Hellllllooooooooooooo Rrrreeeaaaddddeeerrrrr!!!!! I so hope you read that in your head as I said it in mine! I am here for my final post of February (how the f*** is it the end of the month already!?).  This year is passing by quicker than a cheetah. Oh...that was a bad on reader I apologize haha I spent about five minutes trying to think of something more clever, but as you will come to understand my creative juices were targeted towards something else today.
So reader, without getting too personal, I've made a change in my life which is adversely affecting my emotional state. It has me feeling all the emotions and it truly is making me feel like a crazy person for not being able to manage them. Since I'm already an emotional person, this enhancement of such a strong aspect of myself has been challenging to deal with. 
With that background knowledge, let me bring you to today. I was working with a patient and I was encouraging him to create poetry. While he was writing, I had a flashback to grade school and all of the English classes I had where we did poetry. I loved poetry guys. I loved creating things and using words to just majestically speak about things or use it for humor! I actually won a poetry thing in 7th or 8th grade with a ridiculous poem I had created. It was my jam bam! Then I thought about the last time that I wrote a poem. I couldn't remember it. I hadn't indulged in this creative outlet for AGES! I wasn't upset with myself, I was just...disappointed. I write poems every now and then to incorporate into a friends gift, but I don't write poems just to express myself or just for fun. 
So, what did I decide to do while my patient was creatively writing? That's right, I racked my brain for a subject which I could write about. For some reason, I couldn't stop thinking about the ocean. The other topic that I've been constantly dealing with lately is my emotions. So, I attempted to write a poem that incorporated the two. Of course I will share it below, I just wanted to give a quick backstory before we went right into it. So without further ado, here's to my first legitimate attempt at a poem in MONTHS!

Emotional Tidal Wave
By Jordan A.

Ocean waves ebb and flow
Same with our emotions no?
The highest waves crash the hardest
We go from elation to feeling our harshest
The darkest pools suck us into its depths
We get tossed around, straining to catch our breath
Just when we're about to succumb to despair
A voice inside screams, "There's more for you out there!"
A fighting spirit bursts from buried treasure
Locked up in our heart, because of our minds, not forever
We kick against the current, striking out against fear
Fighting for that life we took for granted and now hold dear
Each stroke has a purpose like every thought in our mind
Trying to breach the surface, to ourselves, we be kind
We finally break free, our struggle is won
To grow and be better before the next wave to come

Thank you for taking the time to read that! There are many things that I would like to say at the moment and none of them seem right. I hope you enjoy my conscious re-emergence into the world of poetry. I may share more in the future. Who knows! This was one of the more enjoyable blog posts that I've done in a hot minute. 
I appreciate your time reader! I hope you have a great day and please make an effort to be the reason someone smiles today! :)
Until next time...

​Jordan :)

