Leah's Adventures in Las Vegas: Ripping My Heart Was So Easy

It’s been a wild year!

One year ago, almost to the day, I had my heart unceremoniously stomped on.

Actually, that description barely does what happened to my poor little heart justice.

This is better:

A hacky sack circle was formed where a bunch of lousy stoners wasted an entire afternoon kicking my heart around before forgetting about it when they left to smoke blunts and watch Entourage.

That wasn’t Too Much Fun.

Then came the nightmarish aftermath.

That was…

Actually…

Pretty damn fun!

I mean. It sucked. I was lonely and despairing and all of that great junk.

I could listen to sad songs all day and have them really Mean Something.

Bawling along to Steely Dan’s “Reeling in the Years” - while one person’s tragedy – definitely, super funny.

“The things you think are precious, I can’t understand.”

I may have freaked out a man or two who showed interest.

“Do you want to get coffee sometime?” they’d ask me.

“Sure!” I’d answer.

“OR, instead of coffee…

“Do you want to sleep over at my place every night and cuddle and make food together and NEVER LEAVE ME?”

This is the subtle art of seduction.

No one is able to resist insatiable neediness. ;-) tip tip tipity tip.

So what was the fun part?

Well, you see

“Freedom’s just another word for Nothing Left to Lose.” :-)

Pre hacky sack heart I’d been thinking, “I could settle down in Ohio with this man, get my entry level job, have a little grow op and maybe a dog. Sleep through winters.”

Post blunts and Entourage: “Fuck it. I’m gonna Viva la Vida Las Vegas! And I’m Never Going to Sleep Again!”

My lack of mental stability allowed me to make a series of impossibly risky, unhealthy, and ultimately, super awesome decisions.

“Sometimes shattering defeat is the key to real success.”

One Year Later

I’m impossibly happy.

Happier than I even knew was possible.

My life is going wonderfully.

I often suspect that I’m actually a schizophrenic old woman in an insane asylum simply hallucinating that I’m young, healthy, and free, living the life of (way better than) a rich old dude in Las Vegas.

I became a yoga instructor, and that has changed my life profoundly and beautifully forever.

I’ve gone on some of the most Wild Adventures of my life. And this is really saying something good.

I became my own best friend. I think I’m groovy.

And, most importantly, I’ve met so many wonderful people.

Each new person that inspires you makes you grow. Makes your light shine brighter.

Listen, baby, I AM bulletproof.

I lived my junior year of high school in Brazil as an exchange student.

It made me immune to fear.

“Wow! You’re really brave!”

“Thanks, but I prefer to think of it as completely shameless.”

Once I learned at 16-years-old, I could thrive in a foreign country where I knew no one, didn’t understand the culture, and literally, was not speaking the same language

Little things like driving cross-country alone to live in Las Vegas where I knew no one and had no job became EASY.

“Are they going to speak English when I get there?”

“Yes.”

“Ah, I think I’ll manage just fine! That’s my first language!”

Turns out, the hacky sack heart incident has done the same thing for my emotional strength and stability.

Once I learned at 22-years-old that I could be crushed completely by someone I deeply and profoundly loved, and still love very much, and come out of it a better, more complete, more interesting person

Little things like almost anything else became Easy

Why Sweat the SMALL stuff When There’s Fun to Be Had and LOVE to Go Around?

Between yoga and meditating, I just don't get upset for all too long anymore.

I’ll feel down, but then after staring at my arms and legs in different wacky positions while breathing audibly in and out through my nose for an hour or more, I’m walking on sunshine again.