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Category: life lessons

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Reflecting on 2020…and Looking Ahead to 2021

What a year. In so many ways, a time of testing, and of turning upside down so many things we held dear or took for granted.

At the same time, it’s been a year with a multitude of blessings: a chance for more calm, more space, more quiet, more time with loved ones, less stress and everyday bustle. We’ve had to really re-evaluate all our commitments and relationships, now with a new context of being safe and responsible regarding the virus, but also with an eye to the new, huge array of opportunities.

I am grateful that my family has experienced blessings in this year, and I’m keenly aware of how difficult this year has been for so many. Many families have lost income, had to relocate in the midst of the pandemic, have juggled competing work and childcare demands, and done it all in isolation from much needed help from family and friends.

In many ways, we were spared from the worst of the crisis. Our family was very lucky not to have our financial wellbeing threatened. We had no job loss or lack of economic opportunities, and we had safely settled into our new home in a great neighborhood just before the lockdown hit. By this time last year, our huge home renovation project was (miraculously) at a calm and reasonable pausing point.

But I also know that none of us were un-affected. The normalcy of going to playgrounds, seeing friends, going to restaurants, museums, and school, was all called into question. My family began to have a totally home-centered life, and while it suits us well and we really love it and thrive here in our home, it was still something that required a stripping of expectations, a surrender, a re-orienting of hearts and minds.

At the beginning of 2020, I choose three words for the year: Simplicity, Savoring, and Surrender.

Choosing words for each year is a practice I began a few years back. I tend to be a performance oriented person. I love my lists, my goals, my short-term and long-term planning. For me, choosing words or themes or virtues to define my year keeps me focused on the gentler, bigger picture of growth and the life I want to live, rather than putting too much emphasis on a list of goals or thresholds to measure my performance or my worth.

Choosing these themes and words has proven to be immensely helpful for me. I like to stick with three, both so that there can be some distinction and diversity between the concepts and also so the alliteration keeps them front of mind.

Clearly, the Holy Spirit had something in mind for me when He led me to simplicity, savoring, and surrender for 2020. Lessons that I’m still unpacking.

In early 2020. I savored our home even as we painted, cleaned, cleared out, and finished many of our spaces to be a place we truly love. I savored many moments with kids, unexpected time with the girls home from school, then a transition to homeschooling this fall. I savored our ability to shape and work hard to create meaning, balance, flow, and peace in days that were now, suddenly, so open-ended.

We savored watching spring turn to summer, watching our littles grow before our eyes, long golden days and evenings in our new garden, romping in the yard, swimming at our local lake, eating dinner outside. We savored all the time with dad during the time he was home with us (in lockdown). We savored regular walks, local hikes, moments in nature, and all things that were “safe” to do. We savored new neighborhood relationships and friendships that deepened during quarantine.

We embraced simplicity, of life and of schedule. Weekly trips to the grocery store were considered our outings. The focus was simple days, simple pleasures, simple moments with kids: sitting and reading to them, playing, cultivating of our home spaces, gardening & tending to our outdoor spaces, cooking, and doing dishes peacefully, after months of living in a constant state of upheaval and stretched between two homes in fall 2019. I saw my kids embrace simpler days and thrive without having to leave our home, neighborhood yards, or walkable town. Their contentment inspired me to dig deeper into simple joyful routines of my own.

Simplicity & embracing what’s essential…giving in to days that prioritize rest, nourishment, connection, and creativity….are beautiful seasons indeed. That’s what 2020 allowed for many of us. Stripping away the extra & superfluous led us deeper into the callings of our heart, our creative natures, allowed us to stretch, learn new things, care for our selves & families & homes in new intentional ways.

I surrendered (not always graciously) to the day-in-day-out demands of motherhood with four littles. The hard moments jumble right up next to the simple and beautiful ones, and it leaves me every evening falling into bed exhausted and knowing I gave my all.

I surrendered my expectations of what home life, work life, and school life would look like, when they all blurred together even more than before (and yet, beautifully, I saw how they informed, inspired, and lifted each other up). I also surrendered the pain and frustration of challenging relationships that were not working anymore, letting go of bitterness and letting our smaller, slower life show me that it was okay to forgive and move onward in peace.

I surrendered my hopes for a school year that would look like the previous ones had and embraced the beautiful mess (sometimes not beautiful, just messy) of homeschooling. I surrendered to a tough(er) first trimester with this baby, grateful that in those early weeks when I napped daily, was constantly nauseous, and rarely (never) made dinner, we had a dear cousin able to come stay with us to help. I surrendered yet again to allowing my work goals to shift and look different for the fall (and yet, somehow to feel more confident and passionate about what I doing than ever before as I watch so many of us step back to reconsider and redesign our lives). We started work on our unfinished basement, and surrendered (me, less than patiently) with the delays, setbacks, and challenges of doing renovation work during Covid-19.

As I look ahead to the spring, I am surrendering my expectations (me, the ultimate planner) to what life will look like with five. I know it will be different, will stretch us, and will be beautiful just as every stage of life has before it.

