It has taken me 42 years — sí, ¡cuarenta y dos! — to finally get over my ridiculous fear of celebrating my birthday. Of course I love to celebrate my birthday and feel the love, but I detest having to organize it, come up with a fun and original plan and then go through the stress of  convincing myself it’s okay if no one actually shows up. It’s L.A. after all –big city, lots going on. My birthday is also so close to Mother’s Day. Es más, muchos de mis amigos celebran el día de la madre el 10 de mayo, el mismo día de mi cumple.

So many excuses to ultimately cover up my fear of rejection. Seriously!

But you know that fear is just your ego. The ego that fights hard to not be wounded and would rather isolate you and deny your Self what you really want just to protect itself.

Well, I beat it this year. ¿No dicen que más sabe el diablo por viejo que por diablo? Yep, age makes you wiser and I’m so embracing it, because not embracing the wrinkles quite yet.

So what was my wise-with-age move to celebrate my birthday? I decided that I would treat myself first, meaning that I would practice what I’ve been preaching about how much we need to take care of our own needs and wants first and by doing that we manifest our desires and create our every day to our vision.

My sweet friend Yolanda had asked me a few weeks ago if she could take Camila with her on a playdate with her daughter that day. Pero claro!! That meant that my husband and I could have the whole day to ourselves. I had always wanted to go to Malibu Wines, but it’s only open during the day and I always felt guilty leaving Camila with a nanny on a weekend just so we could go drink wine in the canyons!

So I let me intimate circle of friends, that I don’t get to see as often as I’d like, know that we would be spending the whole afternoon there and that they could show up if and when they wanted. And if no one showed up, I would still have had a great time having a picnic with my husband, surrounded by nature in a beautiful place, on a picture-perfect Southern California day, drinking delicious wine. Best decision ever.

 

Y los amigos llegaron. I felt so blessed, so happy, so fulfilled to be surrounded by friends I adore and admire. None of them are in my blogging world and I wanted that on purpose. The last five years I pretty much put myself in cave while I built my blogs and businesses and I lost touch with so many people. This year I’ve been proactively dedicating time to those friends again. I adore my blogging circle of amigas and we sustain each other every single day, but I also need to spend time with people that know me from before this beautiful craziness started. The ones that have no clue of exactly what I do or how I do it, much less how I’m thriving in it! Turns out that our lives being so out of context is what is now inspiring each other.

I couldn’t have asked for a better birthday and it’s going to continue today at lunch with some of my bloggy besties at the hip and delish L.A. Chapter in the Ace Hotel. For sure you’ll get to catch us on Instagram 😉

But this is the best one of all!