Month: April 2019

10 years ago today at this very minute, I was wiling away my last few hours of being unmarried. It was my wedding day, and it was nothing I envisioned it would be. We were juggling a 10 month old…(well, 2, if you consider the fledgling restaurant we opened when Kaia was 4 days old), I was 5 weeks pregnant with Mason and utterly exhausted, and as is my modus operandi, I was overly ambitious in the DIY wedding planning.

I hear, from all appearances, it was beautiful and fun, but, y’all, I was a wreck. My internal state 10 years ago isn’t the point. What I’m getting at it is this…

Life doesn’t always go as planned, and it sure as hell isn’t what it looks like from the outside. As I’ve embraced the idea that expectations are dangerous and quite useless, it’s transformed the way I view my reality.

Ten years of marriage has taught me that reality can be better than expectations. It’s all in the way you choose to see it and create it.

Don’t get me wrong, it ain’t easy. We’ve shown up. We’ve done the work. We’ve endured many, many desperate, gut-wrenching moments when we didn’t know how we would carry on. But, we did. We battled addiction, anxiety and depression. And, we forged on. We were saddled with bankruptcy, and crushing debt. Yet, we marched on. We started completely over with toddlers in a new place with no jobs. Still, we kept climbing. All the while, committing to being better than we were the day before. We created something, when there was nothing.

Our marriage marked the beginning of a better life, one day at a time, every day for the last ten years. Not because it was the catalyst for two kids, a white picket fence and a dog. We had already been there, done that. And, let me tell you, a fence, a dog, and two kids, happiness doesn’t make.

We’ve found a better life through communication, acceptance, forgiveness, self-realization, discord -> resolution, a willingness to show up and do the work and lots of therapy.

I’m so proud of us. We have overcome, and I have faith that we can continue to overcome whatever may lay in our path ahead. We’ll keep climbing.

Thank you for growing with me, Michael Jerome Rivers.

P.S. To everyone who thought we wouldn’t make it this far, we showed you.

I see you little one.

You don’t realize it, but you’re whole and perfect exactly the way you are.

As a matter of fact, the things you resent about yourself are the gifts you have to share with the world.

You’re meant to live out loud and be unapologetically you.

Your story has served you in some capacity for so many years.

You can let go now.

You can rewrite the story.

I forgive you.

I love you.

You are meant to be here.

You’re destined for great things.

Be patient.

You’ll see.

Every time you ask someone how they are in Costa Rica, they respond, “pura vida.”

Literally translated, “pura vida” means pure life, a Costa Rican version of “hakuna matata.”

The term came to Costa Rica by way of a Mexican movie in which the character, despite his continually negative circumstances maintains eternal optimism via the phrase, Pura Vida.

It has now become an ubiquitous, all encompassing term to mean gratitude, a worry free attitude, a general sense of happiness and so much more. But, to even attach definition to those words doesn’t fully convey their gravity.

It’s an attitude, a way of life. It’s as if just through the utterance of the phrase, you’re infused with a touch of optimism and a sense of all is good.

I think we should make it a trend back at home. It’s so much better of a response than, “I’m fine.”

But, I want to make a difference in this world.

You already do, my dear, you already do.