Surrender doesn’t come easily for me. But I’m immensely grateful for all the opportunities to watch a bigger, better plan unfold this year and to learn to expand my heart and mind, always.

These three themes helped guide, anchor, and motivate me during some of the challenges of the year. They helped me appreciate all the good moments…simple and savoring as they might be.

2020…the year we embraced HOME and fell deeply in love with ours. The year I transitioned from “I’ll never homeschool” to “we’re going to do this and give it our best shot,” and then fell in love with the pace of life it gives us. The year we relished each social gathering and strategically chose the friendships to invest in and allowed others to recede. The year when family became more central than ever.

I will never forget this year. I’m truly grateful for the lessons that I needed to learn. I hope to carry them with me as we step across the threshold of the new year and acknowledge just how much resilience and strength this year has required of us.

Congrats on making it to the end of 2020! You’re a different version of yourself, hopefully a version you’re proud of or surprised by. The odds are that you did some pretty extraordinary things this year, and it’s good to celebrate what you’ve endured and worked through. Here’s to building on all of this, and running into 2021, together!

Curious: What were your main lessons & takeaways from 2020?

Have you ever chosen themes or intentions for your new year?

Have 5 minutes? Take my healthy habits & fulfillment quiz to determine how prepared you are for positive changes in 2021!

Do you feel like you could use a mindset support for your goal, intention, or habit setting? Check out my inspired life coaching program, and my 5 week signature life design course as a way to jumpstart your new year.

Thanks for being part of my 2020. You’re a big part of the reason why I wake up every day inspired, hopeful, and ready to continue doing my small part to make this world better, brighter, kinder.

Fear and darkness will not win.

2021…let’s do this!

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10 Lessons about Transformation from Our Experience Renovating an Old Home

*Shout out of gratitude for my sister Annie who faithfully edits & improves these posts!*

Exactly a year ago, we signed the papers & grabbed the keys for our very own fixer upper home project, one that we knew would stretch & challenge us. In some ways, it’s a very good thing we didn’t know just how in over our heads we would feel last fall as we rushed to renovate most of the main spaces before moving in. We had no idea how it would all unfold, but we were excited & ready.

The good news is, here we are, a year later…so happy, so grounded and at home in this space that’s both old and new. It’s been a shelter & our true happy place during the turmoil of 2020. We’re thrilled with the progress we’ve made and always neck deep in the next project. Currently working on Phase II which is finishing the large basement & creating our ideal rec room, and finishing the mud room (garage entrance) and laundry space.

I sketched the outline for this post a year ago when I was fresh out of the late nights—staying up painting trim, welcoming crews each morning, and just generally in the thick of it. Even at that time, I could tell the experience was changing me and changing our family. But as with all things, it’s taken time for this post to go from a seed in my mind to germinated thoughts & experiences in full bloom.

Now, a full year later, I’m excited to take this anniversary as an opportunity to share some of these thoughts about our #pidelprojecthome (@pidelprojecthome).

  1. Transformations require massive amounts of patience.

We live in a world of quick updates & slap-dash before/afters bombarding us from social media. Not everyone likes to acknowledge the slow process, the messy middle, the curveballs, the two-steps-forward-one-step-back that comes with real, beautiful, timeless transformations…of homes and of our hearts & selves.

2. It often has to look worse before it looks better. 

Picture any house after the demo process of ripping everything out—piles of dust & old radiators, moldings, junk everywhere. We literally had four dumpsters for our project over the span of four months, slowly carting away old layers of the house to replace it with new.

It’s a bit like someone in the middle of a KonMari de-cluttering when all their belongings are laid out in piles on their floor. It can be hard to start these kinds of excavations of spaces and selves because we’re fearful of this element of the process. It quickly becomes larger than our control, and we have to surrender to the process itself, until with the lack of tidiness comes a true sense that big things are happening here. That’s when we have to lean in.

3. People won’t undertand the process and that’s okay. 

During our intense nine-week timeframe for renovation (yes, we did it as a major sprint because we didn’t have to be living there during the time), I felt like we were in a bubble, a completely all-engrossing cloud, that others couldn’t really reach us in.

That was hard for me at first, and then I became at peace with it. Sometimes, when you’re committed to making big changes in your life, and you set out to take those actions, it will feel lonely at first. Things are shifting & the relationships in your life may change too. Not everyone will be able to relate to where you are and why you’re doing it. That’s okay. Once you move past the grief of this, it can be incredibly freeing.

And these times of intense growth can still allow for powerful relationships, it just has to be based on a new kind of communication and an acknowledgment of just how different things are. You need people who can love you where you’re at, as you evolve. Anyone who can relate to & stick with you through an intense growth phase is a keeper, a friend you will value more deeply than ever. 

4. The vision is what will enable you to carry through the tough moments.

I talk a lot about vision boards. There’s something so important and powerful about creating a clear vision of where you’re headed. With design, it’s obviously an essential step to creating the new space, but it has a similar importance when we’re considering the future life that we’re creating for ourselves (and how our own personal work ties into that life vision).

It’s scary, but so powerful to put a visual up on a wall (yes, I’m a big believer in doing it old-school style for maximum daily connection) to remind yourself every day where you’re headed. Keeping eyes on that vision is your best chance to pulls through the tough moments when we wonder whether it’s all worth it. 

