What a Girl Wants...

Last week I attended a 4 day Tony Robbins event called Unleash the Power Within (UPW). This is full immersion at its finest - we did over 50 hours of deep work over the 4 day period and breakthroughs were made, folks. Clarity is power and I got a whole lot of power from this event.

This year I quit smoking weed and I weaned myself off of antidepressants - two drugs that I have been using for over 20 years to keep my emotions a bay. During one of the working sessions at UPW we had to write down empowering emotions that we felt and disempowering emotions that we felt...seems simple right? I had to fucking google 'emotions' because I couldn't come up with more than a couple on my own. I actually wrote down the word 'grateful' and had to ask Google if that was an emotion. So that's where I was at in the beginning of this thing - a professional Emotion Avoider.

Fear is a mother fucker, and Tony Robbins does this thing where he makes you identify your deepest fears, write them down, stare them in the face, and then tell them to fuck right off because it's bullshit. One of my biggest fears (or limiting beliefs) is that I am never going to find real love and partnership. And because of that fear, I have avoided it at all costs. As a young adult I told myself it would happen eventually. Then at some point the switch flipped and for the next 25 years I told myself that I didn't need a man or a partner because I can do it on my own. The reality was I feared that I was so broken and beaten down by the life that I was dealt that I didn't deserve true love. I should be lucky to be alive and thriving in all the ways that I currently am, don't get greedy and think you get that AND the deep passionate love that fuels Hollywood movie scripts.

So I told myself I didn't want it. Who cares about that lovey dovey crap, I don't need it. Every day I told myself I'm happy just the way I am, nothing is missing. Because of that, I lowered my standards a whole lot and chose partners that put me down, put me second and dragged me into a codependent spiral as opposed to lifting me up, putting me first, challenging me to keep getting better and wanting to improve alongside me. I would avoid big, bright red flags and tell myself it's perfect because we are both fucked up, that's all I deserve. Nah, this is good enough, I thought every single time I attempted partnership. Eventually I stopped trying altogether because I convinced myself it was a waste of time, it's not going to happen for me so why bother.

The thing is, I had told myself I was lucky to be where I am in life, and luck runs out. I was lucky I was pretty because it got me out of trouble and opened doors. I was lucky I was athletically gifted because that also kept me out of trouble and opened doors. I was lucky I was smart because it got me a full ride to college and many promotions throughout my career. I was lucky that I moved almost every year from ages 8-15 because it made me outgoing and personable. My view of self was so low that I couldn't possibly find a man that was attractive, emotionally stable, successful, athletic and funny to look the other way at all of my flaws. I believe the term is 'damaged goods', that's how I viewed myself, and that's what I thought I deserved.

Fuck that. I got some clarity this past week - I have been selling myself way short. I am brave, strong, resilient, hopeful, grateful, DESERVING, and yeah, a little lucky. I am attractive, smart, funny, driven, uplifting, motivated, athletic and caring. I have a network of close friends larger than most people's entire families. Because I am pretty fucking awesome and people want to be around me. I won't settle for someone that doesn't put me first, treat me like a goddamn queen, have big goals and a path to attain them and care about their personal wellness as much as I do. I've done a ton of work on myself over the past 8 years, there's always more work to do, but all that work has led me to this place where I had the realization that I haven't tried very hard to find a partner in life. I haven't tried at all, really. But I'm gonna start now and I'm not lowering my standards to meet the goal, I'm not looking the other way when I stumble on big red flags, and I'm not settling for anything less than fucking amazing because that's what I deserve.

So, who do you know?