Today I turn 40 years old. I’m now in the club.
It sounds so much older than it feels but I feel like I’ve earned my stripes.
I remember my dad talking about his younger brother, and saying that people’s financial problems seem to go away after 40.
I thought I would never get there.
Looking back on my adult decades…
20’s…. were all about building my family.
I started dating my husband just before my 21st birthday, and we were married the day after I turned 22.
We welcomed our first son when I was 23, and we bought our house that year.
Our next son came along when I was 25, at 27 we had a miscarriage, and when I was 29 we were completed our family with a baby girl.
30’s… were all about personal growth and getting to know myself
We moved to the farm when I turned 30. There is hours and hours of lawn mowing to do. While I was on the lawn mower I was listening to audio versions of Abraham Hicks and Wayne Dyer over and over until I gained an understanding.
By 35 all of the hours had totally changed me, and at age 36 I started a new life on my own.
The following 2 years were some of the hardest of my life. I learned people who have treated you like a doormat don’t like it when you stop laying down and taking it… and believing in who I am as opposed to who I was told I was, was no easy task, but also the very best and most important lesson learned of my life so far.
The last 2 years of my 30s have been about really getting to know myself through the layers. I have been working hard to clear regrets, resentments, and anger.
I’m hitting my 40s with a little bit of work to do to finish cleaning up my 30s… but also with a lot of excitement for the future.
I have been asked to be a guest speaker on March 8 at a local ladies event to celebrate International Woman’s Day… that’s an exciting way for me to start this decade off! (If you would like to come you can get more information and tickets at www.ladiesoutloud.ca). I have always dreamed of being a speaker.
Tonight my family is taking me for a beautiful dinner at the same place we celebrated my 16th birthday, I will be reconnecting for a weekend with a lifelong friend soon, and my sister and I are taking a bucket list trip to New York this spring… all of these blessings to start my 40s…how lucky am I?
In this decade my children will become adults and begin their adult journeys and I know I am going to find a lot of empty spaces I will be filling with new things… I suppose there is even a chance of grandchildren popping up, if I’m lucky.
I still feel like I’m just getting started with life…there is so much I want to do.
So I guess it’s Happy Birthday to me…
And onward we go!