5. The result of hard work is always beautiful, and you’re forever changed. 

This one is so simple, but so powerful. When we sat up & rubbed the dust off (and took off our painting clothes), we looked at each other, my husband and I, and marveled at just how much we had changed, alongside the spaces we were working on.

Our hearts & our eyes can see when work has been poured into a space (or a personal transformation). The love and care & detail that went into it becomes its spirit. Same with our own inner work: the results show up in who we become and enter into every future interaction we have. It’s the BE-DO-HAVE model, lived out. In order to be ready to welcome our abundant beautiful life in our new home, it required us to allow ourselves to change first, before having what we had desired & envisioned. (More on this in my life design program if you’re intrigued)

6. Simplicity is always a good idea. Complicating things creates more excuses, mental clutter, & reasons for it not to work. Keep it simple. 

This is just as true with personal growth as with an old home. Don’t overcomplicate things. Stay focused on the vision & the clear path that can get you there. Over-complicating things is usually a form of resistance—our brain & ego keeping us from just GOING FOR IT and going all in.

7. You will NOT do it alone.

Yes, you may experience loneliness as you realize that your former relationships aren’t carrying you in the same way on this courageous journey you’re on. But in reality, there will be key people who serve as inspiration, as mentors, as coaches, as friends, and you will be amazed by the NEW help & relationships that come into your life when you undertake this kind of journey. We absolutely learned this during our project, and we were blown away by the people that stepped up & truly saw this project out to its conclusion, even when the going got tough and the deadlines were real. 

8. The effort is transformative in itself because we learn to work hard for things that matter to us.

This one was a hard one for me, and boy did our home renovation teach us this. It’s easy to focus on the glamorous side of a reno: picking out the tiles, materials, and colors. But then you hit the nitty gritty: the late nights, encouraging workers to meet their deadlines, hauling materials in every weekend, the millions of runs to Home Depot, bringing out boxes and boxes in an ice storm as part of project clean up…these are the experiences that make us love & value our home even more. The lessons learned from the hard work can be seen as their own reward…and they add to the beauty of the final product!

9. Break it into simple, doable steps, day by day, so as not to get overwhelmed.

This is very true in reno life. It’s literally, one thing at a time, one layer at a time, overlapping trades needed for certain moments, building upon each other’s work. The over-arching goal remains, but the steps & focus for each day is bite-sized. The way we kept ourselves from being overwhelmed in moments with this huge house project was to focus on what we could accomplish just in that day or week. Then the next. And soon…you realize it’s nearly complete!

It’s true in our personal work too. It’s why I coach my clients not to set too many goals or priorities…feeling overwhelmed will keep you from moving any of them forward. Same thing goes for setting stretch or unreachable goals—we need to be working on something that we can see to the end of, and then we go a bit further the next time, building momentum & confidence as we go. Set yourself up to have frequent, small wins, and soon you’ll be addicted to the stretch & growth of personal development.

We moved in 4 days before Christmas so this felt like a true Christmas miracle.

10. Stay humble and make gratitude the focus.

Loving attention to detail, bringing order & beauty, and new life & vision out of old & worn out habits/patterns/ways of life is the great gift we are all called to discover & live. Transforming an old home last year drove home all these lessons that I’ve been learning in my own work in personal development, my own journey, as well as coaching others through transformations in their health, life, and businesses. 

The gift of living in a home that has been transformed through a vision made reality by daily sweat, communication, logistics, and effort, that we had the privilege to shape, design, and put intentional effort is a great reminder of a deep truth about all transformations. Namely, we must trust the process, build patience, stay open to all the ways that change, once begun, will be out of our control and will take us to places we’ve never even imagined going.

However, the initial choice is always ours—to take a chance and begin to tear down old walls, so that new ones can be built. 

Are you ready to tear down some walls? To embrace a journey of transformation that encompasses all aspects of mindset, facing resistance to change, and powering into a place of inspired momentum, check out my life design course, enrolling now for fall 2020, the last time it will be open until spring 2021! 

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Life lessons from my garden

Maddy’s note: this is my 100th blog post! I had no idea when we started this humble project a few years back, where it would take us, and how much we would enjoy the process. Thanks to all you faithful readers, and a huge shout-out and thank you to my sister Annie, my talented editor.

This post was featured in the Theology of Home roundup on August 5, 2020.

Our humble garden has been changing the pace of our summers for four years now. 

It started as a fun project that we took on when moving to the “country,” and has become something we look forward to each year. The first year was a lesson in many things, but mostly in eagerness. We enjoyed building the beds and planting a large multitude of different seeds and seedlings, only to realize we could overcrowd the plants, and that we had alot to learn about tending them into a fruitful harvest.

When I started my gardening habits four years ago, I was in a season of mild postpartum anxiety (PPA) and was generally overwhelmed. Adjusting from two to three kids was hard for me, and on top of that, we had made a big (wonderful) move to a more rural lifestyle, out of the crazy hustling pace of New York City. It was a lot of change, and I needed a full reset of the pace that I’d grown accustomed to. I knew that life could be simpler, slower, and richer in little ways, but I struggled to relinquish the cultural pressures of hustle, “more,” and “instant,” and my kids did too.

