“When everything seems to be going against you,
remember that the airplane takes off against the wind, not with it.”

~ Henry Ford

Getting divorced was the hardest experience I’ve had up until now. It was frustrating, emotionally crippling and felt like spiritual abandonment. The experience forced me to face my darkness and to face what choices had brought me to this moment. Why I had separated with a partner who I had pledged to spend a lifetime with. I do not commit easily and when I do, it’s for deep soul partnership. When that dream shattered, I became lost.

I was fortunate to have the strongest weapon in my spiritual arsenal during that time period. My faith. I used the melancholy time to go inward and reflect. I committed to feeling the pain, understanding the pain, cleansing myself consciously and journaling every day. While all of that that helped me intellectually, nothing touched my soul the way that joy would. It was a journey I was meant to go through and it changed my life and gave me soul purpose in a way that nothing else had the power to.

At some point in the divorce process, I decided I wanted re-invent myself and change my career direction. I was an advertising executive working in San Francisco and New York. I began to dream of a life I’ve always wanted but was scared to pursue. One year in the Mediterranean. I imagined a life in Spain. I listened to flamenco music and Cafe del Mar all day long, I had vision boards of “My Life In Spain” in my house and at work, I listened to my intuition on places to visit that matched my inner desires, once I arrived there I networked and created trustworthy relationships with people who lived in a magical island called Ibiza.

For months I journaled through my resistance and transformed doubt and worry into passion and purpose. I channeled the joy I felt about this life. When I journaled about the possibilities of this experience, there were so many voices that cautioned me out of it. What will my parents say? What about my full-time job? I trusted the words that poured out of my soul. I followed that. I trusted my inner voice and my inner vision. I chose that. After hundreds of pages filled with the voice of a woman’s whose soul had been set on fire, I had discovered the ability to follow the voice of my soul consistently and discern between soul and ego. My body was tingling all over. My heart was pounding and I felt excitement and passion flow again through my veins. I had laid down plans for a new vision for my life. My deepest longings and desires to dance at festivals and concerts the way I once had when I was young girl. To swim in moonlight and dance across the shore of an ocean. I wrote down all the possibilities. I arrived in Ibiza with money to live there for a few months, retreat and rejuvenate. I took long meditative walks in nature, spent time meditating on my desires, enrolled in belly dancing classes, painted and wrote poetry. In other words, I connected with a beautiful, sacred and magical part of me. I was not only dancing at healing festivals and concerts and weddings again, I was dancing with life.

I had found joy.

After the first year of discovering joy, I knew I had tapped into a fountain of power and it had regenerated me. Now, how to maintain that power? This was to be my next learning. I created a daily manifestation practice as well as a seasonal one where I trained my mental powers and physical body. I made decisions based on my core values, spoke my truth even when that meant disappointing others. I took inspired action, believed in my worthiness and deservedness to receive all my heart’s desires and became a leader of my community.

The result?

I ended up living on a magical island for 3 years, developing a sacred dance practice, life coaching business and a wisdom school to mentor young women. Every year I felt stronger, eating fresh salads and fruits, swimming in turquoise Mediterranean waters, running 12 kilometers three times a week on an ocean road, learning new spiritual skills, belonging to a sacred community who embraced me. I had learned how to take care of myself again and belong. And not make my partner responsible for filling those needs for me. I marketed my dance company in the Mediterranean and was invited to dance in Greece. I danced with famous sacred musicians who taught me the value of joy through dance, song and music. I was so connected to my personal power and what I could manifest with that. By this point, I felt I had fulfilled all my wishes.

I looked back on my vision board I had created three years ago and I wept. I had achieved everything I wanted. A life based on music and dance, strong community relationships, and feeling beautiful inside and out. I felt very abundant. But there was something missing.. Something was still holding me back. There was resentment, bitterness and unforgiveness. I had to learn to let that go. If I was going to have a beautiful relationship with myself – clean and pure – I had to let go of old emotional programming.

The divorce was final. The courts had signed the papers. I was a free woman. I called my ex-husband and I wished him well. I let him know that I would always be here should he need anything and that I honored our friendship still. I gave both of us the gift of forgiveness. And I gave myself the gift of self-acceptance and peace with my past.

Once I did that, the magic began again. And a new set of opportunities presented themselves to me. I was done with my three year retreat on the magical island of Ibiza. I had finished the lessons life was teaching me. It was time to learn a new challenge. Now, a new career is now opening for me. To teach sacred dance, online empowerment classes and open a wisdom school to mentor priestesses in training. My new dream is to spread these rich teachings globally to women. Some are transitioning from a relationship, some have been abused or mistreated and some just desire more abundance from life. I have a message for these women, “Yes, joy exists, After everything you’ve known falls apart, it is this one thing that can save you. And you have this power within you.”

Here are my top 5 tips on how to connect with your power:

1. Trust your inner voice Envision your ideal life, desires and dreams. How do you feel? What are the things you want to do the most now? Let your voice flow and listen. Feel the quality of freedom of being able to do this. Journal to connect consistently to this voice.
2. Claim your personal power Believe in your worthiness. Write down all of the goals you’ve already achieved this year. Character traits you love about yourself. Read this list over and over. They key here is to believe in yourself and go after your dreams!
3. Manifest your dreams You can manifest anything by getting clear. Clarity cuts through confusion. Get clear on how your perceptions. Get clear on your imagery. Get clear on your expectations of your life. Feel into the possibilities of the picture you’ve just created.
4. Transform pain into wisdom Master how to change one form to another form. Transform depression into expression of life. Transform deep loss and regret into life lessons and joy. Shape-shift your career into your spiritual mission and life path.
5. Own your magnificence The world needs your brilliance, joy talent, grace and radiance. Hold the vision of your life, sing your soul song out to the world and be a light.

Joy is a practice. You have to practice it every day. Joy is based on pure desire. Desire it. Long for it. Claim it and own it. Not only will you attract and magnetize to yourself the life you want, but a life that you deserve.