happens to be the front of a card that Chris received from one of her customers is my ABSOLUTE FAVORITE!!! I just LOVE how these seemingly unrelated colors just go soooo well together, just like me and my friends, and co-workers Chris, Julie, and myself!!

Have a GREAT weekend girls!

We’ve DEFINITELY EARNED it!!!

😉

Have a FABULOUS evening!! 😉

A Surprising Evening!

Good evening!

Let me just start out by saying, I am soooo thankful it is Friday tomorrow, because I am not sure how many more bad days at work I can handle without getting a break!!! In my office, my boss hands out colored, and funky shaped paperclips if you have done a good job, and a red one if you’ve made a big boo-boo!! We display our paperclips like medals of valor or something!! LOL!! So, it is kind of a fun competition between our team! Now, we don’t really get paperclips very much, we are all just too busy to really even notice, but my co-worker Chris and I were talking about it the past few days, how it really would be nice to get a few more handed our way! Silly, right?? Anyway, I was having one of those horrible, wrotten, no good, yucky days, and this is what I saw on my desk when I got back to my office, which was after EVERYONE else had already gone home!!

This simple little sign literally MADE MY DAY!! I left knowing that someone loved and cared about me enough to remind me to smile, and then when I looked closer, I realized that Chis not only left me this sweet little sign (it is in her perfect handwriting!!), she gave me ONE OF HER PAPERCLIPS!!!! OH!! When I realized that I had to sit down, because it had made me a little verklempt!! Thank you, Chris!! You probably didn’t even realize this seemingly small gesture meant to me!! I owe you one, friend!! 😉

Tonight I had my belly dancing class!! Are you sick of hearing about that yet?? I am finding that I am catching on to the moves a little bit better every week, and although I am struggling a little to flow smoothly from one move to the next, I am still having such a GREAT time!! 😉 The class is an hour long, which is just long enough to get me on an endorphine high and I go home feeling ultra jazzed!! What a FABULOUS feeling!! 😉

At the end of tonight’s class, we got to choose which type of belly dancing we wanted to go into – there are three main kinds (I think): tribal, cabaret, and oriental! However, don’t quote me on that, I think that is what our instructor said!! I am choosing to go into tribal-type belly dancing! It is more free flowing, more gypsy-like, you get to more freely express yourself in your costuming, and the dances are more of an improv, follow-the-leader-with-subtle-clues type of dancing. She once described it as, you all could have grown up in the same village, so your costume fabric is similar, but you dress and dance a little more freely and it is more representative of your own personal style. Right now, my own personal style is the goal – so that is where mamma is going!! YEAH!!

Have a FABULOUS evening!! 😉

A Monday of Positivity!

From Tiffany's "Happy Girls are the Prettiest Girls" Shoot

Good evening!

Work did get a little bumpy today, but I knew that it would, right? And it did, of course! There are a lot of changes going to be happening in the next few months, but that is alright. I know that everything is going to turn out alright, it always has and always will.

I have to tell you that all of this tapping into my creativity has given me hope that there is light at the end of the tunnel for my life! I feel like I am learning what my true purpose for being placed on this earth for. I can not yet articulate what I am thinking, but I am learning that it is ok to be creative, and to use my creativity to somehow make the world a better place. I honestly didn’t think that was possible before. I thought creativity was something that you stole moments of while your life takes a break from chewing you up! Sad, really!! I realize that I don’t have to be “chewed up any longer” that I am allowed to take time for myself, without guilt, to replenish and recoup what is the best of me, so that I am ready and able to better take care of others!! That, my friend, is called growth!!! LOL! 😉

I had quite the surprise right before I left the office today! Sometime last week, I had taken a leap of faith and had e-mailed a couple of my FAVORITE photographers/bloggers, not really thinking that any of them would EVER write me back. It was more for the action of stepping outside of my box, and doing something I wouldn’t think I could do. Well, today, quite unexpectedly, I got a return e-mail!!!! When I saw the name of the person sending it, I can not tell you how excited I was to see her name – I literally started jumping up and down inside of my own head!! YEAH!!! WHOO!!! HOO!! I can’t believe she wrote back!!! Anyway, it was Tiffany Kirchner Dixon of The Fancy Farmgirl, and she very graciously answered all of my questions, plus gave me some very lovely encouraging words of advice for getting myself started with photography!!! To say that I was jazzed, was a HUGE UNDERSTATEMENT!! It gave me proof that I was on the right track. I am still not sure what my “art” is, or how it is going to manifest itself, but I KNOW that I am heading in the right direction!!!

Tiffany’s blog (I feel like we are at that place now, you know, first name basis!!) is ABSOLUTELY SCRUMTIOUS!! I love the ebb and flow of her postings, reading about her family, and perusing her DREAM-LIKE photography!! I KNOW that my sis, Alex would REALLY like her work too!! PERFECTION!! The photo above is one Tiffany’s and you can see more of her photography here!

I have to confess that even though that was the MOST PLEASANT SURPRISE to my day, I was soooo thankful to get home today! I had been hankering to get home the entire work day, kind of like a little kid pining for recess during an especially difficult math test!! My sweetie and I finally scheduled some time to have some quality time for right after work! It has been a while since we have both been able to get away from all of the work and distractions of life, and just spend some much needed time together! It is ALWAYS so much fun to spend time with him, sharing out laughter and dreams! He is just such a genuine human being, and he really had this way of bringing out the playful kid out of me!! He is my own personal gentle giant, and really makes my life so much better!! Thank you, Love! You mean the world to me!!!

Well, before I ramble on for the rest of the night, I am going to close up shop for the night so that I can go climb into bed with my love and do some reading before we slip off to la-la-land and have some SWEET DREAMS!!!

Have a FABULOUS evening!! 😉