Sometimes I feel like this life is a dream. We live in such a beautiful place! I could completely imagine living in some other beautiful places, but I know I will always come back to this island – because it’s HOME!
With spring in full swing, I find myself appreciating this place more and more each day.
And I find myself more grateful everyday that I get to spend my days setting my own schedule and taking full advantage of everything my surroundings have to offer.
Life is good. Life is REALLY good!!
Life Wasn’t Always This Way
Life used to be hard.
It was hard for a long long time. Like 8 years of hard before the storm broke and the sun started shining more regularly again.
Before moving back to my Island, life handed me what felt like one bag of shit after another for a long time.
It all started with a nasty breakup after a 5 year relationship with a man I thought, at the time, I would spend the rest of my life with. He had two little girls who I adored with my whole heart, and it completely shattered me to be blindsided by the breakdown of that relationship and to lose them from my life. My heart was broken into what felt like a billion pieces.
It changed me in so many ways that I didn’t even recognize myself anymore. I saw an empty shell when I looked in the mirror, and it took all I had to get out of bed in the morning and face the world.
I moved house nearly every year after that, to a different part of town each time, trying to find somewhere that truly felt like home. I went from owning a home to never really feeling like I had a home to go back to, except when I came back to my Island to visit my parents in my childhood home.
I had a hard time finding work that inspired me beyond a 6-month period.
My love life and dating were a joke. I had one terrible online dating experience after another. The scenarios were so bad that one of my girlfriends actually suggested I start a blog about it! Thankfully, I can laugh about it all now, but at the time, I cried. A lot.
Then yay! I finally met someone great, or so I thought… And then that imploded too. Twice.
There were some good times mixed into these years too, of course. It wasn’t all bad all of the time. I had great friends, I had a new nephew to love and adore, I did some fun things, I traveled to a new place every year… but life was not consistently good for very long periods of time. Something always seemed to happen to mess things up before too long.
The only thing that saved me and kept me sane and gave me a purpose was my Roxidoo, who showed up in my life about 4 months into this whole situation. Roxie has helped me through so much. She was my one constant. My rock. My beastie. My best friend. My love. Roxie is my Soul Dog.
Time For a Change
Then, one day in September 2013, I decided that I had had enough. I felt like Vancouver had chewed me up and was ready to spit me out. I decided to move back to my Island. My home. I needed a fresh start. A clean slate. In a place where I didn’t really know anyone. I grew up there, but I didn’t know very many people anymore outside of my family and a few close friends.
So I just decided one day. Just like that. And 2 days later, before I could talk myself out of it, I gave notice to my Vancouver landlord, sold almost all of my stuff (except some of my clothes, my bed and my car), and a month later I upped and left Vancouver without a second thought.
It Wasn’t Easy
It was hard at first. It was wayyy outside my comfort zone to make such a drastic change without some kind of plan. But something had to happen if I was going to snap out of the cycle of bullshit that life seemed to be consistently throwing my way. I needed a complete change of scenery.
It was like the universe was trying to tell me something. That I didn’t belong where I was. And it would keep throwing more shit at me until I listened.
So I finally did. I listened. I made a decision. I sold my stuff. And I picked up and moved to Vancouver Island.
I found a job and a place to live, and soon Roxie and I met a man and his dog, who would one day become my husband and blended fur family.
Of course much happened in between, but those are stories for another day.
What I’m trying to tell you here is this:
YOU ARE JUST ONE DECISION AWAY FROM A COMPLETELY DIFFERENT LIFE!!
If life keeps throwing you shit, it might be the universe telling you that it’s time to make a change. Its pushing you in a new direction, all you have to do is be open and listen. If you don’t, chances are the shit will just keep raining down on you, like it did for me.
One single, quick decision completely changed my life. It’s up to YOU to make YOUR decision to completely change YOUR life.
What are you waiting for? It’s your time to shine, my friend.
