Feature Friday | Undiscovered Dreams

How’s your week been so far? Ours has been cold. Really frigid cold. 24 degrees as the high…cold. You get it. But, what was I to expect since, you know, we live in Alaska and all.

I’m excited to have Nicole from Moments That Define Life here at my Feature Friday Blogger this week! She’s another one of those uber-fabulous friends that I stumbled across during a random afternoon of blog hopping and haven’t been able to stop stalking  following ridiculously reading. She has a beautiful way with words and always leaves me laughing or thinking deeply about what she’s shared. If you don’t follow her already, make sure you take a few minutes to check her out !

My name is Nicole, I’m a stiletto wearing, cabernet sipping Mama to three beautiful girls. I’m happily married to a handsome military guy. We recently celebrated nine years together. Life in the military is one that takes resiliency, a sense of adventure and an overall positive outlook on life. It is not for the faint of heart.

I am also a temporarily retired Elementary School Teacher and a Freelance Writer. I write for Hawaii Parent Magazine and Military Spouse Magazine – both print publications. Additionally, I contribute over at SITS Girls, Tip Junkie and Savvy Sassy Moms.

 

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As a Stay-at-Home Mother, I often find myself searching for a way to engage my brain and develop myself in some way. I do this because I want to continue growing. I don’t want the baby babble to take over and lose myself in the process of changing all those diapers and wiping all those noses.

I truly believe it’s necessary to continue growing as an individual in order to be a good parent and spouse.

But that’s just my little ol’ opinion.

Before becoming a parent I was a teacher and the teacher in me loves to learn something new. The teacher in me loves to continue my personal “professional development”. In the process of becoming a mother, I discovered that I needed an outlet, which is why I began the blog – Moments that Define Life.  What I found through the process of writing my blog was that I enjoyed writing.

And then I discovered social media.

Oh Twitter, how I love thee…let me count the ways.

{Ahem}

And now, I find myself writing for various online and print outlets while staying home with my girls and I’m discovering a new part of myself, which only confirms to me a point I have had running around in my head in recent years…

We all live multiple lives within our one life.

Let me elaborate a bit.

When I graduated from high school…all those many, many years ago….

Has it really been THAT long? Yeesh!

Anyway, I digress…when I graduated from High School, I had set goals for myself. And they were as follows:

1. Go to college to become a teacher.
2. Get Married.
3. Have 2.5 kids, a dog, white picket fence and Sunday Barbecues.

Yes…this is actually written in my Senior memory book. I’m a nerd.

So, I wrote all this out, set out to accomplish my goals and by 26, I was done…

Except for the dog part…cats seemed easier at the time. I didn’t think through the whole litter-box commitment thing. But, I digress.

And, instead of 2.5 kids we ended up with 1 + twins.

We even had the proverbial white picket fence at one point. I kid you not.

So, by 30 all my goals and dreams had come true.  Now what? I just stop?  No can do.

I slowly I came to the realization that for the type of person that I am, I needed to set new goals. And while I don’t have a lot of dedicated time I can spend on a new goal, I do have enough time in between the priority that is my children, to chip away at those interests and discover new things about myself.

So here I sit thinking of the journalistic possibilities, because I think that’s where I might want to go next. But then again, event planning has become kind of fun too. I also give great parenting advice – you know, if I do say-so myself  {Ahem} so I could be some type of parenting consultant for new parents?!

Ok, so maybe not the parenting consultant. I’d need to survive the terrible two’s (at a minimum) before I can claim victory in the parenting department.

My point?

New dreams + New Goals + Goals already accomplished = a fulfilling life. 

But that’s just me.

What do you think? Have you started to find undiscovered interests and passions as you have moved through the years beyond your youth? What do you see yourself doing in the future?