#TheWriteLifeBalance: Who Are You?

Susan Meier's continuing her #TheWriteLifeBalance column with a look at how to work out who you really are...

I’m working on a romantic suspense right now that tells the story of Annabelle Davis, a woman who learns, at age 25, that she’s adopted, and the mother she looks like and the dad she adores aren’t her biological parents. The life of luxury she’s lived as the daughter of a very smart, very successful dad is a lie. Her real mom is a murderer and her dad is in jail.

That’ll wake you up on a Monday morning.

Through the course of the story, Annabelle is kidnapped, escapes and is on the run until she decides to take charge, to figure it all out and put her life right again.

Wouldn’t it be great if we all had a writer sitting at a keyboard, figuring out our story arc? LOL

I can’t cook. I’m not very good with anything physical (like bowling or golf) I read. (Boy, do I read.) I love discussions of things like the meaning of life. But most of all I like books about organization, time management, goal setting.

I’ve never been a person who leaves her life to chance. So when I woke up a month before my thirtieth birthday, shocked that I wasn’t doing any of the things I wanted to do with my life, I was kind of surprised.

Yet that seems to happen to a lot of people. We find ourselves in circles of friends created based on our kids’ dance classes or which team they are assigned for our town’s five or six Little League offerings. We’re locked into jobs that were fulfilling at twenty-two but don’t do much for our souls at thirty-four. And our marriages have turned into negotiations. I’ll feed the dog; you take out the trash. You put the kids to bed; I’ll do the dishes.

Where’s the fun? Where’s the breath every once in a while that refreshes your soul?

Read on…

Nine chances out of ten, you can’t change your life, but you can be more present. Present. That’s also a big buzz word these days because we have discovered that in racing through life, thinking about work while cooking dinner, thinking about the kids’ activities while at work…We’re missing it. We’re missing everything.

You don’t need to quit your job, take your husband on a retreat to rekindle your passion (though that one would be nice) or yank your kids out of their after school activities…

What you need is to be where you are, watching, absorbing, participating.

Being overly busy is part of today’s world. So even though you might seriously want to consider finding a different job, the easiest way to figure out who you are is to actually participate in your life and see…

What great kids you have.

What a smart person you are.

What a great guy you married.

And how, underneath all that dust, you really do have a great house.

You shaped those things. You had the kids, learned the job, married your husband and bought the house.

That’s who you are.

Susan's latest book, A Mistletoe Kiss with the Boss, is out now. For more information about her and her writing, check out her website, and follow her on Facebook and Twitter.