No thing or person can make you truly happy but yourself.

I participated in a lovely workshop with Jennifer Alexander and Gina Marotta called Redesign and Align. I’ve been doing this kind of work personally for a while but that doesn’t mean I’m any more advanced than anyone else!

What I heard at the workshop, I also often hear from my friends and in my own head; fears or conditioned ways of thinking that hold us back and keep us from hearing the wisdom of our hearts or from making courageous heart-driven choices.

The phrase that kept repeating in my head after listening and sharing with this group was this:

“You are never going to be any more or less alone than you already are right now.”

You come in alone, you leave alone. So what’s holding you back?

You fail. Will you be more or less alone? No.

You are wildly successful. More or less alone now? No.

If the truth is that you could be working a job you hate or struggling in a stagnant relationship, or doing what your heart/spirit loves and, at the end of the day, you still pass from waking to dream time alone (and you always will), then the answer seems pretty simple.

Let it go. Move on.

Forget about all that stuff that isn’t supporting the essence of who you truly are. Opinions, pride, reputation, expectation, obligation—these are all incredibly powerful things. But if it’s holding you back from being your best self-shining your light, sharing your love and gifts with the world—what’s it good for?

Not a whole lot.

So that’s my thought for the day; let’s get good at being alone. No thing or person can make you truly happy but yourself. We put so much energy into accomplishing things, getting stuff, checking the list of marriage, family, kids, whatever. And some of us are so uncomfortable—terrified even—of being alone. Guess what? You already are.

This is it. It’s on you. And that’s freeing.

You don’t need to wait for your “big break,” or “Mr. or Miss Right,” or that perfect amount of cash in the bank to be happy and you can’t blame your spouse or work-life or outside situations for not fulfilling you—because they can’t do that!

Only you can do that.

Meditate.

Practice asana.

Read.

Walk.

Cook a nice dinner for one.

Get good at being alone.

Enjoy it! I bet it’s homecoming that’s long overdue.

Love After Love

The time will come
when, with elation
you will greet yourself arriving
at your own door, in your own mirror
and each will smile at the other’s welcome,

and say, sit here. Eat.
You will love again the stranger who was your self.
Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart
to itself, to the stranger who has loved you

all your life, whom you ignored
for another, who knows you by heart.
Take down the love letters from the bookshelf,

the photographs, the desperate notes,
peel your own image from the mirror.
Sit. Feast on your life.

~ Derek Walcott

I’ll see you on the mat.

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Assistant Ed.: Stephanie Sefton/Ed: Bryonie Wise