Happy MONDAY. Coming Up Roses comin’ atcha…NOT from a hospital bed, praise the sweet Lord baby Jesus. But comin’ atcha from mandatory “bed rest.” I said it before, I’ll say it here, and I’m sure I’ll say it a few thousand more times over the course of the next few months (heck, weeks) – God’s a funny dude. ALSO: First thing’s first – I can’t thank y’all enough for just being so. dang. awesome. J + I were just really overwhelmed by the outpouring of kindness + lovelovelove from the CURowd and then some through everything that is unexpectely happening in our little family’s life right now, and we appreciate it all + you all so so so very much. I’ll keep everyone posted as much/as often as possible, of course – just wanted to pop in with a quick “THANKYOU” before individualing replying to all + getting back on track with CUR a bit this week. 

Besides everything that transpired last week and this weekend, the irony is that this Monday Mantra had been on the calendar for WEEKS as such. It had been a quote on my heart for a hot sec that I knew would be Mantra-able, and sure enough – it’s like the icing on the cake to kickoff this new week. Oftentimes, I’m writing Monday Mantras right in the moment (like right now) before hitting publish – they’re not pre-written or pre-meditated too much, since they end up feeling the most raw, real, + hopefully relatable when they’re just straight off the cuff of my heartstrings. And oftentimes then, it feels more fulfilling on my end to see your feedback and hopefully serve you in some way, since they’re then ALSO doubling as therapy sessions for my own heart/thoughts/mind’s musings at that given time. Writing just does that, yannno? 🙂 Today’s is no different – this Mantra has been sitting there, waiting to be unpacked, and WHAT A TIME to unpack it together.

“Wherever you go, there you are.”

If you’re sitting there with your cuppa pumpkin spice thinking “DUH, E – that’s a no sh*t Sherlock kinda thought,” then I commend you – you clearly have a much better grasp on the whole live-in-the-moment, mindfulness movement than this girl. 😉

So many of us, tho, (myself included – hollah) end up speeding through so much of life in some sorta hot pursuit.

• We’re in pursuit of the next big thing – the trendy, hot ticket to add excitement to our seemingly routinized day-to-day lives.
• We’re in pursuit of the next best thing – the recommended, trendy new fad that swears to be a would-be-transformation, be that a product, an idea, or that crazy new diet.
• We’re in pursuit of the balance unicorn (but thank the sweet Lord baby Jesus we debunked that one together…).

And if/when we finally reach some semblance of a “destination,” we’ve “made it” – and wherever we go, we then end up caught in this line-up of next steps.

Raise yo’ hand if you’re like me when it comes to taking trips, and you like having your entire itinerary planned out meticulously from sun-up to sundown (sans a few open slots here or there for “spontaneity” – albeit planned spontaneity, since it’s got a designated calendar block 😉 ). We plan where we’re going, why we’re going, and what we’ll be doing when we get there.

BUT.

Sometimes, we reaaaaaally can’t predict what that next step will be. We can try our darnedest – heck, we can ask everyone around us for their best guess-timates + calculated predictions based off of XYC statistics and past experiences, getting everyone’s educated feedback on the who/what/when/where/why of what’s to come.

But at the end of the day…

…we have actually no idea.

We aren’t actually in control.

And in those moments, while they can scare the living sh*t outta us (or at least outta girls like me – and probably you, too? – who are Planning Patties through the year 2050)…we realize there’s actually no more we can do besides just be.

The simplest truth of it is:

Whether you’re going to a physical place or a new mentality – you’re going somewhere. And at its core, wherever you go…there you are.

It might (slash it does) feel counterintuitive to every single goal-setting how-to and make-it-happen sorta mentality that exists out there on the world wide web (and all of what we talk about SO MUCH around these rosy parts), but it’s one of those two-sided coins that needs to be flipped now and again for #perspective.

There’s a time and a place for everything, really. There’s a time to #werk and crank out the magic, and there’s a time to sit your bum in a comfy chair (or on bed rest, hollah) and just be. And wherever you are, wherever you’ve gone, and wherever you’re going…acknowledging that quite simply, there you are. 

No overanalysis, no overthinking, no overwhelm. Just…wherever you go, there you are.

It’s time to take off the pressure.

Let yourself out of the pressure cooker that has become your life. Because even if life doesn’t FEEL like an Instant Pot for you right this second – chances are, you’ve got something simmering away in there, waiting to boil overboard. We stockpile the pressures in, in our work, our relationships, our commitments – even our general thoughts can have a way of just becoming toomuchtoosoon as we get from place-to-place, physically, mentally, emotionally, etc.

Challenge yourself to not put Step 2 on the calendar (literally writing that out gave me hives – it’s hard, but we can do hard things).

Close your eyes and truly soak in where you are at right this very second, in this very moment. What are you thinking? What are you feeling? What are the desires of your heart? If #AllTheThings start barreling through your brain, take a hot sec to brain dump before keeping calm + carrying on to that place of just being. That place of seeing + acknowledging the chaos around you, without letting it consume you.

And become A-OK (truly) with the conclusion that not all destinations are discernible before actual arrival. (*Cue more hives, as this is SO STINKIN’ DIFFICULT FOR ME). Trust God. Trust the process. Trust the journey, and the eventual destination. And let yourself feel comfort + peace in the end, knowing that wherever you’ve gone…there you are, and there you are meant to be.

“Meant to be” and “meant to stay” aren’t necessarily one and the same – but for now, give yourself permission to not figure it all out. Let yourself go…and be where you are.

Where are you today? And where are you this week?

How can you go and just be, more mindfully as this week carries on? Would lovelovelove to chat more about it in the comments below.