As we learned to tend our plants that first summer, I saw a shift in all of us. Of appreciation for simple daily miracles, of slowness, of wonder at the beauty of our world, and at our chance to cultivate a small corner of it. 

Over these four summers, we’ve spent some beautifully memorable hours prepping, tending to it (though we’re very low-maintenance about it relative to some expert gardeners), and of course, harvesting, as we are now in July and August. 

There are cherry tomatoes we eat like candy, herbs for nightly dinner enhancements (and cocktails, of course), and other things like cucumbers and zucchinis, eggplant, bell peppers, that appear almost overnight and miraculously…the growth can almost be seen if you watch closely. It reminds me of how it feels to watch my children, ages almost 10 to 18 months, growing before my eyes with the simple ingredients of summer: food, sunshine, and long hours of play. 

In a culture that emphasizes and values consumption over all (think our overflowing homes, netflix subscriptions and screen consumption, constant need for new, different, the way social media fans the flames of need cycles), I know that our humble attempt to grow a garden is something that helps me pause. To lean towards other values. Of cultivation, care-taking, and a slower pace of life. 

Why we garden: some thoughts

Gardening is an excellent form of the “unplugging” and resetting that we all need, especially in the midst of a year that has challenged everything about our sense of normalcy. 

In the past, we, like many other families, have gone down the path of summertime crowding and the “consumption” of experiences like camps, activities at the library, and vacations away. I’m still sometimes guilty of falling prey to this, but the presence of our garden and the life flourishing right there in that patch, pulls me back to a more grounded reality, helping me relish staying home and living expansively within our spaces.

A book that I read last summer drove home this perspective from another angle. There are some nearly forgotten values that we would do well to build our lives on—sustainability, cultivation, peace, patience, and a long-term perspective. Cultivating these values leads us to make decisions that have positive ripples for years and decades to come.

I don’t know how much my kids will remember of all of this, or if they will cherish home grown foods or choose to plant a garden in their future lives, but I do know that they take so much pride in the veggies they are growing here today. They eat them willingly, proudly tasting the fruits of their labor, and I believe they have a deeper sense of wonder and appreciation for the earth and its fruits knowing the process that we go through, from seed to harvest. 

Living in tune with nature’s rhythms

When we start our seeds in the frigid April air of Connecticut or buy our tiny seedlings from local farms in May, we are committing with hope and joy to the cycles of the year; the long hot days are soon to come. 

And in August, when the cherry tomatoes are bursting with ripeness and we walk by and pop them in our mouths as we wander around the yard, it’s a reminder of the goodness of each season and of just how much the little things, simple and fleeting as they may seem, can truly mark and ground our lives. (Do you think we would appreciate juicy summer tomatoes the same way if every day was hot and tomato season was year round? I doubt it.) 

When we get a sudden, strong, mid-afternoon summer storm, I sigh happily knowing that nature is doing its watering (even if it means we have to get creative with our rainy day plans). There’s a bigger life cycle at work that we’re tapping into. There’s something to be said for living with these seasonal rhythms that remind us, a time for everything and everything in its time. 

This year, the four kids each had the chance to be responsible for designing and tending to one of the garden beds as we built. They enjoyed every aspect from moving soil, picking out seedlings from a local organic farm, and planting their selection of herbs, veggies and flowers. It was a process that kept us happily busy for long spring days, and now they burst with pride when picking veggies for dinner or showing yard guests the growth of their gardens. 

Keeping it simple

All these plants really need are good soil, sun, and plentiful water—sometimes rain, sometimes overzealous hose soaks from the kids, or a gentle sprinkler mist, mid-day, that helps punctuate our routines and outdoor time.

The garden welcomes whatever attention it gets, and these plants are hard-wired to thrive. The other day my daughter was having a tough moment and I told her that plants grow and do well when we sing to them. Now I’ll see her pausing in the middle of her play to sing a short song to them (or catch the dragon fly that always linger there) before she goes back to her games. 

It’s easy to over-complicate gardening, like anything in life. Or to focus on the results (I have a zucchini plant that is HUGE, but not producing fruit! Puzzling, but I’m going with it). Keeping our expectations for the garden project low has meant that we welcome and relish all the harvest we get, and we stay curious/learn from mishaps or things that don’t turn out as planned.

Creating Space

Turns out–we learned from our beginners’ eagerness the first year, you can definitely over-crowd a garden space, causing nothing to grow very well because each plant is competing for the key ingredients to a good life: sun, water, and soil nutrients. 

When I’m pruning my tomato plants, cutting back the stems and growth that, while pretty, will keep the plant from flourishing and producing fruit, I’m struck by the metaphor for our lives. I’ve distilled this metaphor/life lesson into a phrase that’s become a guiding principle of my life (and of my signature life design course): “create space”. In order for the good stuff to flourish (and even before we may fully see it coming to fruit), we have to diligently prune and make room in our lives so that the good fruit can make itself known.

