#phoenixthelionkitty

Meet Phoenix, my best friend. 🐱

"Who rescued who" - Tulsa SPCA

Almost four years old. 

Loves napping, chasing toy mice 🐭, cuddling, and patio sitting. 

Forever-shedding. 

#itssofluffyimgonnadie

...to be continued...

23 emotions people feel but can't explain..

1. Sonder: The realization that each passerby has a life as vivid and complex as your own.
   
2. Opia: The ambiguous intensity of looking someone in the eye, which can feel simultaneously invasive and vulnerable.     
3. Monachopsis: The subtle but persistent feeling of being out of place.
   
4. Énouement: The bittersweetness of having arrived in the future, seeing how things turn out, but not being able to tell your past self.
   
5. Vellichor: The strange wistfulness of used bookshops.
   
6. Rubatosis: The unsettling awareness of your own heartbeat.
   
7. Kenopsia: The eerie, forlorn atmosphere of a place that is usually bustling with people but is now abandoned and quiet.
   
8. Mauerbauertraurigkeit: The inexplicable urge to push people away, even close friends who you really like.
   
9. Jouska: A hypothetical conversation that you compulsively play out in your head.
   
10. Chrysalism: The amniotic tranquility of being indoors during a thunderstorm.
    
11. Vemödalen: The frustration of photographic something amazing when thousands of identical photos already exist.
    
12. Anecdoche: A conversation in which everyone is talking, but nobody is listening
    
13. Ellipsism: A sadness that you’ll never be able to know how history will turn out.
    
14. Kuebiko: A state of exhaustion inspired by acts of senseless violence.
    
15. Lachesism: The desire to be struck by disaster – to survive a plane crash, or to lose everything in a fire.
    
16. Exulansis: The tendency to give up trying to talk about an experience because people are unable to relate to it.
    
17. Adronitis: Frustration with how long it takes to get to know someone.
    
18. Rückkehrunruhe: The feeling of returning home after an immersive trip only to find it fading rapidly from your awareness.
    
19. Nodus Tollens: The realization that the plot of your life doesn’t make sense to you anymore.
    
20. Onism: The frustration of being stuck in just one body, that inhabits only one place at a time.
    
21. Liberosis: The desire to care less about things.
    
22. Altschmerz: Weariness with the same old issues that you’ve always had – the same boring flaws and anxieties that you’ve been gnawing on for years.
    
23. Occhiolism: The awareness of the smallness of your perspective.

2017

2016 has been a year of challenge - of HEARTBREAK, of change, of growth, of enlightenment, and ultimately - of WHOLENESS. 

I started 2016 with a heart full of hope. A recent engagement, a new job, a beautiful home, talk of a family, etc. All the things in life that I thought that I wanted. 

And at the end of 2016, I still have a heart full of hope, but of a different kind - knowing that I gave all of that up (and I would do it again in a heartbeat) to become the person that I am right now. 

This year will not only be remembered by the breakdown of my relationship with my partner of over 5 & 1/2 years, nor by the sudden and harsh disconnect from my mother - but will be remembered by how 2016 changed me. 

2016 defined me in ways I feel unable to truly explain - ways that I feel have reshaped me entirely. Molded me. Allowed me to see and focus on my value, my worth, my relationships, my future. 

2016 has taught me patience, courage, understanding, willpower, boundaries, tolerance, balance, growth, and self-respect. Those and a million other things. And I am still learning. 

2016 has shown me my weaknesses and my strengths. It has shown me, trial after trial, that I am strong enough - not only to persevere, but to learn to be a better, more well-rounded, more compassionate, deeper-loving, genuine person. 

So, to 2016 - thank you for teaching me what it is to feel the shipwreck, and to have the courage, determination, will, passion, and ability to move forward. To learn, lean into the changes that come, and take steps towards a better, healthier (mentally and physically), more complete and self-aware "me." 

Letting go will generate a sense of emptiness at the beginning, one that can be difficult to live with. Nevertheless, strength resides in our capability to face this emptiness and transform it into wholeness. To overcome fears of doubt and unfamiliarity.

And so, 2016, I'm so incredibly ready to let you go. 

I know I am strong because I’m ready to know what lies outside my comfort zone. I’m ready for freedom and I’m riding this roller coaster with an open heart and mind.

2017: The year of Paula. Bring it on!