Souls grow back

Warning: This post is chock full of emotions. If you cannot handle them read no further.

I'm having an overwhelming emotional reaction to everything that is happening in my life. Though most of the emotions that I'm feeling are happiness, wholeness, and excited anticipation, sometimes I'm reduced to tears and can barely begin to put my feelings into words.

Thursday I woke up, and for the first time in months I felt genuinely happy and full of positive energy and enthusiasm that those last few months of Americorps beat out of me. The only way I can describe it is to say "I feel like my soul has grown back." I'm ready to go back into the world and experience its beauty, and meet new people, go new places and have an impact on the world. My future was all of a sudden filled with infinite possibilities. I want to bike across the country, and lead trips through the backwoods in nature to teach and share this passion for the world. And I want freedom. I want to be able to give up this materialistic lifestyle that I feel is just holding me back.

There was one thing stopping me. How could I tell Noel that I didn't want to live with her anymore? I know that she had built her life here with the assumption that I'd be here too. But I'd made up my mind. I'd tell her after she got back from her trip to Chicago. After Liz dropped us off, Noel turned to me and said: "My mom asked me to move closer to home. I'm going to move to Chicago." Wow. We were nearly on the same page! She told me her plans, and I told her mine. She wants to leave in a few months, but I intend to stay in Denver for about a year. But now I've been granted the freedom to move on and live my life.

Last night I had Ryan over to pick up his stuff that I'd accumulated. There wasn't much, but I felt bad throwing his things out, and there was some things like a movie we watched together, and the heart necklace I wore everyday while he was in Afghanistan. Things I can't look at without crying, but can't bring myself to dispose of. So now they're his problem to deal with. In conversing with him, his impending marriage became real to me, cutting one more cord that was keeping me here and granting me the gift of freedom.

Then today after the relief and joy of talking with Noel started to ebb, I was filled with an overwhelming sense of loss. Now I can't help but think that I'm losing two of my best friends at the same time. I feel a sense of loss and  fear of being completely alone; with no one to fall back and rely on.

I'm choosing to embrace the positives in these changes. I feel like I can return to the life I love, and that each day is an adventure. I can now look at my current lifestyle with more positivity and enjoy each moment, no longer being stuck in a rut, but moving forward with my life. In the next few months I'll be trying to accomplish my "Life After Americorps" Goals, and creating a plan for the future. More than anything, right now I feel happy. Happier that I've felt in a long time.