New Year Reflective Post – 2019

On By Emily WIn Inspiration, Motivation, WritingLeave a comment

My, oh my, how life changed this past year, yet again. I think that’s a good sign though, no? I believe it’s a good thing as long as we are evolving personally, not regressing LOL.

Anyways, here are some things I’ve been reflecting on.

I hope everyone has taken some time to look back at the good things of the year and has planned some things for next year. Keep, moving, forward.

What I have learned this year / What I’ve been RE-reflecting on:

Habits are truly something you train your mind and body to do.

Determination will push you to where you want to go.

I give too much of myself to others(energetically) but am learning how to recharge myself, and learning who/what to say no to.

I learned that people’s actions will disappoint you because you expect them to be like you, and that’s just not realistic. What IS realistic is communicating what you want. If it still doesn’t happen and you want more, move on and go get more.

Stand your ground, respectfully, but without fear.

A reason, a season, or a lifetime. And any of those are OKAY.

Push past the fear of the unknown. Hell, JUMP right into it!

Giving is living.

Your mind is so, so powerful(the force is strong with this one ;))

You attract what you FEEL.

Energy doesn’t lie.

A lot of the times the company of your self is what is needed.

Etiquette is dying and those who know what it is, need to keep passing it to those we know.

Our mind expands when we are in new scenarios and learn new things.

I’m a strong, very independent person, but sometimes I just want someone to take care of me and I don’t want to solve everyone’s problems.

I’ve learned that my heart is even bigger than I ever imagined it was.

And probably Atleast once a day, I’m reminded that the only constant thing in life, is change.. And energy. 😉

So many more things than just these, but, again, as the year comes to a closing, it’s nice to reflect and turn inwards.

Wishing everyone a happy new year, and all of the success in the year coming up!

Natural Beauty

On By Emily WIn Inspiration, Motivation, PhotographyLeave a comment

For the past week I’ve been craving nature. Simple remedy: Go to the lake and fish.
This morning, however, it felt necessary to go to the backyard and listen to the birds, listen to the drops of rain falling from the leaves, and take some pictures of beautiful mother earth.
The Amazon is on fire, and my soul aches for our planet.
Here are some pictures of the beauty that surrounds us, daily.

Get out there people, while we can. ❤

How do you find your purpose?

On By Emily WIn WritingLeave a comment

My, oh my. What in the world is going on?
This sure will be a way to come back from a hiatus! LOL – Honestly, this post is a total venting post. So, forewarning, there is going to be some real talk in here.

Basically, lately, my life seems to be running in a flat line of mediocrity, which, if you know anything about me, probably has you thinking, ‘what the…..?’
But guess what? At the moment, I’m having one of those, ‘What the hell is my purpose in this life, and how do I start chasing another dream?” moments. Truthfully, its been a couple of months of this but usually the thoughts are, “My life is amazing, I’m so blessed. There are so many blessings in my life.” I don’t think its very fair for us to criticize ourselves for having both types of thoughts, because life is ultimately a balance between the duality of all things… Anyways!

First question to myself: Well Emily, what is your dream?     …… *crickets*…….. That, right there my friends, is the first problem to all of this…… What, is my dream?

When my dad was alive, I knew I had a purpose… I’m not sure if I could pin point an exact dream at that time, so lets go with the fact that I knew I was here for some reason.. that reason being to help my dad as much as I could and to learn everything I could from the situation so as to be able to help friends when they went/go through losing a parent(I was 26 at the time and not a lot of my friends have gone through that even now at a few months shy of 30).  – And that, is fulfilling to know: that what I went through will essentially help someone else in some way when its all talked about or experienced.

But, it feels like I need to go chase after something… or feel some type of purpose towards something..

Now, chasing a dream could be many, many types of things. It could mean striving to reach the top of your career, being a rockstar, traveling to every continent of the world..

But having that dream, leads to having a sense of purpose.. right? So, as the title of this post asks, “How do you find your purpose?”

Do you just, go somewhere new to discover new things? Do you take a class in something you’re interested in to see if it leads to a deeper passion? Do you do something you’ve absolutely never thought about before to feel out if you love it? Do you just close your eyes and think of where you want to be and then just GO for wherever and whatever that is?

If you were looking for answer from me on this one, you’re SOL, because I’m looking for the answer myself.

