Today I choose to love and appreciate myself, and honor the exquisite life for which I’ve been blessed.

I didn’t always feel this way. My personal struggle has been to live authentically when my addictive tendencies have pulled me into darker times and inner places where I felt truly lost from myself.

It used to be the norm for me to abandon and mistreat my body and spirit with over-reliance on alcohol and substances to show up for life.

I was in a romantic relationship for years where I felt I was continually abandoning myself, but couldn’t find the strength to leave. Friends and loved ones in my life always told me I deserved better, but there was some part of me that didn’t believe it, and I kept myself chained to a painful cycle of emotional abuse, in which I was a willing participant, for much longer than I care to admit.

It took years of inner work and transformation to put back the pieces of myself that I had scattered throughout this time of emotional wreckage and self-inflicted pain.

I am so grateful to be the woman I am today, because I chose to become her.

What I learned from these experiences is part of my mission to share with others. I know what it is like to be stone-cold sober from substances and still hit demoralizing emotional bottoms. I know the feeling of wanting desperately to blame “someone,” but recognizing the finger points back to me at the end of the day.

It wasn’t until I learned how to cooperate with my internal reality that I was finally able to transcend it. And it wasn’t until I learned to flood those hurt and rejected parts within myself with my own loving and compassion, that true healing began to occur within me.

That is why life today requires excellent care of self on all levels. After waking up to adoring myself, not from the ego but from a deep place of soul recognition - that I am a being worthy of Love simply by existing - everything changed.

In my eyes, awakening and fortifying this inner awareness is true Spiritual Gold, as once discovered and owned, it can never be taken away.

From this recognition, in my experience, we can learn to minister to ourselves in profoundly loving ways. This honor and respect begins not only with the physical body, but also my behaviors, habits, inner thoughts, and voice with self. I ask myself regularly if my outer relationships are reflective of the loving within my own heart. Am I seeing the value that I hold for myself mirrored outwardly?

To go from constant self-doubting and criticizing to self-appreciation, and being willing to see the beauty of my being while supporting myself in positive ways, has been the most miraculous journey I’ve ever experienced. The more I do this, the more I am also able to assist others to do the same in laying the foundation for their truest selves to emerge.

This is why I also love working with women - no matter how far along they find themselves on the scale of suffering – on their awakening and healing journeys.

If you have an aching soul, you can make this choice to take a stand for yourself and your heart, forfeiting the inauthentic games and returning to your Truth. You too can participate in your life and show up fully. If I can do it, you absolutely can too.

We awaken together, we arise, we learn from each other, and keep rising higher.

Trust the love in your own heart, and its most fine, unique manifestation yearning to be expressed.