Happy Valentine's Day Reader! Historically I have been a person who absolutely loathes this holiday. Having a holiday that profits on the concept of love and pressuring/guilt tripping significant others into purchasing extravagant gifts is nauseating. Truthfully, even when I was in relationships I hated the idea of being forced into displaying my love on this set day for commercial purposes. In the 365 days of the year, why should this one day be the day where you have to show how much you love your person? Can't it be like any surprise Saturday or Tuesday in June? 
Truthfully, part of me is a bit cynical about the whole lovey dovey thing. After some self-reflection, I think that some of my aversion to this day is due to the fact that I'm kind of jealous. This is the first year in a while where I've been able to objectively look at the Valentine's Day posts from friends, strangers, and acquaintances where I haven't been green with jealously. Having that disgusting self-loathing pang in my gut wondering why I can't have that and instead being happy to see everyone else celebrating their love. I don't feel like my aversion to this day is completely based in my jealously of it because truthfully I stand by my thoughts that if you love someone you can show them on any day, but I am less judgmental of those who utilize the holiday as a way to set aside a for sure day/night to celebrate their union as significant others. 
What I've done on past Valentine's Days to help myself feel better about the holiday was to get gifts for my friends and convince myself that if I had any love in my life, then I needed to celebrate it. I think the beneficiaries of those gifts enjoyed and appreciated them, but I also felt like there was some pity associated with the gift giving. I still enjoy the concept of giving your friends/cared ones gifts and letting them know how much you care for them, but in my experience...a romantical holiday assigned to couples is not the time to do so. Although, I will never discourage you from sharing how much someone means to you because life is too short for that shit not to be expressed!
If I haven't told this part of my story yet reader, let me give you some background. When I was in high school, I had this image of my life. I was going to college, meet the love of my life, and walk out of college with a fiancé, and the tools to start a family within two years of graduating...jokes on me! Life did not go this way for me at all. I had a pretty serious boyfriend for two years who shattered my heart and broke me as a person.
I spent the following years in college closed off, and skeptical. I declined offers of dating and slowly single life just became my thing. I haven't been in a relationship since 2012. Have there been opportunities? Yes. Have I wanted to stay single? Yes and no. Have I tried going on dates? Yes. Meeting people organically? Yes. Meeting people through dating apps. Yes :I.  Have I fallen for people since? Yes, the wrong ones haha. Do I fear I'll be alone forever? Sometimes? What do I picture the rest of my life to be like? Truthfully, I've never pictured my future or life not having a family or finding love (thanks Disney ;) ) 
These past four to five months, I've had a LOT of time to self reflect and think about this topic, and there are a few takeaways I can share. 
1. SELF LOVE! It may sound cliché, but this is the big numero uno of where I think most people (myself) need to develop to have a successful relationship. If you've heard it once, you've heard it a thousand times, "You can't love someone until you learn to love yourself." By learning to love yourself, you learn your boundaries. You learn self-respect and how you deserve to be treated. You set the standard for how others treat you by how you treat yourself. You become more confident and in doing so actually make yourself more attractive. You stop tolerating bullshit and honestly get better at seeing through it. You grant yourself grace and are able to treat others better and be a better person for others when you learn to love yourself. So how do you develop self-love? There are many ways to get started! One of the best things I think a person can do to help develop self-love is to start a daily positive affirmation practice. Positive affirmations are positive statements you say about yourself, your life, etc. Saying them at first can be awkward and feel phony, but there are so many studies out there where the continued use of positive affirmations is linked to increased self-esteem, confidence, and self-worth. 
2. EXPECTATIONS. Reader, leave your expectations at the door! I've told you what I expected my life to look like and while I still compare myself to my friends who did end up taking that route, I know that my life would be 100% different had it worked out that way. At this point I wouldn't sacrifice where I am and the adventure life has taken me on to go to that cookie cutter life I thought I wanted. However, when I say letting go of expectations, I'm also talking about the expectations you create for the people you go on dates with. I have the tendency to either plan out my future with a person or cut them off from future endeavors with them within a very short amount of time into trying to get to know them. This is a big no-no! Not only is it kind of crazy, but you're cutting yourself from fully living in the moment and being mindful of getting to know that person. If you want to give yourself the best shot of not getting ahead of yourself and truly giving the person a fair chance without walking down the aisle to them in your head, try to think of each date as an individual letter of the alphabet. Date 1 is letter A. We aren't skipping all the way to letter Z, we are getting to know this person in the moment. We aren't making plans ahead we are solely focused on what this person presents on date A and not what they might give me by date L. Now, this doesn't mean completely cut off plans of the future, but in those first few date scenarios really get to know the essence of that person before you determine if their husband/wife material or if they check all your non-negotiables. 
3. NON-NEGOTIABLES VS DESIRES. Speaking of non-negotiables, lets define what this exactly means. In relationships, there are traits/characteristics we'd like our potential partners to have. These can range from being taller, to being athletic, or a nerd, or loves animals, health conscious, generous, etc. What you, as a single individual need to do is figure out which of these traits fall under desirable or deal breaker. Is the fact that they are 6 foot five inches tall a plus? Heck yes! Would them not being that height make you not want to date them? I can't speak for you on what your deal breakers are, but for me, that isn't a requirement I would need. Just remember that no relationship you have will be perfect and while some people may get lucky in having all of their boxes checked in a significant other, chances are you'll likely be compromising in certain areas. You have to decide what is actually important to you in being with someone long term versus what would be nice to have. What is actually going to make you happiest long term? Green eyes or someone who puts in the effort to make sure you know you're loved? You have to make that call. 
Well reader, I'll leave the love advice there for right now. I hope that if you have someone today that you do let them know how much you care for them. If you don't have someone, I hope you let yourself know how much you love yourself. :) After all, you're stuck with you for the rest of life no matter what! Might as well learn to love what you've got!
Be someone's reason to smile today, even if that person is you! :)
Until next time!