All words of wisdom are very, very welcome. I’m reading about 3 life-style/motivational books already but if you have some that you swear by, please drop them in the comments! 🙂

Thanks for listening.

10 things I learned in Tuscany

On By Emily WIn Motivation, Travels, WritingLeave a comment

Traveling is always an adventure, literally and figuratively. There is self discovery that always happens, and usually enlightenment to follow. Growing up a motto stuck with me which was ‘Knowledge is Power’ and this is pure truth. As I’m growing and experiencing(and gaining knowledge) it’s very apparent that it’s always better to talk about things you know, and listen to those who talk about things you don’t.

On that note, here are 10 things I learned on my trip to Italy in 2018(no order in specific)!

1. How to live out of my suitcase when going to a different hotel every day – it can be easy, but make sure you have plenty of space for dirty laundry!

2. ‘Legs’ in a wine glass demonstrate the amount of alcohol content in the wine(difference between a 12% wine and a 14% wine) amongst other things, but we’ll get into wine posts on CaptivEATing

3. You can drive 140km/h safely on the autostrada – there are auto ticketing radars but, everyone’s going faster than you at 130kmph so more than likely you’ll be fine

4. Italians think I look like J.Lo

5. Make sure that no matter what, you ask if your living quarters have AC (!!!!!) – I can’t stress this enough, make sure you know exactly what kind of living situation you’ll be in before you get to your destination. Do you have AC? Do you have a kitchen? Do you have a shower? It may seem like all of these things would be listed but, sometimes they’re not! Just ask and there won’t be any surprises.

6. You can easily get lost driving 2 miles through the hills of Tuscany

7. Burrata is still my favorite of all time

8. The Alps are one of the most magnificent sights, even from the road

9. Traveling with strangers (in this case, being in a new place with new people for a solid 9 days) will open your heart and bring you to a new place, internally – one of the best things in life is sharing and learning from those around you. My dad used to say if you learn ONE thing a day, you’ve had a good day. I spent 9 days listening and partaking in French, Italian and German languages which all come kind of easily to me because of Spanish, however, languages require brain power, mine was tired after every day but it was beautiful being in touch with that part of my senses/brainwaves!

10. You can make progress with whatever you want if you really want to (speaking languages, for instance) – put your mind to it, you can do it.

Listen, absorb, learn, take it all in, be in the moment, be grateful, and live it up my friends!!!

Living, Loving, Growing

On By Emily WIn Inspiration, Motivation, Travels, WritingLeave a comment

This past week was spent at the PGA Show in Orlando working a booth, and man, what a blessing it was to be there.

So many vendors, so many beautiful displays, and so so many people.

When you’re thrown into something you’re not used to doing, let’s be honest, it is a mental game. Either you let everything get to you and freak out in anticipation, or lock it up and own that shit. 
In the last few months I’ve realized that I was letting fear get the best of me(even though most of the time I seem fearless) and I also re-realized that one thrives when one lets themselves.  You’ve got a set of skills, use them.

This trip was exactly what was needed to get myself back together and remember that we can all do anything. 

Life gets messy, we get laid off, we deal with emotional moments, but thats the beauty, isn’t it?
The rollercoaster.. The ups and downs..
Because when you feel that rush of excitement, that nervous energy, that means you care, and that is your soul telling you that its all going to be alright whether it works out or not. 

You’re growing from living that moment. 

You create your reality, my friends. You are in control of nothing and everything at the same time. And you will succeed in life if you let go and just breathe. 

Do your thing. 


Roads of Life

On By Emily WIn Inspiration, Motivation, Uncategorized, WritingLeave a comment

Feeling like my thoughts need to be put on ‘paper’ somewhere, so why not share on here.
🙂 

Going off of something I wrote a couple of years ago today:
“Strength-positivity-patience-love. The things I ask for and give thanks for everyday. Those are the only things I need in my life. “

I must say, the last six months have shown me and taught me even more of those things.
The last six months have grown my gratitude x 9348293748234723847.
Its like with every breath taken, more awareness is induced within.

I wish I could put into words how grateful I am to even have that awareness. I wish I could transfer the emotions I have inside so every.single.person I know could feel this enormous amount of love that’s been created. Its really, truly, so freaking beautiful.

The things in our lives lead us to where we need to be at that present moment – at least that’s how I look at life and what I believe. It’s taken a lot to get here, don’t get me wrong, but man…. Every little thing has so much meaning, yet so little meaning at the same time.

