As I’m gearing up for the official release of DEFRIENDED: A Guide to Breaking Up and Shaping Up, I thought I’d give a little sneak peek and an introduction to the book.  (Plus you’ll see it in the “Preview” when it goes live online anyway.)  For those of you interested in pre-ordering your copy at a special discounted rate, please visit www.defriendedthebook.com.  

FOREWORD

We all have a voice that lives inside our head. Some of us have more than one. Mine is a little fat girl. Let’s call her Molly.

That voice is the driving force behind almost every bad decision and self-destructive tendency you’ll ever experience in your life. She’s made excuses for why you gained twenty-five pounds in college. She’s the asshole who made you believe that you could handle “just one last time” with your ex. She’s the scapegoat for all those nights you got dressed, looked in a mirror, and crawled back into bed in a deep depression over your perceived inadequacies that led to the perfect storm of your late twenties. Or maybe that’s just mine. Either way, that stops today.

That voice is a bitch. And before you can ever understand how to “defriend” those toxic relationships, you’ll have to learn how to delete her. This book is the first step you’ll take in telling your “Molly” to take a hike and start owning up to your actions, your decisions, and your life. 

YOU are in control. In the next eight chapters, you will learn how to pick yourself up from the lowest situations, the greatest heartbreaks, the “rock bottoms,” and become the amazing person that you were, are, and always will be. You will learn to recognize and change the patterns that have sabotaged your happiness time and time again. You’re moving in a forward direction now, entering the next stage of this crazy, wild ride we call life… battle wounds in tow.

You’re going to be okay. Don’t let any other voice tell you otherwise.

Yesterday I was in Target picking up a few things and waiting for a prescription to be filled.  Since it was my first time in that particular location I had a few minutes, and ended up in a rather lengthy conversation with an older gentleman.  He too was waiting, picking up medicine for his very ill wife who has been battling ovarian cancer for 7 years.  We chatted about his children, work, the state of the country, the state of healthcare… or should I say HE chatted and I listened and smiled.  

As he drifted from topic to topic I couldn’t help but think how many times this man had probably been to Target picking up prescriptions.  All the long drives home alone from the hospital, the nights he spent worrying, and the time lost to uncontrollable circumstances. I felt this strong sense of compassion for a man I had just met and will probably never see again.  Even when I had no clue what he was talking about, I felt compelled to keep listening.

At one point the pharmacist came by and he asked if he was holding me up.  She grinned and winked at me, as if to say ‘thank you for talking to him,’ and replied, “No, we’re enjoying her smile.”  The old man nodded and said, “Yes, she does have a lovely smile.”

Kids, I felt like crap yesterday.  My head was clogged, I couldn’t breathe, I had not a stitch of make up on and I’m pretty sure I hadn’t showered yet that day.  Not one ounce of me felt pretty, engaging, or like I could make any sort of difference in this poor man’s life.  Yet, all it took was a smile. And the best part of all?

It was free. ;) 

Pay it forward.

A few years ago a friend introduced me to the book, “Hope For The Flowers.”  It’s a really sweet tale written as a children’s book but with a very adult message.  The story centers around two caterpillars who meet on their journey to the top of the pillar.  After returning home together and starting a life, one of the butterflies, Stripe, decides he must return to the pillar, climb to the top, and see what it’s all about.  Yellow is devastated but understands his need to feed this curiosity.  In the interim, she meets a butterfly who guides her into a cocoon, where she later emerges a beautiful butterfly and flies to the top of the pillar.  There she encounters Stripe, who has reached his destination only to learn the view from the top was not what he expected. He sees what she has become and returns home to make his transformation into a butterfly as well.

I think what has always drawn me to this story is not the idea of two things separating and returning to each other, but the lessons that each of them learned in taking their own journey.  It’s common as we get older to spend our time attached to people who we feel comfortable with, or who we perceive as having the life we want.  We succumb to expectations, idealisms, and the “story” of what seems to be a perfect situation, only to realize that it may not be right for us.  We make decisions that we feel compelled to stick with, not realizing there are options and other ways to achieve our goals and happiness.  

The reality is, dreams change.  Life changes.  The people around you will change.  The more you are able to adapt and take on a perspective of looking at the big picture and not the immediate feeling of the moment, the better chance you have at being successful.  Put yourself in a cocoon for awhile, or climb to the top of your pillar.  Discover what you need to about yourself.  

What’s meant to be will always be.

This morning I was thinking about the past year of my life, and how much has changed, when it hit me that a year ago this week I made the most difficult speech of my life to date.  I stood before a group of students and their parents, all who were loyal followers of my dance studio business, and had to announce to them that at the end of that school year, the studio would be closing.  I explained through broken words and tear-filled eyes that after exploring many options, I was left with no choice but opt out of a lease renewal and close the doors in May.  Most of these people had been with me since my doors had opened 5 years prior.  I watched their families grow, and I watched their families break apart.  We shared stories of school, boys, family, life, love, heartache, business, birth, and death.  Most of these students and their parents knew more about my life than my own family and friends.  R.E.A.C.H. had been a second home for all of us.  In the months that followed before the closing, the reactions were mixed.  Some of the people I was closest with stopped speaking to me.  I suppose they resented me for not telling them sooner, or for abandoning them, or for failing.  A huge part of ME felt like a failure, as I packed up the 3,000 square feet I had built from scratch, giving away pictures that hung on the wall, selling equipment at a sickeningly reduced rate, closing down accounts and shutting down services.  Each time I checked one more item off the list I felt more and more like a traitor to myself.  This was supposed to be my dream… it was the only thing I knew I wanted to do with life and the only thing everyone else knew me as- Christina, the dance studio owner.  Now what?  What was I qualified for?  How could I be successful in another field with no prior experience or training?

I needed an escape from Philadelphia, because I no longer felt comfortable with my life there.  27, single, and miserable, I spent 3-4 nights a week driving or taking the train to NYC to see friends and check out live music shows. I started a blog about the arts.  I networked, I interviewed, and I wrote.  I wrote away the pain of my heartache.  I wrote away the pain of my failure.  I wrote away the pain of my loneliness.  I lost myself in the lives of others so I no longer had to focus on my life.  And that made me happy.  In this escape, this therapy, this avoidance of who I was at the time, something crazy happened….

I found myself.

I found friends who completed the missing parts of my heart.  In less than a year we’ve been through some of life’s most difficult ups and downs, and I finally understand the meaning of unconditional love in a way I had only seen with family.

I found an apartment that is the smallest place I’ve ever lived, and on the day I moved it was hands down the filthiest place I ever lived.  I made it home.  It is now more “me” than any other dwelling I’ve inhabited.

I found peace with my parents, and my guilt that I had let them down after all the opportunities and support they provided me with the past 6 years.

I found a city that accepts me for who I am.  Where it’s OK to have a different career path every week, and it’s OK to go a month (or several) without a steady job.  Where you can be accepted and loved for who you are and not who people expect you to be.  Where everyone understands what you’re going through because they’ve ALL been there… literally.

I found a life.  It’s a hard life, it’s an ungrateful life, but it’s a beautiful life.  I’d be lying if I said it was easy to let go of who I was, grab my parachute, and take that blind leap, hoping there would be ground to land on.  There are days when I feel like the parachute is definitely NOT working.

But I know that ultimately, whether I was floating gently or dropping recklessly, letting go was the only thing that saved me.