Well hello there! I thought I'd pop in quickly to see how you're doing. This post is a bit personal but I'm just going to go there because I really miss you guys and want to talk and what better place? I've been writing a bit on my personal blog, Haus Maus, in case you feel like checking out some of my more recent posts so we can play catch up. I listed a bunch of things that I've been up to over the past few months here because it's nice to be open and give mini updates so I can connect with you. But today I'm thinking to just spill some feelings here on decor8 to see what comes back. Maybe some of you need to hear this, feel the same, or simply have comments to leave. Encouragement and support would be nice.

Lately I've been really stressed because despite taking a month off, I don't feel much more refreshed or better than I did when I began. This concerns me. I eat well, I exercise regularly, I do things that I love, I have friends and go dancing, shopping, paint my nails neon pink(!)... You know, all of the things that usually perk a girl up. But this summer has been different.

It's not been a normal summer. It's not been much of anything really, just time passing. And this concerns me.

I wonder if I need new projects or quite possibly a vacation away from home, as in faraway for several weeks? I keep wanting to go to India or Bali, I think those places would be most restorative for my soul and heart. In the end, I think it's really my heart and soul that needs a safe place to rest right now. I need new experiences, new sounds, sights, things to capture with my lens, colors, patterns and most of all, I need to feel alive again because this has been a hard and challenging year for me in ways I cannot begin to describe. I don't feel 'dead' or clinically depressed, but I do feel like there has to be something more for me - that I need to identify what it is and somehow capture it, place it into my nearly complete puzzle, and finally feel like that space has been filled.

I didn't feel like I was missing anything for years but suddenly I do and I'm not sure where this springs from. Or maybe I've been missing it for years and used my workaholic/over-achiever-ness to mask it and now that I've paused a bit, I have had enough quiet in my life to hear that little hollow space that I had no clue ever existed. I just thought I was all cool and "A" type and that it was something to be proud of. Perhaps in some ways working hard and trying to prove our talent and value is how we avoid thinking about the real stuff. I have many workaholic girlfriends who, the minute they really stop and think, feel like stuff is missing in their life but they quickly wash that feeling down with wine and a 'girls night out' thinking that will cure it. For the moment it does. I am ready to face whatever this empty spot is and finally heal it. I'm ready.

But how do I get started? This is what I will explore in the next month of my life. I have a new journal, a sharpened pencil, and a park behind my house where me and my blanket will spend the final days of this beautiful summer to write stuff. Lots of stuff. And to think.

It's scary to think about those ugly bits, isn't it? But it's exhilarating because change is in the wind. I smell it stronger than ever before. This is good.

I am thinking more and more lately about the importance of being happy. How you really have to be happy in your heart and with yourself and in your skin and well, just honestly happy. Maybe age does this to us. We stop trying to fit the form that others want us to be and instead, work at being really, truly, 100% true to self. I often think about, "To Thine Own Self Be True", which when really considered is quite a strong statement not to be swiftly uttered but to be sifted, felt, the sands of the truth from those words falling gracefully upon the floor leaving traces of glimmering hope on our fingertips.

I don't always write so openly on decor8 because this is a design blog, a place of pretty things and inspiration. But then I thought that it can be quite inspirational to read about how others feel because we can sometimes relate to those feelings and be somehow inspired that someone else 'gets' us. Well if you understand any of what I've written above, then hopefully my words have inspired you to consider your feelings too, take them seriously, examine them and evaluate next steps. This is what I'm currently doing.

I wonder what you are thinking about lately? I wonder if you often think about the puzzle of your life and whether there is a piece that needs to be refit elsewhere or perhaps one that is missing altogether? I wonder if you have ever gone through a time when you felt an authentic shifting inside, a need to truly find your 'happy' place like never before and then grab it and hold onto it for awhile?

Love, Holly

Photos: Holly Becker