four decades on this earth feels like a milestone for sure. people keep asking me how i feel about turning 40 and honestly, i feel more than okay with it. there is an odd cautiousness about this birthday, a wary acknowledgement of the stereotypical backlash that is supposed to happen, some mid-life crisis where i feel the compelling desire to go back to my twenties steeped in regret and unsettled about all the things i haven’t yet checked off my life’s To-Do list. god that’s depressing and that couldn’t be further from my truth, thankfully.

it’s not that my life is perfect (not even close), or that i’ve done and experienced everything i though i coulda, woulda, shoulda by now. hardly. i think it’s simply that somewhere along the way i recognize that i have let go of any expectations of how my life should be. long ago i diverted form the prescribed path and eventually, through winding and feeling my way, made peace with that. in the process of all the bumps and bruises, all the surprises and remarkable moments, i looked around at some point and realized that i had discovered my own Life.

in these forty years i have also found my Faith, a huge metaphysical love affair with the universe and the powers that be, and an unwavering belief that my life will unfold in the way it’s simplymeant to. again, this doesn’t mean it’s all rainbows and perfection or that there is no work to be done along the way.  it is quite the opposite.  there is so much to do, so much to learn, and embracing the imperfection of the process is part of the wisdom i have stumbled upon… my life isn’t broken and neither am i, and i don’t need to fix anything or apologize for who i am. i simply need to live and love the best i can at any given moment and that that will always be imperfect too, and that is more than good enough.

i’ve come to know as well, in a powerful and steadfast way, that every single day without fail there is the extraordinary, transcendent, and incendiary.  it is always there waiting for me, to meet me when i’m in need of inspiration, light and a guiding north star… all i have to do is look up. my life has a purpose beyond me.  i know this is an incredible gift. it propels me forward, even on the darkest of days. the flow of creativity, connection, and finding passion and authenticity is the river that runs straight through me. i understand now, this river is Me.

my life is beautiful, challenging, exciting, heart wrenching, fulfilling, messy, and overflowing with love and grace.  forty turns around the sun has taught me so much already, and i truly am appreciative for every blessing and every lesson that is my life unfolding.

to think that there is still another forty years yet to come! who knows what awaits. i am armed and ready, and ridiculously and immeasurably grateful that i get to continue on this adventure! it’s been an unimaginable journey thus far, grander, more difficult, and more rewarding than i could ever have guessed.

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Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, And sorry I could not travel both And be one traveler, long I stood And looked down one as far as I could To where it bent in the undergrowth; Then took the other, as just as fair, And having perhaps the better claim Because it was grassy and wanted wear, Though as for that the passing there Had worn them really about the same, And both that morning equally lay In leaves no step had trodden black. Oh, I marked the first for another day! Yet knowing how way leads on to way I doubted if I should ever come back. I shall be telling this with a sigh Somewhere ages and ages hence: Two roads diverged in a wood, and I, I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference.