Easy Buttons

I have been feeling so emotional and weak and overwhelmed and lonely lately. It’s fine, it’s just how I feel under stress. But today I needed to do something that made me feel strong. So off to Faust Valley Hill I went with my bike. The hardest part of the ride is the grueling 11 minutes from bottom to top that makes me question everything in my life. 😂 It is always hard and always worth it. And now I feel strong and grounded and motivated and supported. 
I am so grateful that I have the power to choose. I can choose the couch and Netflix and food and social media, or I can choose to connect with the core of my being: The Tiffany who really loves herself and wants to make choices that are empowering. This is usually through physical exercise, mindfulness, yoga, meditation, conversation, and laughter.
There are two things I wish I would have realized earlier in my life. The first is that all of the emotions I feel are ok to just feel. It doesn’t mean I did something wrong and now I feel crappy because of it. It’s just that I am human and it’s normal. What I do with them is the key. The second is that when I choose the couch and Netflix and food and social media and all the other “easy buttons”, I can make a different choice next time. The important thing is to keep coming back to myself, just like in meditation. And implementing self compassion is so much stronger than criticism. “I am not a prisoner because I hold the key.” Do any of you have a Faust Valley climb that you go to when you need inner strength?