Shoes to Shiraz

I think I'm still in a food coma from yesterday and all the deliciousness of today didn't help.  I sure hope I don't gain back the 10 lbs I've lost. Sigh.

Today was our shop day and we spent 6 glorious hours at Woodbury Common Outlet which is an hour ish bus trip out of the city into the beautiful hilly tree area of somewhere else in New York.  I wasn't paying attention, I was too excited to shop.  And no, we didn't buy any shoes to scuff before we cross the border in case you were wondering.



We all had our wants and I think we found those wants and then some.
Highlights for Jen were her 3 Marc Jacob purses.
Best buy for Kyla is all of her purchases.
Mom's fave purchase is her purse
and my fave was my jacket.



I actually tried on a classic trench from the Burberry store on 5th Ave, it was beautiful and fit perfectly but was 2000$.  While I loved it- I plan on losing more weight before next year so I thought that would be a dumb purchase.  Instead it has now been placed as my end game goal prize.  Luckily I found an even more perfect piece from the Burberry outlet which was a third of the price.  A Deena cape!


Our evening was spent being entertained at Ellen's Stardust diner where we sang, danced and ate way too much.  And now I'm too tired to type any more so good night!

We ended the tour with a walk on the HighLine which was one of my new must-dos for this trip.  It's an old abandoned railway that they turned into a urban oasis...we walked the entire 2ish km and I loved every minute of it.  It was so cool to see New York from a different angle. 



The musical tonight was my pick and I luckily found the coveted tickets to Hamilton.  I don't even know what to say about this show but holy shit.  I also can't say I have ever been in tears before during a musical.  Everything about it was amazing.  Plus, that was Jen's first Broadway show- what a way to start!  This is a must see if you ask me, which you haven't but whatever, I still think everyone should see it.

Are you a believer in signs? Do you trust that you will be pointed in the right direction?  Can you hear your heart over your brain?

I was tagged on an Instagram post a couple weeks ago by Kim, who thought an upcoming workshop in YXE would be right up my alley.  She invited me along and despite the fact that I had never heard of this series I decided it would be a good experience.  I'm all for following the signs and well, this one was clear omen to pursue.

I jumped on the Desire Map train and let me tell you, I don't plan on getting off anytime soon.  Especially after reading Rachel HOllis' Girl, Wash Your Face (twice) (okay, three times) I feel like I'm finally coming to terms with my inner rockstar.  The Desire Map course, facilitated by Jennifer Sparks was just one more tool that I can add to my kick ass tool bag (that obviously goes with my outfit).

I'll take you through what we did with a little look at what I walked away with.

THE DESIRE MAP PROCESS

The Desire Map is essentially a novel way at looking at goal setting by honing in on your emotions and figuring out how you want to feel coming out of things.  To be honest, I didn't really think it would be that impactful, but I was wrong.  The minute I figured out my actual desired feelings, what I really wanted started making sense.

Like most life balance philosophies, the Desire Map is divided into 5 sections livelihood & lifestyle, body & wellness, creativity & learning, relationships & society and essence & spirituality.  We did a series of writing sessions in our workbook going through each element and thinking about them in terms of what we're grateful for that is working and how it's bringing us happiness but also what isn't working and why.  As a group (there were 15ish of us) we'd talk about what we came up with.  Jennifer also shared her own stories and observations to keep the conversation lively.


We then got to the part where we got to sift through the emotions that we wanted to feel in each of those avenues of life.  I adore stream of consciousness writing and we were encouraged to let the words pour out onto the paper.  The language teacher in me was giddy when we were told to use thesauruses and play with the words; letting them steep for awhile.  After going through all the 5 elements we went back and tried to find commonalities or words that resonated more than others. With the goal of coming up with a good 5-10 we were asked to try to them on for size and see how they worked with all the elements.  Could you feel at peace in your livelihood, your spiritually was well as you relationships?  When you found the 3-5 words that were positive, uplifted, expanded and felt like home , then you knew that you had your Core Desired Feelings.  The last step was to figure out how you could actualize those feelings in your day to day.

WHAT I LEARNED ABOUT ME

God it feels good to just sit down, away from responsibility and give yourself permission to dig deep and explore all the feels, plus it was a bonus to have a couple friends there to bounce ideas off of.


