Hi guys, it’s been a while since I wrote a formal post. Life has been crazy. I went back to the office to a totally new role a little over a year ago. In the midst of that I took it upon myself to complete two Ivy League Graduate Programs. The first one was at Harvard Business School which I completed and graduated from last year. Now, I am in NYU for their CFP program, which is a very robust, demanding and time-consuming curriculum. ( All while working full time ) In the thick of the craziness I’ve came to a lot of self-awareness. I think stressful times will either make you or break you and for those of you who know me, know that I am by no means a stranger to trauma. That’s a whole other blog post topic. With that being said, I found myself just not feeling like me. I felt very off my weight became off. My mood was off. My workout patterns were off. Everything just felt not like me. So what anyone would do when they’re not feeling right is go to a doctor, specialists, nutritionists etc. to get lab work done and try to pinpoint and figure out what’s going on. I found out, Thank God and by the grace of God I am healthy and I am OK. Recently, I was sitting in an appointment with my nutritionist she was reviewing my labs with me and my eating habits she said you are so healthy, your labs are excellent, your eating patterns are excellent and your exercise habits are excellent it shows in the results. So I said to her why am I not losing weight why am I inflamed ? And she I think you really need to just practice self-care and stop being so hard on yourself. At that moment I had this come to Jesus awareness. That was you can be working out ,you can be eating really well, you can be taking your vitamins and supplements. But, if you’re not practicing true self-care, you’re truly not healthy so I did some really deep soul searching, and had some really sobering self-awareness on where I could improve and I realize I am very hard on myself. I am very critical, and I feel as a result it was making, the stress and cortisol go through my body it was just not good. This realization happened on 2/15 because I remember it was the day after Valentine’s Day and Rob & I went out to celebrate the day after right after my appointment. So we aren’t even a month out yet. However, I am so thankful I came to the realization I need to take care of myself. I need to do things that bring me joy. I need to do things that make me happy. I don’t want this post to be misconstrued. I was by no means never not happy. I’m an extremely happy person. I’m super positive, super grateful and love my life. I have an immense amount of blessings my wonderful husband , my mom, our 3 beautiful cats who we view as our little babies. I am earning a good living all by the grace of God, but I felt like I wasn’t being true to myself living out my true talents, hobbies and gifts, so I had to really dig deep. From there, what I’ve been doing is reading I’ve been reading a lot books upon books upon books and not just school books everything from finding your purpose, making good habits, business planning how to be successful. how to think like the most successful people, staying to yourself, designing a life you love I even got a manifestation book which I’m not sure if that’s a conflict to my faith for those of you who don’t know I am a devout Catholic. But, I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that as long as I’m walking in the light of the Lord and staying true to my faith so I can happily say that now I am in a much better place. I am centered. I am grounded. I’m being kind to myself. I’ve dug deep down inside to what I really desire. I set some goals. I’ve set some new habits. I’ve realized there are things I want to and will accomplish. Additionally, the field I’m in is the financial world. Everything is so heavily structured on investments, and people might say invest in this invest in that. If we’re not talking about the financial sector someone may say invest in that Chanel bag you’ll never lose your money. Invest in real estate your profits will always grow. Although these may be great investments, the biggest investment and the most important investment is in yourself doing things day in and day out that make you your best self. Yes your career is your livelihood and it’s a blessing and you need that money and financial stability. That job though, it doesn’t define you it can’t just be the one thing about you. You need to do things that make you be who you really want to be and not let self doubt get in the way and if it’s a matter of taking 10 minutes a day to work towards some thing, you just have to get started. If you believe in yourself, the success will follow. Please follow along to learn more about things I’ve been doing and will be on this new adventure of me.