February is always a terrible month for me. It marks the anniversary of Ed’s passing on February 3. It’s hard to believe but this year marked four years of his leaving us. Four long years. The first year, I just got through things thinking that after the first year, things will get easier. Joke was on me as I learned that the second year was actually harder than the first, and much too popular belief, this is somewhat normal. The first year you are in a bit of a fog. Disbelief mostly, but as the fog lifts, reality sets in, and that is mostly in year two. They are still gone. Still not here for holidays. Still not here to mow the lawn, fix a leaking faucet, and all of those other things that was “their” job. So February is always a bit tough for me, and this year, I decided to do what I had said I wanted to do the past few years. I went to Maui to forget about my day-to-day. I needed a vacation from myself :-)Maui was an incredible trip for so many reasons. I was on a tropical island with two very dear friends and we just had an incredible week. Sun, sand, ocean waves, shopping, dining and exploring the island. I can’t imagine having done this trip without them! I am so thankful to have them there with me at such a challenging time. That itself is incredible, but this trip provided more than just a respite. I actually learned a lot about myself in a very short period of time.I loved how I lived life in Maui. Granted, it was vacation, but I think the further away we go away on vacation – and by that I mean actually “check out”, the more we learn about our authentic selves and what makes our souls sing. I used to refer to this being “vacation Tracey”, that in comparison to “work Tracey” which are two different people (note, I hate when anyone refers to themselves in third person vernacular, myself included :-)). Removing myself from my day-to-day and truly disconnecting gave me a good reset and not only showed me, but made me “feel” some things that I now realize are important to me. I think the biggest thing was how in Hawaii, the day is received with gratitude and it is done so by welcoming the sun-rise and honoring sunset daily. When the sunsets in Hawaii, most people stop and bear witness while many blow the conch shell as the sun hits the ocean. Every. Day. Push the pause button to respect the beauty, the nature, and something bigger than ourselves. It is amazingly beautiful and a reminder of how I take this for granted daily, adhering to a tight schedule and letting one day drift into the next. Getting the right balance of “real world” responsibilities so I can live the life of leisure on a tropical island for a week, while striking the chord of what makes us tick internally is not easy. But I remembering how I was in Maui and I want to live more like this. I don’t think I’d actually do well living there full time, but how can I bring a bit more of this balance into life to serve the person I am today? The person that has changed, for the better I hope, in the past four year?Facing this when leaving Maui proved to be incredibly difficult. The obvious reason of course is living on a tropical island for a week is pretty nice. 80 degrees, sunshine, listening to the soothing sound of the waves in the ocean – you get the picture. What became very clear the day I was leaving, though, was asking myself, “What am I going home to? How am I really living my life”? I had to take a good, long look at that answer, and I didn’t like it. Don’t get me wrong – I have so much gratitude for my life –my home, my children, my dogs, my family and friends, and my job which affords me a great deal. All of it. I genuinely do. But when looking at how I spend my day, I didn’t like what I saw. And that is on me to change and no one else.I had also pushed away a lot of feelings and things I needed to deal with as the proverbial “I’ll deal with it when I get back from vacation”. Guess what? All of it was waiting for me and pushing it off didn’t make it go away. Dealing with the grief that comes with the realization my husband has been gone for four years and by the way – he’s still not coming back – was merely delayed for a week. It was waiting for me and one lesson I thought I had already known – one cannot side step grief and the feelings that come along with it. We must walk through it, work through it and then and only then will it pass. Kind of like surfing a wave in the ocean. If you get caught in a wave, it has the ability to completely take over. I call this the “spin cycle” as the wave can knock you over in such a way all you do is tumble over and over not knowing which way is up until it’s over and you come up for air. If however you actually dive into the wave directly and sail through it confronting it head on, it’s actually a very smooth and gentle ride. No spinning. No upside down. No fear of not coming up for air. You just sail through it. My traveling friends taught me the beauty of this, amongst many other things during our vacation.Diving into the wave voids the tumble of the crashing wave itself. Fear and anticipation of the wave paralyzes us from moving forward.One month later, where does all of this self-awareness take me? How can I shift the sand under my feet? For now, just some small changes really. First, I had to be compassionate with myself allowing the grief that I had pushed away come for a visit. It was brief, but it was allowed. Second, I’ve asked myself what is a small thing I can do each day to keep me as grounded as I was in Maui? I don’t need magnificent sunrises and sunsets to receive the day with gratitude and open possibilities. I have accepted that I won’t get these rays of beauty in Seattle in February or March (some years even April), but I can hang pictures of my moments in Hawaii and go back for just a minute and connect with my own happiness daily. And the last one I’ll share here, but certainly not the last on my list of things I am shifting, is being more flexible with the time in my day. For as long as I can remember, I have been on a schedule. My calendar rules me. In the office by a certain time, out of the office by a certain time – I am a time management freak. I, like most, have a job and responsibilities, which I adhere to daily. I also have a very flexible work environment, and so I am going to take more advantage of it. For the first time I think I am managing my calendar filling in my “want to’s” and then my “have to’s”. This doesn’t mean I am not getting my job done. It just means I am prioritizing things differently. Balance? Maybe, but old habits are hard to break. Time will tell.All is a work in progress, so before I make any other small changes, I’m going to try to get good at these.  I liked the person I was on vacation. Ed always used to tell me the he really liked “vacation Tracey”. I like feeling relaxed, laid back and just happy. And for the week in Maui, I was. It was a reminder of how I want to be. Every. Day.What are you doing to make every day happy?Thanks for “listening” JXOXOXO,Tracey