redefining definition

Twice today I found myself in conversations with clients about the definition of family.  In the first, I was assisting to expand the parameters and in the second, one of the clients said it best when she said, "there are two kinds of family, one that you are born into, and one that you create yourself."  This is an idea with which I totally agree, but find that my belief is only one way.

I've created MY family.  An eclectic mix of friends, with myself as the common thread--well and some basic core values--but I am struggling with the idea that I could also be incorporated into someone else's family.  Intellectually it makes sense that it could happen--but accepting this as fact has become more difficult than I thought.

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11/15/11

Everything is in flux.  I am in the process of redefining myself--who I am, what I want, where I belong.  At it is there that I am getting stuck.  I feel like there are very few places that I do belong.  [I would say there is no where--but a few of you might knock me upside the head] I am trying hard not to feel "in the way" or like a burden (I know I know...), but there is a debate going on inside my head.  I am opting to participate, even though the opposition gets louder when I do.  To do otherwise is just playing into the emotion mind and the gremlin--and she cannot have that much power.

The upcoming holidays are what is bringing this to the forefront, I went through this a few years ago when I first stopped talking to my parents, and now to a greater extent that Kate and I are no longer together.  Where I "fit", trying not to impose, that sense of belonging are all in question.  Granted, I am speaking to my parents again, but certainly not to a degree with which the notion of spending holidays with them is even a remote possibility. 

I do fit though, I know this and get a little bit closer everyday to KNOWing this. 

Jump in with both feet
Let go of self-consciousness
Let go of fear of failure.

I have a beatiful family and they all love me for who I am, not who I was or who I will be.