I always tried so hard to become the woman I wanted to be.

I am someone that has always struggled to get up in the morning.

There was always the battle between wanting to feel cozy and coddled and content and wanting to feel productive, purposeful, and powerful.

They felt like complete opposites and I felt the pressure every morning to choose between them.

My first cup of coffee held such promise and portent. It was like I was drinking hope in liquid form. I felt ALIVE with potential when I was enjoying that cuppa. It wasn’t just the caffeine doing the talking. My desires were near the surface and I could mold them into opportunities. My daydreams during that first part of the day felt like they could come real. Opportunity abounded!

I stretched out that moment as long as I could until I had to face the “real world” and get ready for work. It was like I left my true self there in that mug next to the sink. I walked out of my home trying as hard as I could to hold on to these feelings, but I couldn’t. The day would replace them.

I read the books. Discipline was needed. I hated discipline. Discipline made me feel so bad about myself. Like, beat myself up for not being able to keep it up, bad.

I set alarms, I set intentions, I went to bed earlier, I set a dream journal next to my bed, I got a coffee maker that would make coffee for me at a set time to help get me out of bed, I stayed positive.

So many nights I felt AMAZING before going to bed, knowing with my whole self that tomorrow would be different. I mean, I could feel the positivity surging through me. It felt like power.

The next morning, that person was gone. My alarm would go off and I’d think, nooooooooooo, just a little more sleep, and turn over to reset my alarm before digging back into my covers.

The negative self-talk in those moments wasn’t great. I would feel like a loser because I was choosing safety and the need to feel comfortable over starting my day and choosing possibility. It always felt that stark.

Perimenopause exacerbated this dynamic to no end.

I would wake up BEFORE the alarm with that first hot flash of the day, feel alert and would think I could start my day. But the need to feel content and safe was overwhelming. I would lay there nestled in my comforter and anxiety would ramp up. Crazy, non sequitur anxiety. The doom and gloom just served to reinforce my need to stay still and quiet for as long as possible in my bed before I had to deal with things and manage people.

Discipline. I kept reading about being disciplined. It just didn’t work the way the books said it would and I ended up more frustrated and lost than I was before.

There were some aspects that spoke to me and I liked. That was true. When I for instance wrote down what I was grateful for that morning, that made me feel good. I felt accomplished when those couple sentences turned into a paragraph of journaling. The writer in me felt like it was a win.

I would feel so good that I would come up with a morning routine that I would do on a schedule just knowing that this would be what turned it all around for me.

I would write my gratitude sentences. Then I would naturally go into my Morning Pages, there must be 3 of them. Yoga. I needed to do yoga so I kept my flexibility. Hmmm, I should probably get weights because I’m losing muscle mass during this time, too. BREAKFAST! I needed to eat something healthful and filling to start my day off right. And I would set that GD alarm and I would Effing get up each and every day and do this for myself.

Funny. That didn’t work either. I just couldn’t strong arm myself into being disciplined.

I decided to let myself off the hook. I wouldn’t hold myself to a strict early wake up time. What I would do is whatever time I got up, I would scribble down something I’m grateful for while I sipped that hopeful cup of joe. And, I would pat myself on the back about it. Literally.

The weight was gone in the mornings. I set my alarm for that do-or-die-time that gets me up in time to go to work and not be late and let go of ALL the discipline, choosing just that one thing that I enjoyed and made me feel good.

I slept a little better with all the pressure to be “perfect” gone. That didn’t mean I slept through the night. I would still sometimes wake up a few hours before my alarm with that alert and anxious feeling.

The mornings I opted to stay curled up in my comforter were delicious. I let myself smile as I smushed my face into the pillow. I didn’t care if I was getting the full 8 hours. I stopped counting. And it was like lifting another weight off my shoulders. When the alarm went off (sometimes waking me up because I went back to sleep, sometimes not), I got up and got ready for work and scribbled what I was grateful for. I pat myself on the back.

I was the first one to be surprised when there were days when I opted to go ahead and get up. It felt natural and right so I went with it. I found myself smiling and calm as I puttered around my home, enjoying the quiet, happy to just be. I lingered a little longer over my gratitude journaling. I pat myself on the back.

I let go of keeping track of how I was doing. I didn’t have a timeline, a schedule. There was no due date for accomplishing a new routine, creating a new habit. I let it all be a little loosey-goosey and just trusted my feeling of “this feels right for me.”

The transformation was miraculous.

I started adding in a few yoga poses in the mornings I got up early enough for it. I naturally let go of a full hour, hour and a half practice and let it be a couple of poses. Whatever felt right that morning. I patted myself on the back.

I started moving my journal aside after noting what I was grateful for and scribbling out some Morning Pages (maybe 2 paragraphs, maybe a few pages, maybe just 1 more sentence) and grabbed my notebook that I used for my novel and wrote a bit there, too. I patted myself on the back.

I had found discipline by giving myself grace.

I am now this person that isn’t afraid of discipline because I can create what that is for myself. I realized I liked to have one day that I had no “asks” whatsoever, so I created one. Saturdays I can sleep for as long as I like and I won’t pick up a pen or open my laptop. Saturdays are for reading, movie watching, series binging, walking, eating…whatever I want.

I go to bed patting myself on the back.

I am now this person that might feel a cold coming on, have that sinus infection brewing, and I still want to get up and start my day. THIS IS HUGE.

I get up, maybe before the alarm, maybe at the alarm. I smile. I scribble my gratitudes, I journal more, I write, I do yoga poses. Or don’t, depending on when I get up. I pat myself on the back.

I am now this person that might feel an illness settling in that requires more self-care. I do not want to get up and I don’t question this. THIS IS ALSO HUGE.

I do not get up. I let myself rest. I call into work. I do what I need to do to take care of myself first. I pat myself on the back.

Perimenopause is the reason for this entire transformation. All the Knowledge I’ve accumulated in my 52 years is now being morphed into Wisdom.

I’m living the results. And it’s all because I let myself trust my inner voice. My higher self. My authentic self. My sovereign self.

Perimenopause was my time to bloom.

I leaned into it, used it as the moment to change my perspective, listen to my Self, and find my own rhythm.

And I am finally (FINALLY) becoming the woman I always knew I was, always wanted to be.