First reflection on TEDxWilmingtonWomen 2018!

It's been a VERY full week. Full enough, that I am just catching up with the reality that it was a full week ago that I was packing and getting ready for my 5.5 hour drive to Wilmington, DE to be a speaker at #TEDxWilmingtonWomen 2018.

On the afternoon of Wednesday, November 27th, 2018, I headed out of Pittsburgh and aimed the car toward Philadelphia, where I would pick up a friend at 5am the next morning at PHL. It was significant that she came, since she also knows about Somatic Experiencing, and is an anchor for me when I need a resource.

The destination was significant, since it was in Philly that my car was struck by a taxi, and I landed in the trauma room of Thomas Jefferson University Hospital, on October 20th, 2007.

The timing was significant since it was eleven years and one month after the accident that changed my life, that I headed out to do the bravest thing of my life....talk about the severity of the situation I have faced since that night, the symptoms, the obstacles, and the hope that is offered through #SomaticExperiencing (through God's grace) to recover a life and regain vitality, AND do all that in under 10 minutes. (Without losing control of the unplanned movements or having a major pain spike....despite how stress increases both symptoms...)

The power of vision was significant, since it was three years ago that I spoke at a non- Dale Carnegie event for the first time, and shared my dream of doing a TED talk one day, and I held up a red carpet toilet seat cover as a prop, to show the round red carpet I was dreaming of. It was five months ago that I attended #TEDxPittsburgh and met Jake Voorhees and said "One day, when I grow up, I'm going to do a TEDx talk.". And that day, last Wednesday, as I drove out of the driveway, I laid my "more fancy" red carpet on my seat, to prepare my mind for Thursday and Friday.

It's a testimony to the power of the mythical Phoenix, that dies, and rises out of it's own ashes to live again. A new life.

That night in Philly I died to a life without daily pain, a life with running for joy, a life where I could use sports as my primary coping mechanism on hard days.

I have risen, and continue to rise from those ashes, as a person who has compassion for those in physical or emotional pain; who knows what it's like to fight for medical care when a broken system wants to push cheap pills on you, despite their side effects on mental health, digestive health, and dependence issues; who knows what it's like to find and build a new career when physical limitations change what you can and cannot do any longer; who knows how to deal with uncomfortable sensations the body can feel; who wants the whole world to understand how to prepare for difficult situations so others don't have to spend a decade recovering like I did, or spend another decade stuck in the grip of immobility after trauma has already happened.

I am living a life where I have resources: friends, flowers, counselors, prayer, smelly candles, a travel Midas, and the new decision that it's time to get a dog, since I miss having Midas as a resource.

And now it's time to ask myself what my new dream is, since I accomplished this one. It. Is. Finished. So what's next?