tomorrow is my birthday.
i’ll be 34 years old. 
i love my birthday and this year i’m noticeably unconcerned about my new, slightly older age. being in my thirties has always kinda freaked me out a bit, and as i have crept towards the middle of this third decade of life, i have become more scared. scared of what, you may wonder, and i’m not sure exactly. probably just of getting older and old, and the changes that that evolution brings with it.

this year, after my fall from hell, turning a year older seems easy. there’s no stress or worry about my new age, as the experiences of the previous weeks really brought me some much needed perspective. now it’s clear to me what matters, what doesn’t. who matters, who doesn’t. and where i fit into all of that. i have greater understanding about my needs; what i need from myself and others, and i am slowly learning how to have those needs met. i assumed that after my tumour shit and lion’s birth, i somehow was staring a new chapter, because that’s what i wanted and kept telling everyone. but, i was missing a huge piece of that… i wasn’t actually doing anything to facilitate change. well, now the ball of change is in motion and although the momentum is slow, i do feel it’s strength.
it’s gonna be a BIG year of change.

i hope that this new year of mine is mine. 
i need to learn to say no, to not care about what others say or think of me and i need to set some strong boundaries around me. not walls, because i want to be involved with people, but i need to learn not to take on everyone else’s problems as a way of ignoring my own. i need to learn to value myself, my skills and who i am. i deserve time, space and love, just like everyone else. this is going to be tough, but it’s time to do this. 
my time.

happy birthday to me and to all the other capricorns out there born on the 28th! 
(denzel washington being one of them!)


xo, mama lola