I’ve noticed my entry into 2023 feels a bit differently than Januaries in the past. This new entry – a slower pace, more thoughtful about creating my calendar, and allowing some focus on my own needs within my business, my friendships, and my family – feels foreign and uncomfortable. But in a good way.

I often hit January with a bang, releasing new programs and trying to “fit it all in” before the end of June. I seem to have some made-up beliefs about the calendar and have split it into three parts – January through June, July through August, and September through December.

But that is all made up so I know it doesn’t have to be that way.

This year is different.

Some of you know I care for my dad and those needs have grown, maybe temporarily, maybe not. I have a full-time practice with feet in two worlds:

• the non-profit, community-based world working with people holding multiple marginalized identities, coaching and supervising students, staff, and management doing some of the most compassionate work on the planet; and
• the work I do with many of you, helping you to live a more conscious, awakened life where you have choices, flexibility, and the ability to show up in the world in ways previously unfamiliar to you until you learned what it meant to let go of the story and be here now.

This month, I’m walking the walk in a deeper way than I have in the past. I’m taking a beat to check in with my best intelligence:

My higher head center: when I let go of my stories, beliefs, assumptions, and social constructs, what is left to think about? It ends up being lots of discovery, real guidance, real possibilities, deep knowing of what is true right now (and holds all the truth of my history in there, too!).

My higher heart center: when I let go of my emotional reactivity, the tantrums, the “poor me”s, what is left? What ends up here is clarity about what I really want, what matters to me, and why I’m doing this work.

My awakened body center: when I let go of what I think should be happening (“it’s time to eat/sleep!”), the story about what hurts or doesn’t, or those impulses that kick in when I’m not paying attention, I am left with the truth of what I am experiencing in my body in any given moment. I know what aches and pains are real and need attention, and which ones are there because I’ve confused it with asking for attention or to reinforce a belief about aging, working out, or something else. When I am experiencing my awakened body, I also access boundaries, intuition, and a sense of what my body needs, despite my head wanting to override it. I can be really clear with myself (first) and others (next) about what I have the capacity to do in any given moment.

And if I check in with myself, these three centers are all talking to each other, guiding each other, and none are working without the other two.

Most of us live in a way that focuses on one or two of these things and forgets about the rest. You may identify as a “thinker” but are you really thinking or are you simply running through a laundry list of thoughts picked out of thin air, disguised as “figuring out,” “deciding,” or “making the right choice”? There is no discovery and wonder in that kind of thinking.Nothing is new, it’s just recycled beliefs. And the same goes with our emotional reactivity.

As I walk through January 2023, I am slowly testing the waters. I am making conscious decisions about what I want, how I am going to make that happen, and what boundaries I need to have in place so that I can show up where I want to show up with compassion, care, and integrity and not with resentment, frustration, or as a way to avoid something else in my life.

From this vantage point, I am more naturally creative, landing in the knowing that the answers are here and I just have to access them through presence. Nothing feels risky from this place because every experience will serve me. I may not like every experience, but I won’t suffer as a result. The suffering comes when I lose presence.

How will this impact you? I have no way of knowing but I trust you and trust that you’ll let me know.

My hope is that you will feel more held in the spaces in which we show up together and your emails will be returned in a more timely manner. I don’t want to be scheduling 3 weeks out anymore. I want to create a community that flourishes and witnesses others walking the walk like them. I want to show up with integrity as I help you to do the same.

I have groups and drop-in hours planned for the next few months. Look for a calendar coming your way with opportunities to experience this work in community with each other.

Here’s to a more present 2023