I don’t quite know where I wanted to go with this entire post, but what I do know is that with the people presently in my life: my family, my friends, my boyfriend, my coworkers who have become so near and dear to me, the last six months have been incredible and all I want to do is share so people can connect, relate, and go internally into their thoughts and feel the love around them.

Didn’t think life could show me even more love than what was infront of me when my dad was alive, but damn, it really has. 

Open your eyes, open your hearts.. Give when you can give, love deeply, give thanks for every.single.thing possible, and everything will flourish.

Yes, there are tough times, yes there are great times. We go through pain, we go through happiness. We laugh and we cry. We are here to experience these emotions to expand our souls.
Just remember, perspective is key in this life..
When you open those eyes and those hearts, your soul realizes all of the beauty around you.
Every moment is beautiful. Every moment teaches you something. Every situation is here to help you. 

You are infinite. 
❤

Thanks for reading my rambling.
Gratitude, is the attitude my friends.
All the Love.

Own Your Life

On By Emily WIn Inspiration, Motivation, WritingLeave a comment

Stop comparing yourself. Stop comparing your journey, your status, your lifestyle…. LIVE the way you want, the way that feels right… Follow your gut, your heart, your soul, and you will be happy my friends.. Everyone’s journey is different. Some similar crossroads may appear, but everyone has their own soul guiding them and you should feel GREAT every.day doing the things you do because guess what, you’re on your own path to soul expansion/success.

You’ve got this.

It Never Rains in Aruba..

On By Emily WIn Photography, Travels, WritingLeave a comment

“Aruba, Jamaica… Oooh, I want to take ya…”
Bet that’ll be stuck in your head for the rest of the day/night!

Family vacation in this beautiful place was wonderful. Hot, definitely hot, like 90 degrees hot, and windy (so you would think you wouldn’t feel as if you were melting..) but MAN that sun was intense! Perfect for getting a perfect tan. 🙂
I have to say that being a beached whale is one of my personal favorite things to do, and at the all-inclusive Divi Tamarijn the rooms are right on the sand and the cool ocean is literally four steps away. That, was the best part. We had some hiccups along the way, it started with my broken duffle bag the second I went to step out of my house.. Then we had the screaming child upstairs once we got to the Divi who we could hear the entire afternoon because of an open balcony door, and perhaps another one was the construction going on during our ‘relaxing vacation’.. And maaaaaybe another thing was that the food wasn’t as good as we were led to believe(it became a joke between us all that my food was going to come out the worst, which it did every, time!!!), BUT, as always, we found the silver lining along the way. That’s what my family does, we find the bright side.
We got to see awesome reefs, different fish than what we have here in Florida, we swam through some wrecks off shore and we got to experience a different culture with Indian and Dutch influence. We found an amazing little spot called “Westdeck” that was right on the water with the friendliest staff and extremely chill decor – it’s one of those places where you can bring your catch if you’ve gone fishing and they’ll cook it for you however you’d like. We also enjoyed dinner at LG Smith’s Steakhouse; my pork chop was the best thing I had eaten the entire vacation. Another cool thing we did was drive around the entire island, from top to bottom (it’s only 20 miles from the southernmost to the northernmost point, and only 6 miles wide!), laughing the entire ride to the stone bridge, the ostrich farm, the Lighthouse.. Great times.
Lots of inside jokes along the way, lots of memories made. I hadn’t traveled with my brother out of Florida in over 8 years so I was extremely grateful for that opportunity.
If you get a chance to vacation in Aruba, you should. There are plenty of markets to shop at for trinkets, plenty of beautiful views, a great Lighthouse to go to, along with friendly people and a pretty safe atmosphere.
These photos were taken with a waterproof Nikon CoolPix camera that I bought specifically for the trip. They came out better than I thought they would. Woo!

Eyes are the Windows to the Soul

On By Emily WIn Inspiration, Motivation, Writing2 Comments

When you look at the world around you, are you really seeing it.. Are you really looking at it? Or are you merely glancing at it, without truly absorbing, noticing, feeling it?
When we take a moment to become still, to listen to the earth breathe, to listen to ourselves breathe, we combine the internal with the external. Your eyes can see what is infront of them, but can your soul connect with it?
Our realities are relative to our perception.
The people around you, the moments and places you are in, we’re in them for a reason. We’re in them to connect. 
We must remember to Be Present. 
❤