Was it stress or a hot flash.....

She pulled out her day planner, dreading what she would see. Important meetings and events, and places she would have to be. On time. And ready to do the tasks required at that time and place.

As she reviewed everything and every place she would have to be, and the people who would be depending on her, her heart started to beat faster and her palms started to get clammy. A wave of heat & sweat started to wash over her body, she wondered if it was the stress she was feeling or a hot flash. As she proceeded to turn down the air conditioning; she remembered her word she had chosen to focus on.

It was a new concept she had just learned about and figured she would give it a try. "I mean, what do I have to loose," she thought. "If it doesn't work, it doesn't work." It would be no worse than all the New Year's Resolutions she had made & never kept.

She turned to the page in her day planner she had decorated with her word. On it she had written how she wanted to use it to change the way she thought about the overwhelm she sometimes felt when her calendar was more full than normal.

She had used rubber stamps to stamp her favorite images and quotes and used markers to add color. She even pulled out her favorite rolls of washi tape. The ones with copper dots and stripes. "What was she saving it for anyways," she thought.

There at the top of the page was her word, EMBRACE. Under it she wrote, "...change with ease ...the chaos with peace ...the fullness of my calendar with peace and a sense of adventure"

As she read those words she remembered all the times her calendar had been full and how, every time, she had managed to pull off what seemed like the impossible.

She turned back to the upcoming week with a new sense of resolve, a new peace and as she read where she needed to be and when, she repeated her word, "embrace" and she was ready, once again, to face the the week, month and year ahead of her.