Jordan

Reader, how in the ever loving world is it that we are in the second month of 2021 already!? Is it just me or were we just making plans for the New Year? The older we get, the faster time flies (I'm not a fan!).
Well reader, since we've completed the month, I figured now is as good as any to update you on how this whole goal situation thing is going...
I am glad to announce that I achieved all of my daily goals 23 out of 31 days. The goal that I struggle with the most is the 10 minutes of cleaning every day. When my plans switch mid-day and I come home later than usual, I am not motivated to tack that on to my day. I may need to plan on getting up earlier on the days I know I have things going on to knock it out before work. That leaves the days where I am a little more spontaneous with my life that I'll continue to struggle. 
Weekly, I have not yet accomplished a full week of goals. The goals that I struggle the most with are self-care activities and the completion of strength, yoga, and cardio workouts. I still don't think I fully understand self-care. Moving forward, I think I need to reframe my mind as to what exactly that looks like and try to recognize when I am applying it to life. The workouts are a little tough for me at the moment seeing as most of my workout time is dedicated to doing my ankle exercises. I do get some workouts through my job, which is definitely nice, but I'm not getting all that I would like to be out of the week as far as my physical exercise. This is a more difficult one to tackle as I want to respect my body's needs in my recovery. I may have to temporarily adjust my goals until I can incorporate more legitimate exercise routines into my routine. 
The monthly goal went surprisingly better than I anticipated. The only box that I didn't get checked on my monthly goals, ironically enough is getting three or more blogs in during a month. As you know, if you're following this, I only had two blogs the entire month of January. I had every intention of doing a blog last weekend and then plans changed and my energy/motivation to complete the task vanished. That one is on me. I'll take one. The rest of the goals were surprisingly achievable! I just have to be proactive about completing them. This means for me, planning ahead and initiating social endeavors instead of just being okay with being a spontaneous loner. Definitely a good challenge and a good way to get me out of my comfort zone. 
One of my monthly goals is to recap some of the positive things that occurred that month. I'll share a few of those with you here:

• I played softball again! This was completely unexpected and truthfully I didn't think I'd be at this point for a least another month or so. My body was definitely hating me after the fact (not doing anything for 4 months and then going into play a sport will really kick your ass), but generally speaking my body responded much better than I could have anticipated! It put me in such a good mindset moving forward with the rest of the year and the things I hope to do/accomplish.
• My friend Morgan had her baby!!! Aunt Jordan is probably my favorite title at the moment and I am so excited to take on long distance aunt duties for this little cutie! 
• I'm back at work full time! Getting back into the bullshit of a job is honestly a nice little blessing in itself so you won't be hearing me complain about that one for quite a while!
• I went on my first hike of the year! 
• I accomplished 31 days in a row of participating in a guided meditation.
• I've decreased my TV and social media time. It is easy to fall back into the habit of it, but in general I have done a really good job of limiting my social media intake each day!

Now this is nowhere near the complete list that I made, but in the interest of keeping some of my shit private and not boring you to death with the entire list, we'll make the mutual decision to move on.
How do I feel after a month of this madness? Well reader, to be completely honest, I do feel a little something something going on. I feel like when I've experienced negative situations, I bounce back quicker, I don't allow it to consume my day, and in the moment I can think more rationally. My entire mood is more stable. There is less roller coaster of emotion. I have been able to control my feelings in a way where there are less tears and I am here for it!
Another thing, I've noticed is that I'm trying to be more introspective and present during my interactions with others. I try to stay off my phone and really listen to listen instead of listening to respond. Trying to be more conscientious of how things might impact others. I've also taken on to apologizing more effectively. Not in a way that blames or undermines the other person, but a genuine apology. 
I have to say the the self-growth podcasts that I've discovered continue to pump my mind with new ideas and new thought processes that I'm attempting to implement in my daily life. I know I have a long way to go still, but I do think that I am taking the steps to do the right thing.
How have you been doing with the goals that you've set for yourself? How do you feel about how it has impacted you thus far in the year? Do you need to make adjustments? Do you need to reprioritize? Has life already thrown a curve ball in your direction? Whatever you may be experiencing this far into 2021, I hope that you breathe and know that you're not alone and you can do this!
February makes me a little nervous with the whole goal thing seeing as it is a whole 72 hours less than January, but waking up each morning with intention and knowing what I have to get done is a great place to start!
Please do your best to be the reason someone smiles today reader!
Until next time!
​:) Jordan