Cultivating patience

As anyone who knows me well can attest, patience is not my strong suit. 

Sometimes my impatience leads to gardening catastrophe. Last year I had a great bunch of seeds germinating in my laundry room in trays, and I transplanted them just a wee bit too soon, before it was warm enough…they didn’t make it. 

Fortunately, I also have kids who help me grow in this virtue. Tending to little ones (plants or humans) requires ample amounts of patience. Like when I’m teaching my toddler to enjoy watching (not tugging or touching) the green tomatoes, growing in size in June and July, and reminding him to wait until they are perfectly red (or purple) before we pick.

How much more we appreciate and savor the long awaited veggie when it’s finally ripe and ready for the sauce-pan or the salad bowl. And how much more our patience reminds us of the value of what we’re anticipating.

Accepting the times of hidden growth, and of times of blossoming

This year, in our new space, I’ve been marveling at watching the growth up close, and with plot twists. With late frosts and a beach trip, we planted everything pretty late, and the first few weeks it felt like we might never see growth. Between little seedlings trying to survive the elements, some pebbles lovingly thrown at them, sporadic watering, and a child’s attempt to “weed” them, our plantings just couldn’t catch a break. And since this was a new garden plot we didn’t know if it would be the winning combo of sun, shade and distance from roving animals. 

But we kept doing all the steps, and trusting the process, more instinctively now, without knowing what kind of a bounty we would get.

Sure enough, after weeks of what felt like incremental growth came a week of heavy daily rains and an explosion of blooms, blossoms, fruits, and veggies just appearing, literally from day to day, before our eyes. 

Nothing can prepare you for that sudden shift from nothing to something, from barrenness to fruit, from hopefulness to gratitude. But like everything in life, we have to accept that there are patient, long, dry periods, followed by the beautiful blossoms, fruits of prayer and work and living, that make it all worthwhile, and cause us to marvel: “how could all this bounty have come from such a tiny (hopeful) starting point?” 

In the garden, as in life, it feels like a miracle, every time. We simply have to trust and stay present to the process as it unfolds. 

Garden rhythms, a slower life

I’m someone that thrives on rituals or daily rhythms. Loose enough (room for adjustments and spontaneity), but structured nonetheless. Moms’ lives can feel a bit chaotic at times, so I look for predictable elements that I can plug into and offer as guideposts to the kids, especially on these long summer days. 

Midday naps, morning work and chores, then afternoon simple outings, and predictable morning routines all work for me. Mornings are my best chance to fit in my necessary quiet, recharging moments like an early morning run or walk in nature—sneaking away to be alone with my thoughts.

The rituals of tending to a garden (water, weed, harvest), which I at first saw as yet another thing on the to-do list, has become embedded in how we do summer. When I turn on the hose for a midday garden watering, it often turns into sprinklers and water play. When I take the few minutes needed to weed a bit or harvest, I savor the long evening rays of the sun hitting the garden and their nearby swing, the kids play around me, or I help them harvest without destroying the plants in the process. The pre-dinner ritual is to plan our meal based on what’s ripe and ready to be eaten…and to grab the herbs, veggies and anything else we need to craft our meals.

We live a moment of gratitude for this gift of food growing right here, for our enjoyment.

It’s good to feel connected to the process and helpful to the growth of a garden, but not fully responsible. Like the “soul gardening” I’m doing with my littles. 

I can’t imagine summer without these garden rhythms, and I pray that the slower pace of life, and the new rhythms we’ve welcomed (often reluctantly) in 2020, sink deeply into all of us, helping pull us out of our modern busyness & hustle, and reminding us of just how much goodness and beauty lies in timeless rituals of cultivation, care-taking and living in tune with nature.

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Themes of 2018: How These Three Key Ideas Have Shaped Our Year as a Family

This past January, the very beginning of 2018, I was encouraged by one of my wise mentors to look at 2-3 themes or intentions for the year ahead. These would be key words or phrases that tied into my vision board and that would guide my approach to the new year and to the monthly or 90 day action plans and goals that I might set. I think we both knew that an overarching theme would help make my short-term goals more meaningful.

I wanted to pause and reflect on how these themes played out for us this year and to share this concept with all of you in case it’s a valuable one for looking at 2019, which is right around the corner.

This quote has come to capture so well what I feel convicted to live, and to encourage others in.

I know for me, sometimes looking at a new year, and aiming to set goals can feel intimidating. We know life can change so much, take unexpected turns, in life, job, career, family, and we want to make sure that our goals will be in line with the big picture vision even as it may change in detail.

I hear this from many folks I work with, that it’s much easier to set monthly or 90 day goals, and harder when it comes to longer stretches of time, like a full year. But, at the same time, the power of a new year is just that—imagining how different life can be a year from now, and embracing the love for that progress and transformation that we’re ready to experience.

For me, setting up themes for 2018 that applied throughout the year helped bridge the gap between the future I imagine and the reality of my more short-term goals. It’s also allowed me to smile and sometimes even laugh out loud at God’s sense of humor.

So, without further ado, here are my three key themes for 2018 and some musings on how these themes played out in my life and in our life as a family in the last year.

