Blog

Happy ALT Vitality Day! On February 14, 2016, a journey began toward living my best life (ugh, I felt your eye roll). That’s so generic, what the heck does it mean? Your best life is the one in which you tap into your true self and have the strength to be it despite what you imagine others might think. It is not an easy thing to do. 

It doesn’t seem like it should be difficult and many of us believe we are being true to ourselves (until we actually do it). ALT Vitality is about sluffing off the scars of yesterday and setting aside worries about tomorrow, so we can enjoy what we have today!

What we have today is a foundation to build on. We have to look within and ask ourselves what we really want our lives to be. Then, take some time to bask in the rays of those thoughts until we dare to imagine more for ourselves while silencing the critics (in our head, in our family, on the internet, etc.) that tell us it’s not possible. If we bask long enough, we might recognize ways in which we hold ourselves back and if we can recognize those, we might discover one thing, one action, one step that we can take today toward that life. 

If we can muster the courage to actually take that one step, the place we land may give us a whole new perspective. We might be able to see a brand new path that we couldn’t see before.  So, we take another step and repeat the process. Each time gaining strength and getting closer to being who we really are. 

I recently had a flashback to this one night back in high school. It was going to be just an ordinary night with one of my friends coming over to hang out and maybe watch some TV. When I heard my friend pull up, I emerged from my room to greet her at the door, but I was stopped in my tracks when I saw it…..It was my mom dressed in her tight black leotard with her tap dance shoes on. She was bent over dragging a big heavy square piece of wood along the carpet. When she got to the middle of the living room she plopped it down right in front of the TV. She had recently signed up for Adult Tap Dancing classes and apparently this was her night to practice.  She slid her “Introduction to Tap Dancing” tape into the VCR and on that square piece of wood, she began to tap, slap, shuffle and stomp along with the man on the TV. Ugh, I groaned and gave her my best teenage angry face as well as a vicious eye roll, I was so embarrassed. She shrugged me off, happily greeted my friend and kept on tapping.

While I was mortified back then, I’m so thankful now. The strong emotional reaction I had that night has allowed me to keep that memory of her and I love that memory of her.  She had wanted to try tap dancing when she was a kid, but for whatever reason was never able to, so she took the leap as an adult and no amount of ridicule from a sassy teenager was going to stop her, she did it and it made her happy!  Me writing this post feels like my “tap dancing”. What’s yours?