Hold Nothing Back

Happy August, friends! It is a new month (one of the best, in my opinion - it is my birthday month, after all!), and I'm celebrating small steps over here. I can already feel so much goodness in store.

For the first time in over a month, yesterday I (finally!!) felt a bit of my old energy returning. No longer did my eyes burn + water from the moment i woke up in the morning. No longer did I feel I could sleep for a week straight. No longer did I wonder how (or if) I would make it through the day.

My heart was seriously bursting with so much thankfulness + happiness I felt like weeping.
'Little things' like energy are so easily taken for granted, until it's gone. It has been one entire month since I've exercised. Since I've had a drink. Since I've been able to take vitamins. Since I've felt even a resemblance of my old happy artist self. I know I still have a ways to go, but I'm getting there.

So much of that I owe to you, friends. You and your kindness. Your tenderness. Your uplifting messages + packages + snail mail. The support I've felt as I've traveled through these unknown waters has been unreal, and I feel as though I owe you everything. I could not have done it without each of you.

Our experiences, good + bad alike, offer so much perspective. It had been way too long since I've been able to spend an entire day in my studio. And yesterday was heaven, for me. A quiet house, and nothing on the agenda except a date with my favorite colors + paintbrushes. It was as though I was looking at all the same things through different eyes. More thankful eyes. More knowing eyes.

And I know now that life is too short + too important to hold back. I want to hold nothing back. xo