what makes me….me

Thank you so so much for being interested enough to click ‘about’ in the menu /grin.

My name is Jen and I’m an early 40-s something currently living in the Twin Cities.  I’m married, have three children, 2 dogs, and 1 cat and currently call my deck ‘the office’ (until winter comes at least).

I am a wife, mother, entrepreneur, holistic wellness coach, and I have a wicked case of wanderlust.  I love decadent chocolates and India.

I think that’s about all you need to know /grin.

Nah!!!!!!! Read on…..

The Wholehearted Life

I believe in living life as passionately and wholeheartedly as possible.  God that sounds so cliche!  What I mean is….for me it’s a philosophy on how I approach life.  I’m not perfect nor will I ever be.  I accept that therefore when I screw up (and trust me…I screw up big sometimes) I forgive myself and move on.  I will always have a pot belly.  I accept that and find other things to love about myself (like my nose, feet, gray hair, big breasts, etc) which allows me to walk confidently in spite of my pot belly.  I quit my high-paying corporate IT job because I knew I could make it doing what I love (coaching others to live a wholehearted life) and in the process – get all the things I was looking for like flexibility in my schedule, working for myself, etc.  I knew this because I believe in myself because if I’m not believing in myself, it makes me pause, question why, and then address until I do believe in myself.  Because I refuse not to believe in myself.  You should believe in yourself too.  It’s what I do and I’m successful at it.  And others like that about me.  And because I believe in myself, I know how to live my life in moderation and balance; indulging in that which makes me happy while turning away from that which doesn’t (and getting in a little extra activity when I indulge too much).  It’s how I maintain a 50 lb weight loss.

Trust me, I get bogged down in life’s shit too.  I mean – who doesn’t?  But my philosophy of living a wholehearted life allows me to move on and prosper because – yes – life can be shit.  But it can also be absolutely fantastically fucking amazing and that’s always what I want to be striving for.  You heard me….absolutely fantastically fucking amazing.  I want to see the beauty in the seemingly mundane.  Because there is.  And I want to have experiences because life without experiences is what exactly?  So I create experiences and adventures.  I don’t sit back and wait for life to happen to me.  I make my life happen.  And that inspires people.  And those people then inspire me.  It’s a wicked, vicious circle full of goodness and I want in on that goodness…always!

 More about me…

• I’m average in every way – size, shape, intelligence, etc
• I was not the most popular in high school but I did ok
• I have a touch of the whimsy sprinkled in with a huge helping of wanderlust but I kept it sequestered away (until my mid-late 30s) because “that’s what good girls did”….or so I thought
• I went to college, got pregnant at 19, married at 20, and graduated college at 24 (perhaps I wasn’t a “good girl” after all…)
• Had second child at 26 and divorced at 28
• I went into Corporate IT from the start, put in my dues (ie proudly achieved my programmer-spread ass), and advanced my career
• I grew ever increasingly bored and dissatisfied with my life:  get up, go to work, work, come home, too tired to play with kids, go to bed, repeat – but that’s what responsible adults did.  Right?  I mean – what’s life if not working your ass off to pay your mortgage and fancy toys (oh man do I love my toys!).  WRONG!  (But more on that later)
• I gained weight, lost weight, gained more weight, lost weight, gained even more weight, vicious cycle continued over and over
• I had my third (and last) child at 34 and decided to try my hand at making soap (quite the leap…I know)
• Wait…somewhere in here I met the love of my life and married him about 10 years ago
• At 38ish I decided to start yoga and in the process, learned to listen to my body, love myself, want to only put good things in my body, and figured out how to let my inner voice shine!
• Read more about my story and past here and here  and here (I have more to write but the spirit hasn’t moved me yet…it will and when it does…I’ll let you know!)

Even more about me….