Hey gorgeous,

When you are contemplating stepping into the role of chief operations officer (COO) in your own life, one might imagine that there is an abundance of drudge work. This is exactly what people describe when I first introduce the idea of radical self-responsibility. That concept is often first met with... silence and stress.

And yet, that is the exact opposite of how I feel when I imagine this role within my own life.

For many years I struggled, desperately wanting someone to tell me what to do, someone to tell me how to heal the eternal problem of my not-enough-ness.

I wanted to be rid of myself. And if I couldn't be rid of myself, at the very least I wanted to hide from everything that was causing me stress - namely: my body, my indecision, and my imperfection.

Read: all of the things that make me, me.

The beautiful thing about self-responsibility is that you have the honor and the privilege of being the master of ceremonies. You get to choose. You have the permission to cultivate a life that you want, no matter where you are today or what you've done to date.

This is between you and yourself, and you are more than up for the challenge.

One of the ways that I truly love to exercise my power as COO of my own life is to be the one in charge of dishing out the fresh starts.

I believe that the power of a fresh start is what saves me from spiraling into an all to familiar tail-spin downward, where I ceremonially drag out each and everything that I've ever done to disappoint myself and use it as evidence for my utter undeserving. When I feel this type of energy lurking on the horizon, I give myself the enormously powerful gift of beginning my day (or life) again.

In this moment - the slate is wiped clean. I can choose my next step carefully - it is not dictated on where I've been.

That moment is highly personal, as it is between you and yourself (and whatever higher power you believe in, if you're into that sort of thing).

I believe in the power of beginning again. I am not above climbing back into bed, pulling the blankets over my head, and pretending that I am waking up again. Fresh start, no matter what time of day.

I do not believe that I deserve to suffer in running back over my mistakes or disappointments.

I believe that change is non-linear, mistakes are inevitable, and our saving grace is that we have the gorgeous privilege of making the next choice based in what feels really good to us, what lights us up.

I believe that you deserve to be the master of ceremonies in your own life, and, thus, the one in charge of granting yourself a fresh start.

I believe in you. Period.

I believe in your power to grow, unfurl, and become - no matter what you've survived.

If today was the first day of the rest of your life, what would you choose? What might you imagine is possible?

If you knew that you had the power to alter the trajectory of your day, what might you believe? Think? Do?

I'm raising cup to you and your new beginning.

I cannot wait to see where it takes you.

xxoMara