I while ago I blogged about what my “memorial bench” would say if I cut through my crap and just followed my bliss. I had been hiking with my husband and saw several memorial benches, which inspired a long talk about how we would be remembered upon our deaths.
The blog came back to me yesterday as my priest gave a sermon about holding on to the parts of our past that no longer serve us.
This got me thinking, what would be on my rubbish heap? What garbage would I prune away and discard if I was ready to release the shit pile I have been carrying around for the last 30 some odd years?
What pieces of trash are YOU schlepping around from your past that are keeping YOU from living out your legacy?
What bits of judgment, annoyance, clutter would you cut away and burn so that your memorial bench could reflect the life you truly mean to live?
Here are 5 things I am clearing away into my garbage heap:
Fear of doing intersectional feminism wrong.
Anger towards those that are doing the best they can with what they know.
Envy towards all the millionaire women who are sent by the universe to inspire me, NOT to make me feel jealousy.
Judgment of those who are speaking their truth even if their truth doesn’t resonate with me.
My shitty list of shoulds.
We are not all just one thing. We are a myriad of experiences and identities rolled into being a human.
What a revolutionary notion to discard the crap that no longer serves us so that we can come together in the spaces where our lives intersect – free of the garbage holding us back.
Would releasing the crap actually help us create opportunities to see each other clearly as people?
I am a bisexual wife with a PhD who is married to a male army veteran with three kids. I am a woman who has suffered from a lifetime of infertility and imposter syndrome. We are not all one thing. Our experiences create our existence but they do not have to limit our legacy.
This is what my memorial bench says today:
Dr. Melissa Bird, PhD was a human doing the best she could with what she knew at the time. She was an inspirer, a seeker, and a totally awesome badass.
Amen. Namaste. Mic Drop.
Raise some mayhem…cause some hell, Dr. Melissa Bird
P.S. According to my coaching client Kevra, my superpower is bringing hard topics to the table to allow others to have dialogue. She says, “The rest of us just think there is nothing we could possibly do that would make a difference…You show us how to do just that.” If you are ready to make a difference in your world, I want to be your coach. Send me an email today and let’s get started!