I am being blessed with imperfect skin

Just now, I was in my bathroom putting on my new W3LL Narcissist Stick Foundation (thanks to No More Dirty Looks for introducing me).  I caught myself in the mirror and with no pre-meditated thoughts, said outloud, “I am blessed with imperfect skin.”   I paused, hearing what I had just said and thought, wow that is true.

I regularly say that I was blessed with fibroymalgia, because it made me truly listen to my heart.  I was always in so much pain physically that I could not stand to carry around emotional pain, as well.   I noticed that when I was in situations that I did not like, working jobs that I did not like, or when I was holding things in that my pain multiplied. Really, the pain was always there, but when I was I doing things that I loved it was easy to ignore.

At the age of 15,  after hitting an ultimate painful low, emotionally and physically (I was still undiagnosed at that point)  I started to completely tell the truth, to speak my truth.  I chose to tell my parents what I was really up to on the weekends, when I said I was spending the night over my friend, Ali’s.  I chose to speak up in high school, to not be afraid of being disowned by the “cool” kids.  I said what I thought, even if it was uncomfortable.

Over the years, I have committed to this.  It is not always easy to speak up, but I have to.  My body won’t let me get away with not.  Sometimes, I don’t even know what it is, but I feel the pain, the anxiety in my body and I know, there is something that I am not saying.  There is something I must get clear about.

So, no matter who it is with, a top artist that I am working for, a tough guy boss, a friend who I looked up to, my parents, a love interest,  or even myself, I have to speak up.  My body won’t let me play games.  My body won’t let me fake it.

Today, when “I am blessed with imperfect skin” came out of me, I paused to ponder that.  “Whatever do you mean, Tricia?” I asked myself.   I have always battled acne prone skin.  It runs in my family.  I have tried all sorts of things.  I have accepted it.

I don’t wear makeup everyday anymore, sometimes I go weeks without.  I walk just as tall with my imperfections covered as I do with them bare for all to see.   My skin, does not define me.  Perhaps, I have been blessed with my skin for me to see that my true beauty lies within, and from there shines out.  Perhaps, I have been blessed with my imperfect skin to teach me to love and accept all imperfections, internal and external.

Do I want clear skin with no visible pores and no signs of scarring?  Abso-freaking-lutely!  Do I try out new products, get facials, use purifying masks?  Of course, but I am not caught up in “if only I had clear skin”.  I accept what is.  I accept who I am, scars, blemishes in all.  The ones on my face and the ones on the inside, too.

What blessings can you find in your own life?

I am being 30

I did it! I turned 30!

I have always felt much older than my actual age and never got caught up on the number.  A good majority of my friends and people that I have worked with are far, far older than I (twice my age) and I never felt out of place.  To tell you the truth, when people ask me my age I have to do the math.  What year is it? Okay, subtract that from 1981, so that makes me….

30, though, feels different.  Something tells me that I won’t have to do the math this year.  I will be able to immediately answer with I am 30!  I am proud to be 30.  I will admit that growing up I swore up and down that I would be married with kids before this age, it seemed so old.   My mother had me at 30, and I made up that she was too old when I was growing up, but of course she wasn’t.  I still crave to have a happy family of my own, but I am not attached to the timing that happens in.  My ultimate dream of being a mother will happen at the perfect time.

For as far back as I can remember, I have been a five year old where my birthday is concerned.  As soon as the new year hits, I become giddy with excitement.  My birthday is coming!!!!  Friends  teased me when the day came around, “Woah, it’s your birthday? I had no idea!”  This seeped into me,  and made me question my excitement.  Is it wrong to be so excited about celebrating myself?   So, I went through periods of not showing this on the outside. I played my excitement down. It has built back over the last few years, but there was still something deep inside keeping me from fully celebrating me in front of others.

This year, turning 30, felt different for many reasons, but the biggest reason for me is that this is the first year in a long time (probably since I was a kid) that I 100% fully accepted love and did not hide one bit of excitement for my big day, for my big life.  I planned the day out myself and did not have one bit of anxiety on how it would work out,  the timing of things, if friends would get along, any of it.  I only had pure, unabashed joy.

I celebrated me, full out.  I was not ashamed.  As the clock hit midnight, entering into my big day, I posted this on my facebook page and wow did it feel good.  I didn’t pause to think, “What will people think of this? of me? Is that wrong?”