Theme 1: CREATE SPACE

The first theme I focused in on this year was to CREATE SPACE. This is a phrase I use a lot, in my business, coaching and general approach to life. I find that when we declutter our spaces, schedules, lives, we allow room for the GOOD stuff. You know, the moments we want to remember for a long time.

I’ve spent years glorifying the hustle (a remnant of my Brooklyn lovin’, NYC bustlin days)… even with several kids in tow, and a few things have helped me shift away from worshiping being busy (or hiding behind my busyness as an excuse for why my bigger dreams and life goals weren’t getting tackled).

One of them reaching a point of frustration with the pace, and realizing it wasn’t allowing me to fully enjoy each day and the little moments with the kids, that can be packed with meaning. Another avenue for mindset change was a book called “Chasing Slow”—and the other one was a book called “The Best Yes,” which is about the beautiful grace of saying no, to the things in life that we can feel pressured to do or take on, so that we have the energy, mental focus and ability to say YES and be all in on the things that we truly value or feel called to do. These books, as well as our intentional family move 18 months ago to the country for a naturally slower pace of life, and embracing this with my children—and seeing how they like to live their best days—it’s all led me to the conviction that we need to work hard—in our social media driven, commercial, NOISY world, to carve out that beautiful space in which to live meaningful days, with lots of intention, connection to the small (and big) tasks. It takes real effort, and is so worthwhile.

For 2018, there were plenty of things I said no to, especially in the early parts of the year…when I was feeling called to a deeper rest, a deeper, more peaceful family life, and new rhythms, that helped us finally get the hang of the 3 kids thing, and to all thrive. It also looked like carving out time in the spring to train for a half marathon, to launch the girls to the end of an amazing first year in their new school, and then to welcome baby #4, right at a time when we were heading into a summer of slower rhythms and beautiful days with nature as a forefront focus—-lazy days at our local lake beach, long days in the backyard, the kids enjoying stretching themselves in all the ways they know how.

Creating space to welcome a new life into our family, and to continue having a flow and rhythms that work well into the fall, has been such a blessing. Yes, it’s hard to fight the pressure at times, for more extracurriculars, more volunteer things (that I love), or more errands (ok, not hard to fight those off!), but my heart was craving LESS, along with the 2nd theme, so that’s been our work.

I think that we’ll learn these lessons all over again when we welcome another babe in January 2019 and zero in on just the most simplified and beautiful rhythms to support and nourish the family during that season that’s coming up. I know I don’t want to miss the important moments, and CREATING SPACE started as an exploratory theme for the year, and is now the baseline for a full life by design course that I’m launching for all of us to work through in early 2019.

Theme 2: CONTENTMENT

The second theme for 2019, CONTENTMENT.

This one is hard for someone like me. I’m a thinker-ahead—focus on the future, often itching for the next thing…sometimes living in the future at the expense of the present. This has had it’s advantages for me, but as a mother, it too often creates a pull that disquiets me. I felt in prayer and in chats with my husband, Joel, that I needed to really embrace this theme and nurture more contentment. With a business that can always demand more, and with family life and motherhood always able to tempt me to MORE…I wanted to be able to wake up each day, and say—it’s ENOUGH. What I’m doing today, what we’ll get done, where we’ll go, how we’re living, with simplicity and focus on our family values, it’s ENOUGH.

How many of us know our hearts need this! I had a few books that were helping in this regard—and one of them has a title some of you may laugh at. It’s called “Happy Are You Poor”…and my dear husband recommended it to me as we had these conversations about being content with the present moment, and what we have, rather than staying in a striving mode. It’s a reminder that more of worldly things is not what makes our hearts either at peace, or brought to their full fulfillment. It’s a good wake up call, and reminder. Another fantastic read for me was the 8 doors of the kingdom, meditations on the beatitudes, reminding us that detachment and focus on other than earthly things are what sets our hearts at peace. The books mentioned above (“Chasing Slow”) was also helpful in this regard.

And truly, some days in the summer, as I looked around at our slow, peaceful rhythms, and as I focused on not desiring things, not shopping online, not scrambling for business goals, more followers, more extracurriculars, more, more more, I found that I was happier. And this happiness brought more clarity to me–of what I was truly seeking when making goals or plans. I think this one needs to carry through for me into this coming baby season as well. Getting away from measuring worth, accomplishment, or my treasure in the wrong places.

And I found that in my contentment, my relationships and my impact could be more real and less forced. It’s so important for gratitude to be the baseline of our lives, that they can be fully rich. I journal daily (this habit has fully clicked back in this year), and the themes of knowing what I HAVE, and how good it really is, helps balance out my approach to growth, in various areas of life or work.

Theme 3: COMMUNITY

The final theme for 2018 was COMMUNITY. We were 6 months into a new home, new school, and new area when the new year hit, and I knew we were called to dive in and both foster community where we’re landed, as well as reach out in faith and form new bonds of community across miles, where appropriate.

