Last week my son and I went on our first vacation together – EVER.

This might not sound like much to you. But to me, it was monumental.

Because up until now, I’ve simply been too sick to travel. Too unwell to even dream about or consider doing something beyond my usual routine.

Too exhausted and ill to take on the tasks of packing, traveling, parenting, vacation-ing, traveling, parenting, and unpacking again. (IFYKYK 😉)

So, this trip was a benchmark moment for me. It was a moment in time that I very deliberately took in and celebrated.

Because it felt good to appreciate all the hard work and deep devotion it’s taken to get my body and my health to where they are today.

Because it felt important to relish the renewed strength, endurance, and capacity that I have now.

Because it’s so easy to gloss over these moments without pausing to acknowledge what it’s taken to get here, and to be grateful.

If you’re dealing with a health challenge, or are in the throes of a healing process, you know what I’m talking about. It’s a very hard, deeply uncomfortable, incredibly challenging thing to go through.

Sometimes you feel like you’re always going to be in it. That you’re always going to feel the way you do right now, and that you’ll never feel good, or like your former self, ever again.

I can’t tell you how many times in the last 7½ years despair paid me a visit.

And how many times I doubled down on my commitment and my intention to keep doing what I needed to do to heal – to keep taking one tiny little baby step in the direction of feeling better.

Healing is a journey, and it has its own timeline – one that is often very different than what our egos would like it to be.

Healing takes as long as it takes, and despite our very best efforts, there is no rushing it. It is what it is, and it will be what it will be.

If you are healing, or you know someone who is, please remember:

• Be gentle, generous, and kind to yourself or to the person who is healing. That person (or you) is likely being very hard on themselves. Your kindness will remind them they are still lovable, even if they are currently unwell.

• Celebrate the little milestones, the small moments in time when you see or feel improvement. Take these in and let them nourish your body and spirit. Let them show you that healing IS happening, even if it’s incremental or very slow.

• Improvements and feeling better aren’t necessarily a green light to push or go hard. It’s very easy to slip back into the ways our hustle culture wants shames and gaslights us for resting and healing. You are doing your own thing, and if you’re feeling better and seeing improvements, it’s a sign to keep doing what you’re doing.

I am still healing. But I want you to know there is something beyond healing, and it is worth your devotion and efforts to get there.

Thank you for witnessing my benchmark moment, and for celebrating with me!

Lots of love,

Alicia