If we were having coffee… well, I’d be offering herbal tea today. Rather late in the day for caffeine. For me, anyway. After weather hovering in the mid-80 degree (Fahrenheit) range, today turned cloudy, wet, and has cooled down to the 50s, so warm tea seems apropos.

If we were having tea, I’d tell you that this past week has been one of introspection for me. With years and years spent on the self-help/self-improvement track, I never managed to become very self-helpful, no matter how many books I read, seminars I attended, meditation techniques I tried…

But life threw me enough curve balls – make that hand grenades – that I had to finally just hunker down and work on survival. Not getting rich, gaining power, living the life of my dreams, finding true love, finding nirvana… Just surviving.

Once the dust settled and I could lift my head above the trench I had cowered in, I came to a kind of peace with myself and my life. It’s okay. Everything is okay. More than okay. A lot of facets of my life are pretty freaking amazing.

No, I didn’t win the lottery. I didn’t suddenly figure out how to “make friends and influence people.” But I realized that what I truly wanted in my life had very little to do with what the self-help gurus were peddling.

I’m not perfect (okay, stating the obvious now), my life’s not a bed of roses. Dandelions, yes; roses, no. But I get to just be me.

The real work I see for myself at this stage is learning to be comfortable with being me. Comfortable with my lifestyle choices, with my appearance, with my priorities. And not feeling the need to compare myself to others. Not overthinking everything and stressing over what everyone else might think about me and my choices.

Wow. How did I get off on this tangent? From chatting about the weather, I managed to segue into life values. Hmmm.

I’ve been introspecting so much here that my tea has gone cold. Yours too, probably. And I have no spiffy wrap up planned for this unplanned post. More tea, perhaps?

Next time I’ll let you do the talking. Hope you have a great week ahead.

Thank you to Diana at PartTimeMonster.com for hosting the #WeekendCoffeeShare.