In Jan of this year, we launched a postpartum community that has become a beautiful group of women and friends that I value deeply. We cheer each other on, listen to challenges, and encourage in the most fragile and important stages of healing, growing, and thriving after a birth. I am so grateful for how it’s blossomed and developed–especially as I prepare for another postpartum. Additionally, we’ve formed a few other important communities around different topics—business related, beautifully growing the influencers reading group I love dearly, and some communities on healthy motherhood and kids.

Then in our day to day lives, on the ground, we were able to dive more fully into the school community we’re blessed to be a part of, and to have real, deep friendships begin to take root—both among the kids, and with the parents. Which led us to beautiful summer nights up LATE under the stars, sharing wine and laughter with amazing new friends, who we now can’t imagine life without. Or beach days lingering into dusk, with the kids playing sand soccer, and celebrating life and sunshine with good people.

These are my 3 themes for 2018—I’m still marveling at how real and relevant they continued to be for me, even as my monthly goals, task lists, and details of life shifted.

For 2019…well, I have some that I’m close to committing to, but I’ll probably save them for another new year’s post.

I’d love to hear from you—do you explore themes and intentions as you kick off a new year? Will you explore themes and intentions as part of welcoming 2019? It’s fun if they start with the same letter, but not necessary, of course 😉 If you have any experiences to share about thinking in themes for seasons of life, I’d love to hear about it!

If you’re interested in trying this for the year 2019, I recommend just spending some time journaling, talking to those you trust, and seeing what comes up for you! You might be surprised at how quickly your heart and mind land on the themes you need to embrace for peace and growth in the coming year.

A super fun word of the year generator can provide additional inspiration and hilarity (while it’s random, it seemed uncannily relevant from all the folks we did it with last year). My word of 2018 that was generated for me was BALANCE. I can’t say I have it fully figured out, but I’m worlds more balanced in many aspects of life than I felt a year ago, at the holidays.

So here’s to a fresh start, a new perspective, a new way to approach new years.

Much love and thank you for being part of this blogging journey in 2018. I had no idea where it would lead and I’m just having a blast as we continue onward and upward!

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Importance of Stretching practices in a balanced life

This image is very appropriate here: as I had just sustained a minor foot injury  (Sept 2017) that was nagging me, and that led me to reflexology treatments, and a full re-balancing of the body, and new insights/experiences into how our body is designed to function and heal itself continually!

Brendon Burchard (you’ll hear me reference him alot, his work has had a big impact on me), in his High Performance Habits book, talks about the importance of daily mindful movement for optimal thriving and functioning at our best selves. He talks about daily walks for boosting brain function/clarity (runs work for this too—you know those aha moments and piercing insights or clarity you have when doing walks or runs? We can and should build this into our everyday, for optimal mind-body function).

And he also talks about daily stretching, and how in the high performers he studies, all of them at the top levels of performance are working out or being active 5 times a week–much more than the average population—a nice correlation to performance that I can get behind–as a health coach and athlete. I know it helps my mood, my mothering, my self-image, focus and so much more when I’m regularly exercising. It’s a no-brainer to make time for it.

I was intrigued that he brought up stretching, specifically, but it very much fits with his peak performance mind/body connection emphasis, and the idea that when energy is “stuck” or we’re tight in our bodies, we can daily bring awareness to that, release it, and move forward more effectively, rather than staying with the same patterns of behavior, thinking or “stuckness”.

This REALLY rings true with my experience with the benefits of reflexology, essentially using the body’s maps on our feet (and face) to become aware of where things are stuck/need healing, and promoting that process through our own healing work.

(More on my life-changing reflexology experiences in another post, in any case, many of these things came together for me and I wanted to share them in case it supports your overall philosophy and decision to bring more low-impact and mindful movement into your day).

“The body benefits from movement, and the mind benefits from stillness”

More on Stress Relieving practices and tips in an upcoming post on Adrenal Fatigue. It’s amazing how connected all of this is, for whole-being health which is what we’re after.

Stay tuned, and hop on my email list (at top) to be sure we can keep having these important conversations!

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Life lessons my children are teaching me right now

Oh my goodness.

This moment in time is one I want to remember for many many years to come. My 3 littles are these incredibly beautiful, blossoming ages, and I just am blown away by all that they are doing, becoming, and how much they are showing me about life, and the many facets of what it means to be alive, and to be in the present moment, while embracing growth. So much is learned from these simple, beautiful, un-tamed hearts. Sure, they make me crazy and some days, exhausted, but I decided for this post to share with you my focus on the incredible lessons that they are teaching me, and for myself, so that it sinks in deeply and I can treasure these lessons for what they are…beautiful gifts from God, who is always putting the people in our lives (literally, plopped into my body and heart) to teach us needed lessons about life and love, and becoming more of who we are truly meant to be.

Emma L. Pidel

My eldest girl, my absolute joy, she’s a ray of warmth and lightness and is so sensitive to beauty, to others, to sadness, she’s like a beautiful wildflower, growing in the sun, but delicately battered by rain. I remember even as a baby, how sensitive she was to the world around her, and that challenged and stretched me at the time, and it continues to! She’s never happier than when creating–primarily with color and paper (art of any media) but also now with writing; her stories, imaginary games and worlds become the focus of the other children, and we all get swept up into them, so powerful is her imagination and her desire to make it real.

