The Totality of Celebration
This week is a celebration because it’s my birthday week! The week of my birthday is always a sacred time of year for me.
It’s a celebration in August heat, being in water as much as possible and I also have the gift of several important people in my life having their birthdays during this week and season too.
It’s joy on joy on joy. This year is an extra special time because in just a couple days, I turn 30!
So, as I write, I’m living the last week of my 20’s. It’s a bizarre feeling and time. I’ve actually been feeling a lot more than I anticipated.
Birthdays or milestone markers have a way of bringing things to the forefront. They bring a pulse check to the soul and path.
Where have I been? Where am I going? Where am I right now? Am I making a big enough difference?
All of this and more has been on my heart.
I laugh at myself and how I used to think the biggest question of becoming thirty would be, “Do 30 year old’s still wear crop tops?” Rest assured, I’ve already decided YES.
Potent questions and feelings are arising in the present. I’ve been a pendulum swing between being wildly excited and suddenly weepy.
The truth is: I loved my 20’s. I adored them. I loved how much I grew, I loved how much I created, I loved all of my face-plants, and I loved being a twenty-something wild child in the city.
It was a decade of amazing and challenging experiences. I accomplished so much and had a ball.
The biggest thing I’m proud of and grateful for is the person I’ve become and the relationships I’ve cultivated along the way.
As I live these final days of my twenties, I’ve been surprised about the sadness that has emerged. I am going to miss my twenty-something self. She was awesome!
I also find it incredibly ironic and enlightening that the week immediately after writing about non-attachment, I will release an amazing decade and give birth to a new one. This is conscious living as a practice - not a destination!
With this completion, I am reminded and harkened back to my nine year old self. On the eve of my 10th birthday, I sobbed in bed. I was crestfallen. Never again would I be in the single digits. I said this on repeat to my mom amidst my tears.
That acutely aware and sensitive heart of mine now says a similar story - never again will you be in your 20’s. Grief, “the missing thing”, love and gratitude flood me. I let them arrive and be felt.
At the very same time, the pendulum swings quickly to fiery, energetic ignition and excitement. I’m going to be 30! I have arrived.
If you know me, you know I’m obsessed with mornings. Each is a gift - a brand new slate, a second chance, a blank canvas on which anything can be painted if only one believes.
You can imagine my elation and passion rearing to go on the eve of an entire fresh decade. “LET’S GOOOO” my heart screams.
Turning the page to a brand new chapter is exciting and as I age, I feel more and more like myself every day. If how I am today is where I get to start, I can only imagine where and who I may be a decade from now. It drips with magic and possibility.
The second truth: I’m over the moon for my thirties. I love them and they’re not even here yet. They’re going to be amazing.
This is my current reality, the totality of celebration, the holding of both.
What I am remembering and experiencing is this: every exciting upgrade and change also includes the completion of what came before it.
To me, this is the totality of celebration.
As I celebrate my “upgrade to 3.0” as my good friends says, I simultaneous release 2.0 - a time and era I truly loved.
It’s ending and beginning at the same time. It’s sadness and happiness at the same time. It’s goodbye and hello at the very same time. It’s a portal.
Every shift is also a shed. Oh, how being a human ceases to teach me!
What I am remembering even more is that both the sadness and the excitement are a celebration. Celebration is an important ritual that I continue to learn about.
What I’ve come to know is celebration is gratitude in motion.
Contrary to what many think - celebration did not come naturally to me. This is something I got to teach myself.
I’d historically always been immediately onto the next thing. Ok, achieved that, what’s next? No pause or acknowledgement. Forget the roses, there was a time I barely ever sat down to eat!
Through mindfulness I’ve learned that to celebrate is to say “thank you”. Saying thank you matters.
While the emotions show up in different outfits, they are all celebration. A thank you for an amazing time and era of my life. A thank you for a beautiful opening to a new one. A deep thank you for this present moment that I get to exist in now.
All soaked with love, joy and gratitude.
This week my celebration rituals are birthday-esque, however the ritual of celebration and it’s totality can be stamped and embodied in so many areas of life.
No matter the shift, no matter the change, no matter the doors that close and open at the same time, celebration is a thank you in its totality. All the sad and happy tears are welcome at the celebration party!
What comes to your mind when you think of celebration? What kind of changes and shifts do you celebrate? What completions do you honor?
Do you have a ritual to acknowledge and say thank you when something ends? Or what about when it begins?
What would it be like to know in your soul that sadness and excitement could both be part of the celebration? Neither wrong. Neither right. Both real.
Today the message is simple: Celebrate! Celebrate in its totality.
Celebrate the person of your past, present and future. Celebrate the milestones. Celebrate the hidden gems. Feel the feels. Frame the love and gratitude.
Whatever comes up is absolutely beautiful, amazingly human and part of the totality of celebration. The splendor of holding both. The grief, the joy and everything in between.
Honor it all.
FriYAY Yoga - 8/13
This week come celebrate my birthday with me in FriYAY Yoga! Class is at 12pm CDT on Friday the 13th. The theme is “Hips Don’t Lie”.
This class will be amazing for those hips and will be fun! I’ve got a hip hop inspired playlist queued up for us. See you on your mat! Signup through the link below. Replay is available for 48 hours.
1:1 Offerings
There are three ways to work with me 1:1! All three are with the deep intention for all to access their greatness and fully live life as themselves with mindfulness as the anchor. I do this with my clients through Mindful Music piano lessons, 1:1 yoga sessions and 1:1 Conscious Creation Coaching. To learn more about each, check out my website here.
Interested in working with me in a 1:1 container? Wahoo! Reach out to me here and let’s connect.
Here’s to the totality of celebration.
Of holding it all.
Of feeling it all.
Of being it all.
Celebration is gratitude on the move.
Cheers to the doors closing, the ones that open and whole hearted “thank you”s along the way.
I say a deep thank you to you, dear reader. Thank you for being part of my amazing twenties and jumping through with me to the next chapter!
Very simply, you rock.
In love, birthday joy and celebrations aplenty,
⭐️ Adrienne