Epiphany

Driving home from Liberty this evening - I had gone there to meet Tracey, one of the women who has expressed interest about being interviewed for my book project – I had an epiphany of sorts. Writing about it now, it seems silly that something so glaring obvious struck me like lightening even when I felt like I had thought through the variety of meanings this process would hold.

Even after careful consideration, which for me is typically tantamount to extreme over-analysis, I was headed up the Easley exit, preparing to merge onto Highway 123 en route home, and it hit me: interviewing, recording and listening to other people is going to teach me so much about myself!

It is completely fine if you are thinking “DUH … Nicole!” I’m ok with that because I thought the same thing. Of course I am going to learn something about myself, about my life, about the human condition. Talking with people and hearing their stories is no different than sifting through anthologies of American Literature: these individual stories give the listener (or reader) a new perspective to consider – a unique looking glass through which to view everyday life. Stories make us more human.

The only difference between the people with whom I’m meeting and my endless volumes of Norton Anthologies is that the people inviting me into their lives and homes are not published …. YET!

As the idea that I will experience personal growth through this process [said with an exaggerated overly twangy southern accent] slaps me upside my head  (dangerous while trying to merge onto Highway 123 I might add), it also occurred to me that coinciding with the stories I am telling – the ones that do not belong to me – I might have some stories of my own, emotional responses and reflections, or maybe even times when, dare I say it, I agree to disagree with the philosophies of any particular story teller.

And because talking with people sparks ideas and generates feelings, I might want to write about those things. But I can’t – can I? This project isn’t about me; it is about other people’s stories. Obviously I have a few tattoos that have stories behind them. Deeply personal meanings that I had planned to share, peppered in among the numerous other stories I am excited to hear and write.

One of my dearest grad school friends now part of my family, Kim, recommended I read Elizabeth Gilbert’s Eat. Pray. Love. I purchased the book, and it sat on my book shelf for about a year before the universe drew me to all of the incredible insights captured between the covers. While I would never compare myself to Gilbert as a writer, this Soul to Skin Project upon which I have embarked is really no different than Gilbert’s trek around the world as she discovers herself. Of course I am going to grow as a human being throughout this process! Nicole, me, as a unique individual … I use writing as a way to digest my feelings and make sense out of what I have learned.

I say all this to say that, driving home from Liberty, my mind, heart and spirit were flooded with thoughts and feelings. Things I need to digest and process and write about, and I am going to allow myself the opportunity to do just that as I work on this project. I hope you, my readers, will not find it selfish that I am doing this – that I am giving myself permission to become a part of this project instead of being an outside observer who merely records and regurgitates (I don’t mean that to sound gross. I just love that word). Maybe, just maybe, some of my insights and observations will resonate with the readers out there?

I feel like a broken record in saying this, AGAIN, but I am terribly excited about this project, process and journey. Soul to Skin continues to evolve and is taking on a life all its own. I thank you all for your patience (as I learn to juggle all the responsibilities in my life that I am now doing as a single parent), your support and encouragement and excitement about the Soul to Skin Project (my baby in the making), and for making me feel like I have permission to grow and learn and evolve throughout this process. 

She Never Ceases to Amaze Me

After Em and Ella were snuggled in and asleep last night, Mom and I rendezvoused on the stoop for a moonlit chat before going to bed ourselves. I had to remember, record in my mind parts of our conversation because it was that profoundly meaningful.

Mom read the “Always Remember I love You My Molly Mugwump” blog post and cried. This was her response to me: “I am not amazing. For thirteen years, I prayed for you. I truly believe you were a gift from God. All I have done, Nicole, is take care of you because I wanted you so badly and I promised God if he gave you to me, I would take care of you.”

She told me I was the one who is amazing and special and that she has always know this. She also said that she thinks I am finally starting to understand that I am special – though I haven’t fully grasped it in her opinion. While she has no plans on going anywhere any time soon, Mom also told me that if she went to sleep and wasn’t there in the morning, I would know that she was at peace because she has seen me happier than I have been in a long time. She said she had confidence in my ability to do anything I put my mind to, and that she is so very proud of me (I can’t type this without crying. Geez!)

