Oh dear, has it really been a year since I’ve texted you?

Ms. Fedora: Oh dear, has it really been a year since I’ve texted you?

I’m going to be roaming around Reno solo this weekend so I thought I would reach out and see if you’re around. I know you’re a busy busy girl, so even if you’re unavailable, this was still a good reason to break my 14 month silence and say Hi! 

Abi Dear: Hey lovely lady, so great to hear from you!

Yes, it’s been too long! 

I’ve even been a bad monkey & not writing my newsletter for the last year, partly because I’ve been deeply intertwined in a new relationship and it’s just left me a little dumbfounded on how to write and be honest without making it all about having a new partner, which incidentally is going through a rough patch as we speak.

Regardless, it is so great to hear from you and I would love to hang out! However, I am in the Ohio and Michigan area presently taking care of my mom who just had foot surgery and up until today had a big cast on up to her knee.

I’ll be here for another week and a half and so it seems like sadly I will miss you, but I’ll probably be back sometime in the summer or fall traipsing around the states.

What’s bringing you to Reno and how are you? So great to hear from you and sending you a great big virtual hug and tons of love and thanks for reaching out. It’s totally making me smile!

Ms. Fedora: Oh my goodness HUGE HUGS! That’s a lot to juggle. 

I’m riding up with my sister to keep her company on the drive for a bachelorette party she’s attending. The dynamic is not one where it would be comfortable for me to join, so I am just enjoying the 36 hour break from my regular life while she does her thing, and I’m gonna make my own fun. ♥️ 

I am wishing you lots of love and clarity to get through what you’re going through. I have missed your newsletters but life comes first!!! Take care of you 😘

Abi Dear: Nice! That sounds like a really sweet reprieve.

Yeah, I am really trying on this “vacation” to take this time for myself and write, but being in the midst of my own relationship turmoil does indeed make it difficult, but I shall persevere…

Ms. Fedora: I hope Mexico has been treating you well! I’m glad you were able to get back, my sense from talking to you is that you enjoy being there more than here 😊 it’s always good to be in your happy place.

Abi Dear: Yeah, I finally built a septic and cistern on my property this year with the hopes of glamping in Mexico sometime next year if I can manage it and get pumps working to do an outdoor shower/bathroom type deal.

I spent August-Dec on a weed farm in Ukiah/Mendocino County with my partner there and that was absolutely gorgeous, but I’m not sure if we are going to stay together or if I am going to go back now.

I met him in Baja and on my way to come and stay with him I found a dog in the desert and unbeknownst to me he has some big issues with dogs and doesn’t really want to live with one and it kind of reached a climax when I needed to leave and go take care of my mom here.

And in some ways, it would make sense for me to give the dog up for adoption to save the relationship, but the dog has actually just brought up a lot of red flags earlier than expected of relationship things we need to work on. So, I’m hesitant to give the dog up at this point and it’s made things complicated. Sooo we shall see….

Ms. Fedora: Ugh dating is HARD! I know things are tough, but you look like you’re living your best life from the photos! Hopefully you’re finding some joy in the moments in between the stress. And I absolutely love your comments you wrote in the cement. My fave part of doing cement work is being able to write in it at the end. 😆

and also, extra treats for Doggo for unveiling red flags!!! some people use dogs to predict strokes or seizures, yours can uncover potential relationship troubles 🤣

I don’t think I knew that you owned property out there, that is so fucking cool. Of course you do, youre tenacious as fuck!

Abi Dear: That’s what I did with my money after I left the hostel. I bought a little almost quarter acre titled spot right below one of my dear friends who I used to do a lot of party stuff with back in the day and who speaks fluent Spanish, and in some ways it’s our retirement plan.

Ms. Fedora: OMG I LOVE THAT!

Abi Dear: Now I just keep trying to piece together ways to make more and more remote cash and I do my Siren Saint coaching and a little data entry/sales tax accounting for a lingerie company too and I have a little condo income from my place I own in Reno that I rent, and I might go back to school to become a certified Health and Wellness Coach to make a little extra side cash on top.

I also did a course in conflict mediation and got certified for that and if I do come back to the US this summer, I may try to do an apprenticeship at a place in Reno to get more proficient with that skill because you can do it online and that’s cool too.

I need to tweak my website a little bit to highlight that skill before I can really sell it more to clients, but an immediate benefit from taking that course, which I loved, was that it has been incredibly helpful for couples counseling and coaching work as well. It’s been really good to think of conflict as something not to be afraid of and instead a way to achieve peace and understanding in relationships. 

Ms. Fedora: That sounds like such an amazing journey! Have you been enjoying picking out what you wanna do for your professional development? Sounds like the world is your oyster.

Abi Dear: No, I can’t say I really enjoy the picking and choosing what I’m going to do to continue to live my Abitaztic free wheeling lifestyle, and more so it's really kind of stressful and scary in a bunch of ways. However, I just keep making my North Star my desire to be fully remote and I’ve got a pretty big Abi fan club and when I put my feelers out to friends & the universe and get curious things just keep slowly revealing themselves and for that I am grateful. 

So far, I am still piece-mealing making it all work and getting out of credit card debt, which I assumed because of the investment in the property and of course I am now trying to scrape money together to build on it as well. However, it turns out I did learn some tricks with all the coaching in terms of how to breathe and work through it with more ease and grace and that’s all you can really hope for in your adulting journey, as best I can tell.

