As most of you have heard, I love going to my canyon, it’s beautiful and always gives me inspiration. Today is no different, my canyon came through with another blog. I had the rare opportunity to go twice this last weekend, two beautiful days in a row. It was the second day, Sunday morning, that we decided to make “the big hike.” That’s how I refer to it anyway. It is probably not so big to some and maybe massive to others, to me it’s definitely big. Our usual route is a half mile or so and has two loops through this bird filled preserve, the big hike adds another half mile or so to that but it is an elevation change of over 700 ft, so it is a steep climb!

I was just talking with my sister and the title of this blog was born. There was a TikTok she shared with me about being real at funerals, and I realized that we tend to only recognize the shine, not the shit. I think it’s not only ok to acknowledge the shit but necessary, it’s the shit that allows us to shine anyway. We get so caught up in trying to hide our ugly that we forget it’s what led to our pretty. When all we show is the shine it takes no time at all for everyone to think it’s a facade. And it is. Not that you don’t have shine, you do, but let’s be real, you’re also full of shit. As am I! No mud, no lotus. No pain, no joy. No shit, no shine. It all goes together

Today as I hiked my normal spot with the hubs I saw something I couldn’t let go of. As we walked and talked this visual wouldn’t leave my brain. Quite the opposite actually, it started morphing right into this blog. Due to my schedule today our hike was very delayed, what is usually an early morning trek became a late afternoon adventure. The whole place looked different to me, after a fairly dry winter and a fast approaching summer, everything looked different. Even my little creek was practically dry! No sound of running water to be the soundtrack of my hike.

Oh those wonderful moments, you know the ones, when someone or something triggers something deep inside you and before you know it, you are in a “we aren’t in Kansas anymore” sized spiral and there doesn’t seem to be an end in sight. I had such a moment just last week. I was spiraling and there was nothing graceful about it. I had to catch myself, I mean really catch myself. No one was gonna do it for me and if they tried, I wasn’t listening. I would like to sit here and tell you I caught on quickly and had this wonderful come to Jesus moment and everything was calm as quickly as it started, but that would be a big fat lie! I spiraled for a good 12 hours, now granted, half of that was sleep time but it was not a peaceful sleep time. You know the kind, where your dreams are angry, scary, or both. I woke up the next day with swollen, crusty eyes, and hair from hell. My iPhone wouldn’t even recognize me for face id. It was ugly! That was my come to Jesus moment. Now am I proud that my troll-like appearance is what made me take pause and need to snap out of it? No, but I am grateful even if a little vain. This blog is all about the spiral and how we stop the flashbacks from being a setback.

The Tower Of Terror is no longer at Disney California Adventure, at least not in its original form, but it will always hold some special places in my heart. That ride was one of my favorites and still is, maybe more so, in its new form. I bet you’re wondering at this point why is it a blog and what am I writing about? Well, I’ll tell you. I chose this title because it is one of the last things I said to my father in law. The mere mention of this ride would have us laughing no matter the circumstance and while I will keep most of that between us, it is one of the most prominent memories I have with him. It is funny now, slightly funny then, but fun undeniably. Today I am going to tell you all about Richard Juhl, the best father in law a girl could ask for.

Last night I sat watching the Oscars, they roped me in with the promo’s for the first live performance of “We Don’t Talk About Bruno.” I am a sucker for some Encanto songs. Instead I got a snippet of the song and a full on view of the slap heard round the world. The internet blew up immediately and since I don’t have social media, my information came from news sources. I am beyond shocked at some of the reactions to last night. While I almost never speak on current events, this event speaks of such a bigger issue. One I feel is worth exploring. I don’t know if you watched the show live or if you are one of the ones that saw it via social media, but either way it was shocking. So let’s break this down and dive right into the bigger problem that this represents.

I know you’ve all heard the old saying “it’s the journey, not the destination!'“ I’ve said it myself many times. Then today I remembered my husband telling me a few weeks ago(I can’t for the life of me remember where he heard it), that the journey is the destination. I liked it when I heard it, but like many things I let it go. Today has been one of those days of self reflection and this saying popped back into my head. Like most blogs I write, this topic stems from my own experiences. I just hope y’all can relate or, at the very least, my writing is well enough to keep you interested for a minute.

Well, have you? I hadn’t until late last year, I was mesmerized by it though. I came across the same clip just the other day, and since I don’t believe in coincidences, I knew it meant something. This morning this blog hit me and now I know why. So a Hermit Crab shell exchange, what a sight. When an available shell shows up on the beach the crabs gather. There is no fighting over the new big shell, no first come, first served. The crabs all gather around and they size each other up. Not in a fighting negative way like most humans would do, they do so to literally create a size order. The largest first then smaller and smaller until they all have a spot.

This title came to me when I had been thinking of our journey here. Our human self vs our higher self. I was just discussing our souls and our consciousness the other day, how much of us is here and how much is still, not. While this title comes from Genie in Aladdin and his seemingly cursed life stuck in his lamp, I have stolen it. Phenomenal cosmic powers? Yes! Itty bitty living space? Also yes. I’ll explain, bear with me.