Sometimes you have to declare something, put your faith in it and just go with it. That is what happened with 2017 for me. I had declared "The Year Of Carie" at some point when my picture was published in a city calendar. I decided that this was the year that I was going to do things differently. I was going to say yes to writing, I was going to say yes to photo contests, new opportunities at work, and anything that felt right for me.
2017 was filled with major ups and downs for me. I started the year in January with a major depression that left me unable to function properly. I had to get help for that. I had started with a new therapist, trying to heal my traumas, and learn somatic experiencing. It has changed my life. I learned to feel, to heal, to experience all feelings and sensations and emotions and to not shut down, but stay open. I have come further in one year of that therapy than in ten plus years of talk therapy. I am thankful, so grateful.
I opened myself up to new opportunities at work. It has been rewarding. I get to do work with young children and their parents, school aged children learning new things in nature, and now I have the opportunity to bring nature into a classroom setting. For the first time in my life I feel like I have a job that takes a lot, but also gives me a lot. I get to learn new things, be around people excited to be working there, and see nature's beauty while I'm working. I feel very supported in trying new things and I know I'm never alone, I always have support.
I've learned to say no to things that don't feel good in my life and that don't serve me. It has been a tough muscle to flex. I was a yes person. I hate to disappoint others or not meet their expectations. To say no to something that I know is going to upset someone else is so hard for me to do. But this year I decided that I could no longer sacrifice my own self, my own time, my own feelings, my own needs in order to meet someone else's. I'm learning that the best thing I can do for myself is to meet my needs fully before taking on any other demands on me. Otherwise I resent the expectations and stress on me. I don't want to be that person anymore.
With the election of our president in 2017, I discovered that I am an activist at heart. He awoke in me a fighter. I could no longer sit by and say that I didn't want to discuss politics. From the minute he became a serious candidate, I could not even watch him on television. I would have a physical reaction. He as all too familiar to me. A bully. A liar. A master manipulator. I felt it down to my toes and do to this day. I could not hold in my feelings, my comments, my opinions, my knowledge of interaction with similar men in my own life. It wasn't even a choice for me to "give him a chance", it felt too dangerous to me and for once I decided to listen. His policies don't generally stand to hurt me as a white woman who is not poor (aside from the fact that he attacks women and likes to tell them what they can do with their bodies). His tax policy will probably benefit me. I don't use Obamacare. I'm not an immigrant or black. I don't care one damn bit about tax breaks, more choices for healthcare, or borders if it means that my gain will come from pushing down others. I don't want a single thing from him except for him to leave so I don't have to look at him or listen to him and be exposed to his disturbing energy anymore. I cannot imagine how it feels to be an immigrant in this country, or a black man, a poor man, a disabled person, a parent with a sick child, or a woman of color in this country. I'm trying to learn as much as I can about all of their experiences because they are the ones being dismissed, disregarded, or discriminated against. Until they are free, none of us is free. If there is anything for me to be grateful for this year it is that Donald Trump's behavior and words stirred up my trauma and I've been able to channel it to be more compassionate, more understanding, more accepting, and more willing to fight for what I know is right in my heart.
2017 will be a touchstone year for me, I can tell. I know I am different and will never be the same. So what on Earth could 2018 hold for me? I have no idea. No one ever knows what the future holds, but here is what I do know:
I'm planting my flag. The flag on the mountain of me. Big, giant, full me. All of me. The year of Carie was about figuring out who the heck I even was. This year I know a little bit and I intend to know a lot more as I go on in life. I intend to continue to open myself, to feel my feelings, to meet my needs, to say yes to what feels good and right for me and no to what doesn't. I intend to heal, to feel, and to grow. I no longer want to hide parts of me that you might not like, that isn't how it works. I am complex, I am large, I am full of passion and creativity, needs and wants. I have big, fat, hard won opinions and feelings on things that have come with my own experiences and from listening to the experiences of others. I am beautiful and precious, and full of joy and love. I share myself with people who can see me, hear me, know me, accept me and be safe for me. In the words of a friend, only good will come from this.
I don't have a title for this coming year. I don't feel the need to call it anything except my life. My life from here on out. Flag planted on top of the complex woman I now claim as myself. Not hiding. Not shape shifting. Just doing her best every dang day to show up fully herself, for herself and no one else. I'm beyond grateful for the Year Of Carie, I had no idea when I declared it how it would come to pass. I had no idea the people and opportunities and challenges that would come to help reveal her to me. I could NOT have done this year without help and support and challenges to help test me. I'll end with a quote I found for a friend when her first born son arrived almost 13 years ago and she gave him the middle name "Whitman" when I had no idea how much I would need these words in my own life ...
"I am larger, better than I thought. I did not know I held so much goodness." Walt Whitman