And what about you? You and your BF are still together it sounds like, which is fabulous! But you were going through a job transition thing last I checked and I’ve seen you on LinkedIn plugging your new work, but I’m not sure I fully understand it or have heard much about it so what’s your elevator pitch regarding what you’re up to now?

Ms. Fedora: I work in government, in wildfire education. My organization is corrupt and I am perpetually stressed out. I love my job and I hate my boss. Hahahahahaha!

Abi Dear: Doh! What a conundrum and Catch 22.

Ms. Fedora: And yes, my BF and I are still together! We’re actually almost finally maybe fucking finished with remodeling the house, which has really allowed us to relax a bit. 

Ms. Fedora: “Breathe and work through it with more ease and grace” is GOALS

Abi Dear: Wow, that is absolutely gorgeous! If you can’t relax in a log cabin with a fire at least a little bit then you’re probably doomed.

And as Bob Dylan once said, “we’ve all gotta serve someone” and it’s great to hear you serve mother nature in your work even if your boss is a bit of a dick. Way to keep persevering in the face of adversity. 🙌

Ms. Fedora: I’m sorry it’s not always a fun adventure though.

Abi Dear: I think the Buddha and the Dalai Lama all keep saying that life is suffering more or less, but you have the ability to shift your perception and perspective on your experience, even though it’s no easy task.

Ms. Fedora: Sooooo true.

Abi Dear: So, it’s not always necessarily fun, but I don’t have to panic as much these days because I’ve gotten much better at regularly being good to my nervous system.

Ms. Fedora: Have I mentioned you can be such an inspiration? lol I regularly punish my nervous system and then wonder why it can’t do peak performance when I need it to. 🤣

Abi Dear: I mean, I figure if you’re gonna be a Life and Wellness sort of coach, even though your special skill is love and relationships - you should probably get better at being WELL yourself, right? 🤣

Ms. Fedora: I mean……. Hahahahaah!
Yes but nobody is perfect 😁

Abi Dear: It’s all just a practice, there is no PERFECTION and the way we speak to ourselves is really important as it turns out. So, you’ve gotta just keep telling yourself you’re doing a good job and good enough is perfectly acceptable because the beauty of being perfect is that it encompasses all our imperfections too.

And why I can’t just spew this shit out for my next newsletter like crazy is beyond me, but you’re gonna inspire me right back when I try to get back to writing in the next day or two and for that I am grateful in return. 🙏✨🫶

Ms. Fedora: YAY!!!!

I was thinking oh my God, just edit this conversation to fix Siri’s bullshit and there’s your next article. Hahaha!

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And sooooo I DID! 

And here we are. 

I have come back to the moment of NOW.

And it is a scary place indeed!

One laden with the vulnerability of my truth and the fear of my fragility. and for many months my debatably neurodivergent squirrel brain simply could not center itself and focus on the moment of NOW. 

In some ways I knew the roller coaster was crazy, and in other ways despite my terror of the unknown - I also absolutely didn’t care because it was so damn fun!

But, I didn’t know how to express that in words and every time I began and got started, a few hours if not moments later I would stagnate in a crippled state of crumpled and literacy befuddled useless paralysis.

Because there is nothing quite so humbling as admitting that you are a love and relationship coach, but you are currently in the midst of a confusing and chaotic relationship yourself, sighs…

And so in the last few weeks of Abi-alone time, which I have sooooooo sorely missed - I have been working on finding my voice and regaining my power of the pen! 

It has started with first letting go of what might be my possible romance addiction and re-prioritizing my love affair with my SELF. I have had to become very peaceful with all that I am and all that I have - and remembering that above all else, I am ENOUGH! 

And it turns out that while understanding WHY you are doing what you are doing can be helpful for understanding your patterns, overpathologizing and habitually rehashing past scenarios can take you away from the present moment and living in NOWness.

So, I have started a quest to let go of what I think could or SHOULD happen in my life’s story and instead, I am just accepting and getting comfortable with what actually IS happening moment to moment as it is occurring.

I am paying attention to the real time sensory experience that is going on in nature and my surroundings, as well as my body and this allows me to attune to everyone I am interacting with more thoughtfully and carefully, which is allowing me to make more grounded decisions, as well as use my words more purposefully..

In the wise words of Chögyam Trungpa’s book, Meditation in Action, “Nowness is the only way to see directly.

First, it is between the past and the future - NOW. Then gradually one discovers that NOWness is not dependent on relativity at all. One discovers the past does not exist. The future does not exist and everything happens NOW. Similarly, in order to express space, one might have first to create a vase and then one has to break it. And then one sees that the emptiness in the vase is the same as the emptiness outside.“

And so my interpretation of this concept is that in some ways, the only moment that is real and true is NOW and everything else is almost just a subjective illusion. When I worry too much about what has transpired, or what might come to be, I become frozen. Fear wrestles with my ego and silences my truth and authenticity, and perhaps you feel like this sometimes happens to you too. 

So, today I am breaking my glass vase that has walls I formed from my terror and trepidation. I am returning with humility to NOW and catching you all up to speed. I am breaking the mold of what has come before and I do not know what will transpire in the future, nor what will come to be. 

But I am NOT going to let that STOP me from sharing my wisdom and compassion with my fellow human beings.

So, in case you have been wondering what happened to your tenacious Siren Saint, I can tell you that more recently I have not just been saying YES to grand adventures, but I have also been embracing the beautiful power of setting firm boundaries and saying NO as well! Doing so actually both simultaneously empowers me to be in charge of the speed that my inner life sports car is driving, as well as stops me from being led around on the invisible leash of my insatiable desire - taking away its power in return!