So it’s nearly March. WOW. I am taking my first official sick day in months, so I find myself with a little window of time to write even if it’s while laying in bed feeling crappy.

At the beginning of the year, I spent a lot of time reflecting on the past few years, and what I have learned. I think it is helping me figure out where I have been, and where I want to go from here. Here is a short list of some of the more important reflections.

• I have learned a great deal about humility. For most of my life I have felt bad/sad/inadequate that I am not the type of person who is like, “Hey world, look at me!!” But, to me, being humble feels genuine, like I am being true to myself. By nature I am humble, and I like that about myself.
• I like feeling grounded to people and places. I used to feel claustrophobic and trapped if I wasn’t moving around and changing the scenery all the time. Now I feel a sense of comfort in the familiar. 
• I enjoy thinking about the good in my life. 
• Patience and finding a good balance between being optimistic and realistic have helped me tremendously.
• Most people don’t have it all figured out, and that’s okay. Fake it to make it, right? (Which is something I am particularly loving about Girls, Season Two. It is delving so much deeper into how funny, yet confusing and heartbreaking life can often be. That phone call between Hannah and Marnie in last week’s episode? So real.) 
• I have learned how important it is to simplify my life, and how that task is so, so, so much easier said than done.

I have been working on self-care above everything lately. I am meditating. I am being mindful of my health (besides that McDonald’s I made L pick up last night, because when you’re feeling lousy things like spinach and tofu sound vile). I am trying to cut out a lot of the noise from the outside world, and just concentrate on what I need to nourish my mind and body. I have realized that self-care involves a level of selfishness that has always made me uncomfortable. It’s such a basic concept. We have to take care of ourselves before we try to help anyone else. I seem to have skipped over that life lesson time and time again. I always felt like there was something else I could be doing with my time rather than focusing on myself. Even with the whole journey to motherhood roller coaster I have been on over the past four years, I rarely, if ever, stopped to think about what role I was/am playing in that process. On many occasions, I have felt like I was looking down on my life like an observer. What I saw was a generally unhappy woman who could only think of herself in terms of “baby” “pregnancy” “husband” “family”. My life was so black and white; divided by a distinct line. Pregnant = happy. Not pregnant = not happy. Admittedly, it is difficult to not fall into that trap when you are so desperate to make something happen, and it just isn’t happening. But, the show must go on. I continue to have faith that there is a plan for us. We don’t understand it right now, but maybe one day we will?

I still grapple with all of this, but I have found that going back to the basic idea of self-care has really helped me. Having goals and working actively to achieve those goals has helped, too. Staying busy is another big part of this equation. I know it isn’t possible to be happy all day every day, but there have been a lot of good days. I thank the man or woman upstairs for those good days, and continue to push forward.