I love my job. I’m sure I’ve mentioned this fact before. I love the opportunity to get to know people deeply, to know how they think, what they believe, the message they mean to impart. I love that moment when my clients discover their unique writing voice, when it sounds like they do in real life. And here is a wonderful example of what I’m talking about. This is a guest post by event planner Tonia Adleta. Tell me you wouldn’t want to call her up and chat for hours with her on the phone. A little peak behind the curtains.

Tis the season for holiday parties and New Year’s Eve wedding deadlines. And a persistent beeping sound, almost like a back up alarm, and the sound of whirring tires awakens me. Trash day was yesterday. It’s still dark out so it couldn’t be the neighbor’s stucco crew. The propane delivery isn’t due till next week. But it definitely sounds like there is a truck doing something. But dear God, what time is it?!?

5:34am.

And sure enough, my floral delivery truck is at least six inches deep in my backyard. And getting deeper by the second.

You might not think that flowers are all that heavy, but I guarantee, if you take a refrigerated box truck, probably weighted for a good 10-14k lbs to start with, and then load it up with thousands upon thousands of stems (industry slang for individual flowers) all boxed per order, and then attempt to drive that truck through a grassy area, you’d end up stuck too. What I don’t quite understand is why he was driving thru the yard at all. We have enough space to do a three-point turn in the courtyard, and yet, if you’re at all local, you’d know that it’s been unseasonably warm the past few weeks, not to mention damp, and it’s been raining for the past two days.

Not quite what I envisioned when I set the intention to get up early and write, but boy, am I awake now.

So the driver sits, in his truck. I offer coffee, which he declines. (I also offer restraint by not asking why he felt the need to tear up my backyard, though he may never know how great a gift that was, considering I had returned late last night for the second industry holiday party this week alone and feel my sleep is a very precious commodity these days.) So, I’m attempting to remember that his day is a perfect unfolding, just like mine is.

I had a mantra, a daily intention I wrote several years ago to help train myself into a stronger awareness. I merged several different pieces together from my teachers and mentors at the time, which covered concepts like awareness, manifesting, living with clarity and authenticity. I posted it on the massive bulletin board in my bedroom (which doubled as my office at the time; despite the dozens of entrepreneurial experts that advise against keeping a desk in your bedroom.) I had it on my computer at the insurance job. I think I even posted it on the inside of the cabinet door where the cereal bowls were kept.

Today is a perfect unfolding. I am fully present and aware in every moment.

There were several paragraphs to this intention and I’d love to dig it back up again (but that was at least two laptops and five years ago,). More than anything, I’d like to see the many ways I’ve implemented the principles into my daily world, likely in ways I can’t even identify now. The mind is tricky that way.

This one idea, this concept of bringing an awareness to how I feel, what I think and what I choose as a result has changed the course of my life over the past five years, even longer now that I think about it. Ralph Waldo Emerson said, “We become what we think about all day long.” Buddha reminds us, “The mind is everything. What you think, you become.” Proverbs 23:7 says, “As a man thinks in his heart, so he is.” Earlier in Proverbs (4:23 to be specific,) Solomon tells us, “Guard your heart above all else, for it determines the course of your life.”

There are a handful of people on the periphery of this understanding—this understanding that awareness changes everything– loose acquaintances in the industry or friends of friends that say things like, “Everything is so easy for you!” or “How do I get your luck?!” On a day that I’m grounded and grateful, those comments break my heart because they just haven’t “gotten” it yet – and I want to help them understand. Other days it flat-out pisses me off because I have worked my ass off to bring this “luck” into my life, thankyouverymuch. On those days, I have to go back to that first line, sometimes more than once. Today is a perfect unfolding. I don’t even need to get around to the second part.

Yesterday, my practice of being “fully present and aware in every moment” found me grumbling quite a bit. The day unfolded with my over-sleeping (much more to do with the amount of work I had done the day before than the glasses of wine I enjoyed at my own Christmas party, I assure you.) This meant that I missed the window to write, to work ahead on a clients’ wedding details, even to wash the dozen or so wine glasses my friends had brought to the kitchen for me. A colleague, a seasoned industry veteran and musician, left her purse behind. My only way to reach her was Facebook messenger. (I mentioned to her later that I would have called her but didn’t have her cell phone number – but of course her cell phone was in the purse so that wouldn’t have done much good anyway.) In an effort to reunite her with her purse; I stepped away from the computer and drove 20 minutes or so to the location she was playing at, visited for a few moments, and then returned to my computer and to do list. I’d already lost several hours due to my own delays, then this, and time was disappearing while my to do list grew. Grumble, grumble, grumble.

And then, just as quickly, I caught myself. “I am fully present and aware in every moment.” Even this one, when I’d rather be doing something else with my time. So I am choosing to say that I am grateful that I have so many close friendships within my industry, for the chance to finally bring my community together by hosting a girls’ night. I am so incredibly grateful for The Villa, which is so well-suited to entertain in. I’m grateful for my cute little convertible, even though the “convertible” part is a bit broken at the moment (which means I couldn’t enjoy the benefits of having a convertible all summer – and now that it’s winter, I can’t get the soft top to go down in order to put the hard top on!) But, still, I love my little car.

And so, I’m grateful for the insistent beeping this morning, an alarm of sorts that I couldn’t hit “snooze” on. I’m grateful for a pleasant exchange with another new colleague, (though I do feel badly for him as I know his truck is full and his agenda is full of other customers that expect him to have already delivered by this point in time,) for the fact that most of my inventory can be delivered to my back door. For the space to create a better driveway for my deliveries – but that’s something I’ll just have to deal with another day.

            I am fully present and aware in every moment.

And now it’s time to get to work.