The other day she said to me, coming from out of the blue, or perhaps when I was brushing off something that had happened in the midst of a busy moment…”Mom. but it’s OK to feel sad. You can’t just be happy and feel positive all the time.” Those words hit deeply with me and I realized that she needed to see another side of me from time to time. She knows that I have my down moments, as we all do, and she was encouraging me to let that be part of my mothering, rather than putting on a good face and mustering along. What wisdom of spirit! And that vulnerability chosen as strength is where Emma so excels, and where she teaches me so much. She may be little (she’s always been one of the most petite ladies for her age) but she shines so brightly due to her generosity and her desire to expand other’s hearts and their deep joy–all while telling them (and us)–it’s OK, you don’t have to be happy all the time…that’s not how life works. Her melancholic understanding of life coupled with her trained optimism that we’re always working on, is something that inspires me daily, and that I know will richly bless so many others.

Corinne E. Pidel

Oh, my spitfire. Every since she popped into the world on July 5th, weighing in at 9lbs 12 oz, my little firecracker has been making sure that people notice her in every way, every day. Sometimes, that takes ugly temper-tantrum on the sidewalks form, but other times it means she runs into her school and her entire class comes and hovers around her, eager to hear what she has to say, and to follow her around (I kid you not). We’re always working on the leadership side of things and channeling all that CEO mentality she’s already got bottled up inside her. Believe me, she wants to, and probably could run the household for a day if I let her…and I’m tempted but I know in just a few years she’ll be such a brilliant lady to have on my team, so we’re always navigating the sources of power, in all ways large and small. She teachers me, with her fiercely beautiful stubborn streak, that we should STAND UP and fight for what matters to us, large or small, and to know deep down what it is that we want, and what we are about in the world.

She has a piercing sense of fairness and the need to keep agreements in place, so I watch, and marvel, as this little human navigates all the people, situations and environments that she has in front of her. She takes risks whenever possible–OK, sounds like someone else we know. But her enthusiasm and confidence are at such heights when she’s flipping on the playground or trampolining across my living room on these winter eves–she truly marvelously pushes herself to go further, faster, harder, and boy, don’t we all need a little bit of that drive and energy sometimes? Since she has a tender heart under her tougher exterior, I learn much from her about finding little ways and opportunities to let love shine through; it’s not going to look the same for all of us; and in her case, sometimes love looks like laying down clear boundaries and even a few rules, with much explanation of course.

She’s finding her way with full force, and I am so humbled that I get to be her mommy and learn so much patience, trust and peace along the way. Being 4 and trying to understand all that life throws at us is TOUGH. In fact, it’s tough no matter what the age. We can’t always just lay down and have a good cry, but being OK with that reality and the mystery of our power to shape our existence, is certainly always something to grapple with. She’s taught me this, and so, so so much more.

I have no doubt she’ll be a CEO, or running her own company, or non-profit, or doing some other such incredible things some day, and I’ll look back and smile and chuckle over all those moments when she lost it because she couldn’t understand why she wasn’t in charge of the whole show at age 4.

Ambrose. J.T. Pidel

Oh, my babe. I start to tear up when I rock him for his naps and think about the fact that he’s growing up, he doesn’t really need me in the way that he used to, a year ago. This year has been SUCH a gift and he’s taught me some incredible lessons. His gentle, loving, upbeat and fun personality is contagious-how he is in turn affects his sisters and their moods, and it affects me.

He’s constantly smiling at us to get us to smile back, and he now has this sweet trick where he’ll come running over and pull on me until I sit and cozy up with him on the couch, and he’ll sit contentedly in my lap, chatting away and telling me (in gibberish) everything that he’s thinking about, complete with serious facial expressions and chuckles. He’s teaching me, with his absolutely fearless and fierce nature, to push ahead towards the things that are beyond me reach just yet, or are hard for me. That’s how we learn, that’s how we grow.

Seeing him tackle obstacles like the nearest chair, or navigating getting down a flight of stairs (hint; It ends well), he does so smiling widely, and when he falls, he just grins and goes right back at it. Isn’t that all that many of us can aspire to be like, failing forward and seeing the bumps and bruises of life, as a sign that we’re on the right path and we’re learning, it’s not supposed to be perfect and seemly, and together all the time. And his sweet fascination with literally everything that comes across his path or sight reminds me to dive in more deeply to understand  how something works and why it came to be. He reminds me that I love phemonelogy for this reason…the power of experiencing an object and the joy, suprrise and all that it gives.

He’s teaching me to love and give second chances no matter what history is there (with his sisters rough housing him) and his beautiful wide open approach to welcoming the new day—running off to explore something new with sheer delight at being alive. Yes, I’m learning so much from him too, and it’s all so wonderful to watch unfold.

These children, grace and hope are abundant in their spirits, may they always live the deep and bright mysteries of the present moment, as they are doing now. I’m so humbled and truly lucky to be their mother, and as much as I wake up and pray for the wisdom to guide and form them, they are teaching me lessons that are sinking deeply into my core and changing me.