Kerri On Down The Road

I feel like I have spent the past two years on two very different journeys as far as my self development and awareness are concerned.  Last year felt like the year where I got quiet and really started to get to know who I am - the real me, on my terms.  I spent a lot of time turning over a lot of rocks that I had not felt brave enough to examine before.  Looking back I realize more and more just how necessary that work was, and although it was often uncomfortable and caused me to face some realizations that were hard, it brought me to where I find myself today.  This year has been a year spent reflecting and looking ahead.  Now that I have a firm base beneath me, I can start to build on that.  Part of the building that I have been doing is looking at the aspects of my life I want to reclaim and those that I am truly ready to let go. When it comes to what I've decided to reclaim, my true identity would be number one.  I realize now after much reflection...

Have you ever felt like the person you are presenting to the outside world is a completely different version of the one that you know to be your true self?  This is something that I had felt for so many years on and off, sometimes in a whisper and sometimes in a scream.  The feeling of doing what is expected not what feels right, to satisfy an expectation that you never actually set for yourself but strive to achieve regardless. This is the difference between living according to your inner truth versus the outer truths that we have imposed upon us.  One of the biggest realizations that I have come to accept over the past few months is that by living according to what I know to be my truth means that I will no longer identify with what society expects of me.  I will no longer be that cis-gender woman who strives to find her Prince Charming and live happily ever after.  Instead I will be a woman who finds happiness in the company of other like-minded women and who...

When I first thought about writing and posting today's blog, I wavered between a sense of certainty and moments of doubt.  How would it be received?  Do I really need to put this out there?  And if the answer to the last question is yes, then why?  I carried this idea with me on several walks, runs and bike rides over the past few weeks and finally came to the decision that yes, I did need to create this post and as far as why, because it felt like the right time. Back in late April/early May I ended the first post-divorce relationship that I had entered since moving forward with my life.  The relationship was not a "bad" one...I had no concerns around how I was being treated,or the expectations of me within the relationship. For all intents and purposes it was a nice soft place to land.  Despite those positives, there was still a nagging feeling of things not being quite right...a sense of something being off.  I had started to feel this way a couple ...

 I thought it was just the change of seasons that was affecting me...the darker mornings, the cooler weather, no more early bike rides.  I couldn't put my finger on it, but I was definitely feeling different.  Not energized, not wanting to leave my bed, struggling to do the things that only weeks earlier had brought me joy and I had no trouble engaging in.   And as much as all of those reasons made sense, they didn't help the fact that I was feeling like someone had taken away one of my batteries and I was functioning on half power all of a sudden.  Then I listened to the latest Unlocking Us podcast with Brene Brown and things started to make sense (as they often do after listening to Ms. Brown) The episode  was one where she was talking about what was on her mind, and one of the topics she covered was based on an article entitled " Your Surge Capacity is Depleted - It's Why You Feel Awful "  and suddenly things started to make sense.  In a n...

I have been listening to a lot of podcasts lately as I walk, and have noticed a recurring theme around catalysts.  In the context of the discussions, the catalysts being discussed are considered "relationship disruptors" for lack of a better term.  When I take a step back and look at my life I realize how important a role catalysts have played in many of the decisions and choices I have made and how they have taken the shape of people who I have let into my life and situations that I have found myself faced with. The other idea that seems to keep coming up is around tools, and how life tends to give us the very tools that we need in order to move forward or to overcome a barrier that we are facing.  All too often we aren't able to utilize these tools either because we are not in a place where we are ready to do the work, or we are buried too deep in our situation to be able to see what we have sitting in front of us. These ideas have been swirling around in my head and th...

 As I walked tonight I listened to the latest Unlocking Us podcast and as per usual, it resonated deeply.  Brene Brown was speaking with Sonya Renee Taylor on her book "The Body is Not an Apology" and as I listened to their conversation unfold, I heard so many messages that I have been processing lately. The main premise of the book (which I cannot wait to read for myself!) is the practice of radical self love.  In order to make true change in the world around oppression and hatred that is held for so many people based upon their appearance, sexual preferences and gender identity, we first need to address these negative tendencies that we have towards ourselves.  The one idea that she put forward that really struck me was that we possess something called natural intelligence.  Every living thing will become the highest form of itself and will do what is required to reach that naturally.  In other words, we can become the person who we are meant to be, and c...

Tomorrow I will be celebrating turning 49, and celebratory is truly the best word I can use to describe how I am feeling about many things lately.  I look at my life through the lens that I have honed over the past year and I realize just how far I have come in a relatively short amount of time.   It feels like for the majority of my life I have lived as a triangular peg that was trying so very hard to fit into a circular hole.  I was never comfortable with the shape I held naturally and tried so many different ways to try and change it in order to become closer to the image in my head.  So much energy spent on trying to diminish who I was in order to take up less space and slide into a version of myself that I thought would be more acceptable, more likeable, and ultimately would live happily ever after. What I discovered, often to my dismay, is that the parts of me that I tried so hard to change were the parts that make me who I really am.  Not necessarily...