There’s a Hawaiian wisdom that likens our unique spirit to a bowl of light. We enter this world completely unscathed and pure in our essence.

An empty bowl, gleaming in possibility and promise.

As we grow up we obstruct the flow through stones we put in our bowl. Smooth stones and jagged stones like: fear, judgement, deception, pain, grief – allowing the dark – to penetrate our truth.

We lose the connection to our inner light. We lose the belief and trust in our oneself.

The wisdom states that all you need to do, is turn the bowl over and empty the stones. Clearing the past and allowing the present to permeate.

Sounds nice, huh?

I turn 40 today. I’ve celebrated with friends and family, popped champagne and noshed on homemade strawberry cupcakes with piped frosting and even bowled with the babes of my besties to commemorate this milestone.

My thirties were full. Heart-wrenching. Liberating. Complete. I dumped a heap of stones through the previous decade and picked up a few more along the way.

But right now, all it takes is the mere intention to dump the bowl of stones to start anew. It really is as simple as that.

Sure, attachments to the pain, the grief, the wrong-doing and anger can feel like it’s important to cling to. Like, I need to be right-ed. But the truth is: that’s up to me. It doesn’t negate what happened, but it frees one from living in a lather-rinse-repeate like existence of the same reliving itself within.

And I choose to empty the bowl. I evoke my essence to emerge and embody as I move forward.

At the tender age of thirty, I became a mother (a.k.a. not knowing what the hell I was doing, but doing it anyway,) and deeply connected in love as love felt different the moment my daughter was placed upon my chest.

I started a new career within Pharmacy that I knew nothing about, the skills not taught in Pharmacy School and have found myself, 8-years later, knowing that no matter what – it’ll be okay. I’m resilient and capable and able to learn and grow as needed.

I began to write write a story, Glow. That truth opened me up from within as my life then went into a tailspin.

I divorced. I fell in love again – before I was ready, but that provided the feeling of how true love glows.

I wrote and wrote and wrote, I shared my stories, I began to see myself in a different light.

I needed to reconcile the growing feeling within that began to emerge as all that didn’t resonate in my life sifted and shook to fall away.

It’s not easy letting it all fall apart. Its equally not easy putting it all back together again. But that’s where the bowl of light comes in.

As I let myself become engulfed in this metamorphosis, I began to feel of a different light.

I bowed to my mentors and guides of spirit. I lowered my head in reverence to all that came as messengers to help me find my way. I wrestled with change only to realize… it is inevitable. And rather than force change, I’d rather unfold with the flux and flow.

Joy is a conscious choice.

You can dig your way through the dark – sifting through it all – or flip the switch. 

And you, you ARE the switch.

I don’t say this to make light of what you’ve been through, nor negate the systems of power both within you and on the outside for which you are part of the collective, that need radical change. This isn’t to say we live in a perfect world.

Nah, the world is as messy and blessed as you are. As we each are. And you can choose, day-to-day, moment-to-moment, from which you take lead.

From which you take heed.

The decade unraveling before me isn’t known, but I feel it. I know that my light will guide me through the dark. I know that I will be ok. I know that whatever happens I am part of something greater than little ‘ole me.

I am a slice of the living light.

There is light you see and light you feel, close your eyes and soak it up.