30! I luurrrrrrvvvee Birthdays! I gots no problem celebrating me and the amazing life that is mine. I am whole. I am complete. I am fulfilled. I am vulnerable. I am love. I am who I am and I fucking love who I am. Thank you all for your contribution to who I am. You done well, if I do say so myself.

The entire day was a dream.  I celebrated with an entirely new family in the city that I have always dreamt to call home and now  is.  I was surrounded by a collection of new friends, most of whom I have only even hung out with once or twice and who did not know each other.  None, of that mattered, we all were immediately family.

On my special day, I received an outpouring of love via text, phone, email, twitter, and facebook.  Friends from my many pasts, friends from my absolute now, friends that I have not met yet all enveloped me in love.   I accepted that love.  I am worthy of that love.  I truly got that I am fully supported.   This is my family.  You are all my family.  We are all famil
.
We really are one.  I see that now.

In writing my book and working with new clients, I fully get that the reason I am able to serve you, the reason that I am able to keep an open heart towards all, to be the ultimate space holder is because I fully love and accept myself.  All of me.  All of the past.  All of the nasty thoughts.  All of what I do and what I don’t do.  I one hundred f*cking percent love and accept myself.  I am a work in progress.  We all are, and because I can fully see me, junk and all, I fully see you, junk and all.

I believe in me.  I believe in you.  No matter what happened, no matter what happens.
I am the perfect balance of pure COMPASSION with NO BULLSHIT.  I believe in you, I believe in me, but I am not letting either of us of the hook.  Life is meant to be lived, period. 

Hello 30!!  I will leave you with this, Fuck Your Fears, this life is yours.   xoxo

I am being that the world wants me to show up as me.

A couple of months ago, one of my followers emailed me about an opportunity to work with Seth Godin on his  Domino Project.  He was looking for:

…two or three people to work with me in my office outside of New York, engaged in every element of the project, from copywriting and editing to social media to business development to promotion. My goal is to offer you a hands on experience with full exposure to the market, to technology and to shipping great work out the door. When we’re done, I think you’ll be qualified to start your own gig or find a great job in media.

I was immediately intrigued and grateful that she thought to share this with me.  Although, I have not read any of Seth’s books, I know his name, I read his blogs here and there (not regularly), and I am most definitely inspired by him and what he is up to.  I chose not to apply, as I was and still am fully committed to my own projects (for the first time in my life) right now, most importantly getting my first book written and published.

A few times since then my mind has wandered back to thinking about the project, as I know it is a big one, with a great opportunity to learn.  I thought about how cool it would have been to be a part of it, but knowing that I made the right choice, regardless of whether he would have chosen me or not.   Then, low and behold last week I see that The Domino Project is now looking for people to be a part of it’s street team.  I didn’t exactly know what that meant (to be honest, I still don’t) but I knew that I had to apply immediately.  I knew that I wanted to be a part of this.

So, I applied and I applied with passion!  I don’t even know what I said or how I answered the questions, but I know I was showing up 100% as being me and also showing that I wanted in.  I didn’t write from a place of “you need me!” or “I need you!”, but of outright passion and truth and Holy F@*$ing Shit, I was chosen!

When I opened my You’re In email from the Domino Project’s chief evangelist, Amber Rae, I jumped up and down for about 5 minutes straight.  That evening, I started to virtually meet my fellow chosen Street Teamers and my excitement quadrupled, to put it lightly.

I am in the company of a collection of truly amazing and inspiring people.  As I read their bios and checked out their websites I was beyond stoked to be a part of this team.  My thoughts included, “I can learn a lot from them!” ” I am so going to be picking their brains!”.  I was completely high on life.

The next day, I remembering pausing before sending out a tweet out into twitterspace.  What will my new team members think of that?  Many of Team Domino was now following me on twitter, as I was them.    I started thinking of how my reflection was going to show up to them.   I am a lot different than these people, I wonder what they think about me?

I wasn’t getting down on myself, I was just getting real with myself.  I mean, I am still very new to writing and blogging, I know very little about the publishing world, I use words like “stoked”, I don’t use proper grammer or punctuation,  I cuss openly, and I could go on and on and on here on ways I am not like them.  I started to wonder if they were wondering why I had been chosen.

