I am moving very slow today after a great week, a busy week, a week where I moved into a new place as far as my public relations work goes, but whenever I reach some new goal I've asked for, and worked hard for, and set my intentions for, I like to take time now to absorb it, chew it over and let it settle. I didn't use to do that and well, I would always pay. Sooner or later a backlash would come because my intellect loves to speed ahead of what my body and my emotions can gracefully handle.

And actually, I didn't listen to my better self this week, and after my very big Friday I set up a very big Saturday and had to cancel two of things I had set up because there just wasn't time or energy for me to handle them with any grace. So I stand corrected and today I'm not leaving the house, and I'm going to eats lots of delicious spicy lemony pasta with fresh greens and tomatoes.

The universe is presenting the most fascinating mirrors right now, mirrors that I am able to see the good and the lightness in. Mirrors that could give themselves a very big break because of their innate wonderfulness and I am doing my best to say to back to the universe, "okay yes, thank you I hear you."

Yesterday I had the joy of spending time with my best friend from High School who is so beautiful and vibrant and smart and engaging. And I spent time last week, and will do so again at the end of this week, with a man who is so like me in how our operating systems function (how our brains spin so fast and our body's are so sensitive) that it makes the hair stand up on the back of my neck.

In both cases I'm doing my best to be open to the happiness possible. To reawaken, or flex anew the muscles that will allow that to come about, to unfold easily in perfect time. I'm so curious, how can we help each other see the possibility of fun and joy? How can we help each other to be totally okay with who we are? I feel it will happen...

I would really like to be on vacation this week. I would really like to be sitting in a park contemplating daisies, or staring off into some green space, preferably with some stunning mountains in the background.

I want to be on vacation physically and mentally because emotionally I'm doing my best to take on something big, really big. I'm trying to face a new layer of musty old deeply rooted fear, fear that blocks I don't know what, but I've decided I'm ready to face it, ready to do my best to look behind the curtain and view the wizard.

Two things came about to bring me to this place, this decision, one is that last week I had a dream of seeing a grizzly bear in the backyard of the house I grew up in (in the So. Cal suburbs where no grizzly has ever been). At first I thought it was cool to see a bear in the backyard, but then I realized my Dad was in the backyard, and the bear was attacking him, and there I stood with my (then) baby brother in his playpen and the next thing I knew I was scooping up my brother and opening the sliding glass door for my Dad, hoping I could let in my Dad and not the bear.

I woke as I was slamming the sliding glass door after my Dad had rushed in, and it was a race to see if the door would close fast enough or the bear's claws would reach in. Eeek. Especially for those of us who read the terribly sad Vanity Fair article on the tragic end of the famous "Grizzly Man."

But why such a dream right now, I've been wondering? Obviously the bear represents fear, but of what? Why show up now? And I realize I've been going through some transitions of late, starting up a relationship that is moving slow, and sweet, and not being labeled, but still punching my deserving buttons.

On top of which I'm trying to figure out the right work/play/downtime balance for myself, so that the headaches and fatigue are manageable and kept at a duller roar. They've reared their head of late, reminding who is boss right now if I don't follow their rules. It's a challenge, especially because I am only now beginning to emotionally own the extent to which I'm a workaholic rather than just intellectually realizing it.

The second catalyst for wanting to face my fears on a new level was an amazing blog I came upon on Havi Brooks website "The Fluent Self" which I stumbled upon via Twitter called "The Negotiator, The Monster, and the Scribe." Powerful powerful stuff. I cannot tell you how much it resonated with me, so much so that that afternoon I sat at my computer and instead of working more, I spent a good amount of time flipping through her blogs looking for her to share more of her own challenging journey. Frankly I sat and cried, and cried hard, each time I came upon a blog post that spoke to my heart, and my emotional self that has done its best but still often feels frightened and ashamed and carry far too much of a burden.

So it's time to go deeper into the dark, and air old even older closets.

I am on a journey to write a book, my very first book. I have been published in portions of another book, in print and online, but I have never completed and published my own book. And it's one of those things in life I really really want to accomplish, just for me. Oh sure, I'd love it to be a best seller. I'd love to finish the first book and have the publisher like it so much I receive an advance for the second one. That is the dream. So that I could go off to Europe and do deeper research on someplace other than the Internet.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. Right now I'm on the journey of daily writing the book. Of daily thinking about the book. Of daily wondering about the book. And it's quite a journey, one that I'm only a quarter of the way or so into.

I have had a big struggle from adolescence onward to really show up for myself, to follow my own bliss, my own creative drum. I so love the collaborative process that instead I would usually jump on someone else's creative process in order to be included, in order to participate, feeling that I could earn my way in to being worthy by hard work and good feedback. This would be my trick with romantic relationships as well. And I'm sure you've already guessed, it didn't work out so well.

Oh yes, I did end up enjoying the creative collaborative process quite a bit, but it wasn't truly mine - so I had to constantly fight for the space to have a say, and frankly, I often pushed those who simply weren't ready to go where I knew they could go. Because I had the vision, because I knew how to get there. And in the end, though much good was done, it always ended badly. Because it wasn't really mine, and I knew that in my gut.

It's not that I haven't had my own creative projects all along, but my dedication to following my own creative drummer waxed and waned. I was not consistent. I kept thinking someone else's project was so much more legit than mine, so much more important, so in need of supporting first. I couldn't follow my own dreams first because I felt I hadn't been given a permission slip from God. That's my phrase for it that I've used for a long time.

But God doesn't send down a white photo copied form that you remember from school, he/she sends the yearning, the longing, the ideas, and when you pick up the pen and begin the journey support comes. Now I have thrown down the gauntlet to myself, the challenge - do your own thing, write your own book. Give it a total go, see what you can do.

And a fascinating thing happened, something that blew a big hole in the wall of my fear and resistance - two friends from my past have shown up and are showing support. One is my best friend from grammar school and she found me via the Internet about a year and a half ago, the other is my best friend from High School who found me via facebook about a month ago. Both have always supported the idea of me as a writer - and both love the genre I'm writing in - young adult fantasy (focused on girls).

Much of the book is plotted out, I'm now working on second drafts of the first six chapters (1 & 2 are done). It's moving, it's going, but it's still a challenging journey. There is a hole in the wall, but now I can see just how far I've got to go and it's daunting - like LOTR at the end, where it feels like Frodo and Sam will never get there. But they do. And now I just have to keep remembering that it will only happen one paragraph at a time, one page at a time, one chapter at a time and not get ahead of myself and full of worry that it won't be enough when I finally reach the end. The doing needs to be enough in itself.