September’s Intention Recap: Self-Reflection

September where oh where did you go??? I swear to god this has been the quickest year of my life and the last 3 months have gone by in a blink. I’ve been insanely busy balancing work and blog life, hanging with friends, amongst other various hobbies and activities that have become a forefront in my life (who would’ve thought that I’d be carving out space in my free time so I can work on a coloring book and tarot card readings?? 24 is wild y’all.)

At the beginning of last month, I kicked off a new series, “Intention of the Month,” September’s being Self-Reflection. Which, let me tell ya, was probably the most necessary intention for me in my life at the time. Without getting too deep into it, as I’ve been respectfully asked not to, my boyfriend and I broke up. We lived together so as you can imagine, it has been a huge life change to process. I moved back home into my family’s house in the suburbs. With my newfound free time, I’ve been constantly reflecting on past life choices, re-evaluating how to make my present meaningful, impactful, and purposeful, and also asking myself what I need to do to move forward. Or where I even want to move forward to.

I think that sometimes, we need to look back in order to look forward.

Self-reflection has been a constant, on going activity for me this month. I think in events like a breakup, even in cases of extreme heartbreak, there are upsides. It really does open your life up to a series of possibilities and choices that might not have otherwise come to be. It’s a different lease on life.

And in this last month, amidst all my reflecting, I realized what I had been depriving myself of and where I’ve run into some shortcomings with how I’ve been living my life. I was pretty stagnate for a while, and wasn’t thinking about what I wanted my life to look like. I didn’t even really feel like my life was my own. It was always Meghan and ______. Once I was standing alone, I was able to start asking myself the right questions and start searching for the answers.

This month has brought a shit ton of changes. Some scary, some mundane, but all of them incredibly formative. They’ve all worked towards pushing me in the right directions. I realized that I have been wanting to transition into a different industry and start building my career where my passions and skills can align. My goal has never to become a full time blogger (just because growing my career and being a successful woman in business is too important to me to relinquish, especially now given what’s going on with our country), but I do want to majorly shift gears and do something more creative. I also want to be able to dedicate more of my time towards building my brand and honing in on my goals for my blog.

I’ve realized that in order to follow my dreams and make my life plan happen, I can’t stay in Chicago any longer. It has been and will always be one of my great loves, but it no longer offers what I need out of a city. And beyond needing a career and city change, I had this epiphany moment where I realized that what I really need is to further my education. I need and want to go back to school to get my masters. Currently, I am taking a GRE prep class and gearing up to take the exam and apply to grad school for the fall of next year. At this point I won’t say where I’m hoping to go or the specific program/school I’m trying to get into, but there is only one city I’m interested in pursuing, and I’ve decided that even if I don’t get into where I’m applying, I am moving there anyways. So that is this wonderfully exciting and simultaneously crazy “I can’t believe I’m doing this” kind of thing. But it’s what’s pushing me through, well, everything right now. I’ve got a purpose and a plan and I’m doing everything in my power to get me there.

In my previous Self-Reflection post, I talked about some of the activities I was going to work on to further my self-reflecting. I can attest that the “52 Lists for Happiness” exercise journal is AWESOME. It’s my favorite part of my Sunday night routine and has helped provide some intense clarity. At first, I was simply filling out the lists with bullet points, but now I’m trying to write mini paragraphs for each item I’m listing out- it just encourages more thorough journaling and reflection. My “Coloring for Meditation” book is also great; I was really surprised that the main thing it offers me are these insane bursts of creative energy. I do my best writing for the blog right after I color for 20/30 min. I’m planning on doing a full post about my thoughts on adult coloring books soon!

Besides just having more alone time, time to be with my thoughts and think about all of the changes in my life and what had to happen to get me there, the biggest push for my intention of self-reflection has been living with my parents again. Since my sister is at school and I’m basically an only child at home, we spend a looooot of time talking through the random shit that pops into my head, and it’s been very helpful getting outside perspectives on everything. In fact, my mum is the reason I’m trying to go back to school in the first place. Who would’ve thought moving back home would be one of the best (unexpected) things to ever happen in my adult life?

I’ve always believed that things happen for a reason, and they unfold the way they’re supposed to. The last month has made me certain of this. So far, at least. I feel like I’m back on track. And amidst difficult and trying times, that serves as an immense dose of solace.