I stayed home. 

What specifically made me stay home? My body.

If I’ve learned anything through personal experience in 2021, it’s how powerful of an empowerment detection device my body truly is. That combined with my inner voice, well, let’s go 2022, even if it did get off to a highly unusual start. Despite my girlfriend’s best efforts to get me to say yes to New Year’s Eve plans, I felt deeply compelled to decline. I stayed home for NYE because I felt like I needed to rest.

And perhaps that’s exactly what was needed to begin the year on solid empowerment ground.

I often describe the empowerment journey to my clients this way: think of it like a video game. You graduate and elevate from level to level. The interesting paradox with this is that as you elevate, your empowerment deepens. Think of it as a perfect yin and yang. As you go up, you simultaneously go down, further into your empowerment. And as you advance in the video game levels, something from Level 2 can creep into Level 5 because it’s ready to be reprocessed with your deepened awareness. And that’s key because it doesn’t feel the same way when it comes back to the surface because your empowerment experiences it in a completely different way. And inevitably, new things come to light. The need to rest is what came to light for me in 2021.

For me, resting more is really about recognizing and accepting an obsolete structure in my life, which is to go, go, go, without rest. And now I have to navigate walking an unbeaten path of not just prioritizing rest, I can do that, it’s bringing prioritizing rest into harmony with the part of my tape recorder that tells me to “push through”. So a new part of my tape recorder has come up to be deleted. It’s time to record a new song.

While it may be a foreign concept to many that rest is a foriegn concept for some, it is a real thing. I may not have the rest rhythm down pat yet, learning to listen to my body and stopping to rest is a meaningful step, even if it was NYE. I really thought that after moving to Miami from LA at the end of 2020 and having virtually guaranteed regular access to all of the things I cannot be without to keep the autoimmunity things in check, was all it was going to take to get me back on track. Things did not unfold that way. We’re all learning the impact being locked down for an extended period of time has had on our bodies. 2021 had too many physical ups and downs that really brought to light some parts of my tape recorder that I probably wouldn’t have otherwise recognized, let alone tackled. So you can see how rest is about far more than just rest. Being intentional with rest can only become a priority in 2022 by continuing to put it through my empowerment filter, finding the parts of my tape recorder that still have a disempowered track and heal it. So much of the empowerment journey is about healing.

Putting everything in my life through the empowerment filter has become second nature to me. I don’t even think about it anymore. What has come from that is going deeper and deeper into the layers of what feels empowering and disempowering to me. And ‘stop moving’ is what feels empowering to me right now. But again, I admit that living this is where my tape recorder gets in the way.

Here's where empowerment can get tricky. Consider that one of my core values is freedom. I don’t like restrictions and limitations, which my tape recorder signals by pushing through and doing just one…more…thing. Yet, this pattern has ultimately caused a significant stagnation because 2021 saw my body rebel. And that, ladies, caused the worst restrictions and limitations. Interesting how that tape recorder works, isn’t it? It was actually pushing me further away from feeling my most empowered by pushing me to do too much of the things that make me feel empowered, which ultimately led me to do none of the things that really make me feel like I am living my definition of an empowered life. 

So yes, I beat the rest drum in 2021, hard. So in 2022, it’s not about go, go, go…it’s about GO. Just a single GO, but note the all caps. Subtle difference? Maybe to some, but to others, you totally feel me. Remember, we are all different women who have decided to walk the path of our own personal empowerment. 

And we all need our strength to live our most empowered lives. And paramount for me is serving you. So, if you've read this far, thank you. For your 'effort' (haha), I want to share with you that the GGM Podcast is coming back, with a new name, new look, new vibe and new focus. The Empowerment Formula is going to focus on all the tools you need to create your own definition of empowerment, begin understanding where your tape recorder gets in the way and how to move forward. It will be available on iTunes, Spotify, iHeart Radio & Sound Cloud. Click your favorite platform and remember, subscribe, like and share.

To all of you who are part of GGM, you need to know how much you inspire, motivate and fuel me. Thank you. Happy New Year! 

Diana xx