We talked about other things. About this project I have undertaken. What I quoted above, however, are words I will forever carry with me. She might not think she is, but my mom is amazing to me. I only hope I can be a fragment of the mom she is -- for Em and Ella. I am humbled by the way my life has been blessed. Truly. Honestly. Deeply.

 My Mom never ceases to amaze and inspire me. I simply had to share this!

Blessed and Thankful

My mind, body and soul have been flooded with thoughts and emotions pinging, zigzagging, and ricocheting off of one another such that I feel like the Pin Ball Wizard.

Those of you who continue to follow me on this journey will come to know that I am a devoutly spiritual and faithful person. While I sometimes find myself bogged down by self-doubt or anxiety, like a cat that always lands on its feet, I find my focus and press forward toward whatever goal I have set on my horizon.

Hand in hand with my passion for writing (mentioned in an earlier blog post) has always been a love for reading. I have an insatiable appetite when it comes to written words – devouring books like a starved man in desperate need for nourishment.

Believing that everything in life happens for a reason, at the perfect time, applies to books as well. I have purchased books, brought them home with every intention of diving into the pages, only to be distracted by one thing or another. That book might sit on my nightstand for a week, six months, maybe even a year, before some current inside starts to stir and the next thing I know, I’m sitting with that book in hand.

The Alchemist, by Paulo Coelho, is one example of being drawn to the exact book, the precise words, the spiritual nourishment I needed at the perfect time. It accompanied me to the mammogram and needle biopsy that diagnosed my mom’s breast cancer last May. And while I was unable to focus on reading at the time, it was in my bag while I impatiently waited for her surgeon to deliver a report after the lumpectomy.

So many thoughts and ideas in The Alchemist resonated with me at that time, making such an impact that it has become one of those books that I read over and over again. The pages have been marked with my own questions and notations – multiple passages emphatically underlined in pencil:     

“Because there is a force that wants you to realize your Personal Legend; it whets your appetite with a taste of success.”

“In order to find the treasure, you will have to follow the omens. God has prepared a path for everyone to follow. You just have to read the omens that he left for you.”

“But the sheep had taught him something even more important: that there was a language in the world that everyone understood, a language the boy had used throughout the time that he was trying to improve things at the shop. It was the language of enthusiasm, of things accomplished with love and purpose, and as part of a search for something believed in and desired.”

“When you want something, all the universe conspires to help you achieve it.”

“When someone makes a decision, he is really diving into a strong current that will carry him to places he had never dreamed of when he first made the decision.”

Making the decision to start the Soul to Skin Project has already started to carry me places I never imagined. With every fiber of my being, I believe this is what I am supposed to be doing at this precise moment in my life.

Like everything else I do, I am approaching this with unbridled enthusiasm, passion, love and purpose. Writing a book has been my dream since I was a child. Over the years I have come up with a million excuses for why I couldn’t do it. I didn’t have time. I wasn’t a good enough writer. People wouldn’t be interested in what I had to say.

I have come to the point in my personal and professional life when I am choosing to abandon my fears and doubts in order to pursue the dream that has always been inside of me. As I sit and write this I am awestruck by the surrealism of this very moment, everything leading up to it and the endless possibilities awaiting me in the future.

Thank you to everyone who has looked at the Soul to Skin Project blog, who have read the posts, who have ‘Liked’ the Soul to Skin Project page on Facebook. The outpouring of support, encouragement and love is truly humbling and amazing. I sincerely hope you will continue to follow this project, that you will share your thoughts and comments, continued support and encouragement.

Every morning that I wake up, I thank God for the blessings in my life. When I looked at the page views for the blog and had an email inbox full of Facebook ‘Likes’ and comments on the Soul to Skin Project, I was overwhelmed with feelings of positivity and possibility and immense love.

Today I feel especially blessed and incredibly thankful, and I would like to say thank you to everyone out there who has filled my soul with love, blessings, support and encouragement. None of this would be possible if all of you didn’t collectively care about this too. Thank you, thank you, thank you!!!