When going through the steps of finding gratitude for what was and wasn't working in the 5 elements, I didn't really see anything new pop up.  It was all things that I was comfortable with and very aware of.   The one time I did have an ah-ha moment was when I realized that to me the end product isn't necessarily the be all and end all.  For me, I find the most joy in the process.

Here's a little something you may not know- I hesitate to tell people I'm a blogger, mostly because I'm kinda embarrassed and clearly not proud.  It's also very personal to me so any criticism is like a kick in the shins.  But after having come up with the word: Inspired (which is how I want to feel always), I came across other synonyms like animated and infused.  Those are exactly the ways I feel when I am blogging, painting, taking pictures, writing and creating in general and those moments bring me so much joy.  Sitting here right now, reflecting and recording my thoughts, making it pretty with headers and italics- I am so animated, infused and inspired.  And that's what keeps me creating- be it on this blog or elsewhere.  If anyone reads it or anything comes from this post or that painting- it is all secondary and not my goal.  I realized, through the Desire Map process that I love putting ideas together and making something come to life.  Maybe that's why I like to dabble.

In the end I came out with 10 feelings that I needed:
Intimate
Invigorated
Authentic
Confidence
Energetic
Cherished
Inspired
Meaningful
Tranquility
Present.

I narrowed my 5 Core Desired Feelings down to Intimate, Invigorated, Confidence, Inspired and Meaningful.  And let me tell you, the minute I started applying those to my decisions - everything I was doing was exactly what I wanted to do.  It is so easy to say no to things that don't make me feel the way I want to feel.

How about you- what would your words be?

Here are a few ressources if you're interested in pursuing your own Core Desired Feelings:
The Desire Map
WTF to OMG

{Wistful Wednesday}

The short short revolution.  Okay, they don't look that short now that I look at them.

{Wistful Wednesday}

Here are our Monday topics for June, you can link up with us on the Blended Blog

Today's topic on the Blended Blog is Summer BBQ or something like that, I may also be making that up and just felt like writing about food.  So there's that.  Nonetheless I am coming at you today with my top 5 very random favourite things to BBQ.

This post would be so much better if I actually had pictures to go with it because I've actually done all of them and probably have pictures kicking around somewhere.  Instead, I'm going to infuse this post with random photos of my weekend because I can.

1- Pineapple.  Add brown sugar and cinnamon and voilà you have a divine dessert.  I actually made this this weekend and didn't take any pictures. Imagine that.  I also just normally grilled some pineapple (which is ananas in french and one of my favourite words) and put it on a BBQ spicy chicken burger. The spicy and sweet together was magnifique.  Also a french word.  See you're getting smarter just by reading this clusterhuck of knowledge post.

Not eating grilled pineapple here, instead I'm having my other favourite P word - popcorn (with dill pickle seasoning) and a Chelada.

2- Romaine lettuce for a charbroiled caesar salad.  My go-to order when we eat at Rock Creek Grill in YXE.  I loved it so much that I started making it at home.  Key here is not burning the lettuce. Obvs.

These trees remind me of lettuce, so this picture will work here.  I would not, however eat a salad at brunch. Hello, bacon.

3- Pizzas.  Something about that smokey taste that makes me salivate just thinking of it.  I think I'll put this on our menu for this weekend.

This is our bunny, Clover- the non-dead one.  Spot is the one that died.  Clover LOVES lettuce, not pizza and probably would have been a better picture to put after the lettuce. Clover is still pretty damn cute though and is likely thinking I should make pizza this weekend.

4- Hot dogs...not so random and quite normal but they must make my list because they are my fave summer food.  You know it's been an unsuccessful week when you have to go allllll the way back to May 9th in the phone to find a hot dog picture.



5- Cedar Plank Salmon. I don't make this as often but I have way too many cedar planks sitting around meaning I should do it more often.

Remember when it was cool to plank?  Well man, I will take a plank over flossing anyday....the random dancing is driving me nutso.

Well that was an entirely random post that wasn't even fuelled by wine, which I know that's what you're asking, brother.  Nope, just too much sunshine and a love for life.

Happy Monday, people.  Next Monday is TBB Asks in case you want to participate, also how is it June already?