Lucky for me, my whole mission in life is inspiring people to love and accept who they are and to be who they are.  Guess what?  That applies to me, too!

What I get is:  YES, I am a lot different than my team members, but consider that is exactly why I was picked.  The others may have more similarities to each other, (or not I just may be making up that they do)  but not one of them is alike, either.  Consider that this project will be that much stronger because of our individualities and our backgrounds.  If Seth and the Domino Project wanted a team of people that were all up to exactly the same thing, with the same ideas, they would have picked those people (b-o-r-i-n-g).

I am worthy of being in the company of this team.  And I am really F@$%ing excited.
Consider that what the world wants from you is for you to show up as you.



More to come on what this project means to me and my inspiring team members!

I am being Grudgeless

Many of you know my back-story, that from the ages of 19-28 I was a professional live sound monitor engineer. I toured the world with Grammy Award Winning Artists making sure that every person on stage was hearing the perfect mix of vocals and instruments to their liking. They each get a personal mix that best suites them to have them performing at their best. Meanwhile, the sound engineer out in the audience (front of house) is mixing for all of you out there in attendance.

When I was not on the road working for one at artist at a time, I did plenty of local gigs and huge festivals where big name artists would come through without a monitor engineer on staff.  So, I would step in for the day.

Often times on these local gigs, I got to step in to mix monitors for bands that I loved, some even that I idolized.   During the summer of 2004, I was so excited to get to do a show with one of my favorite artists of the previous few years.  Not only did she have an amazing voice, but her songs were absolutely beautiful lyrically.  I could listen to her CD on repeat over and over again and truly feel it.  The messages in her songs reached females everywhere, building self-confidence and love.  Not only did I get to see her live, I got to work with her.  I got to be the one that delivered her performance to her.  WooHoo!  And you know what?  She was a complete bitch, seriously.  Not just to me, but to everyone.  She was cold and mean to her band, the crew that did travel with her, her mother, even the audience.  Throughout my day of working with her, I did not see her smile once.  I did not see one friendly or loving piece of her.

After that day, I never listened to her music again.  If it came on the radio, I changed it immediately.  I buried her CDs, I actually may have even thrown them out.  I didn’t just boycott her though, I vocally dissed her as well.  Anytime that her music came on, I took the opportunity to tell everyone what a true bitch she was.  I did this for years.

Then, sometime in the last two years I forgave her.   I let go of my grudge against her.  I learned about the concept of holding space and who I was being and I realized that those concepts applied to things that had happened in the past too.   I was still holding onto them, so they were still a part of me and who I am being today.  Who cares if my interpretation of her that day was that she is a bitch.  Maybe, she is a bitch.  Who cares?  Who am I being by holding onto my grudge against her?  The truth is that I still love her music.  I love the lyrics that she writes and sings.

Maybe she had a bad day that one day back in 2004, in San Diego?  Maybe she was used to working with her own monitor engineer and was afraid of the idea of working with a stranger?  Maybe she had huge stage fright and actually hated performing in front of an audience?  Maybe she was grieving?  Maybe she was sick?  Maybe those are all excuses for her behavior that day.  True, she as well needs a lesson in who she is being at all times, for all people, but who I am being in judging her?

What is more important for me to get is that whatever is going on over there,  I am still responsible for who I am being at all times.   I choose to hold space for all people, attitudes, actions, thoughts, ideas, and on and on and on, whether I agree with them or not.  I choose to be actively free of judgement.  Who I am I to judge her?  Who I am being by holding onto a grudge?  Who am I to spread my version of her to others?

I have forgiven her.  I have let go of my grudge.  I am free.
Just now on my Pandora, one of her songs came on and without any hesitation I started to sway and swing along.  For this I am grateful.

What grudge can you let go of today?

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Now, that I am reminiscining about my days behind the console.  I am going to throw in few old pics!

2002 House Of Blues Chicago- where it all started

2005 Lollapalooza Grant Park Chicago

2005 Radio City Music Hall on tour with Dolly Parton

Got my thinking face on...figuring out my new digital console 2005

2008- on tour with Tom Cochrane, John Mellancamp's crew plays a practical joke on me...

2006 on tour with Natalie Cole -catching my reflection of my gear & I squeezed into the VIP booth of the Viper Room for a special show

Fun times!