For the last few weeks, I have been training my brain to focus on gratitude. When I first moved out to Denver nearly a year ago, I clung to my sadness and broken heart and wore them both like a badge of honor. I foolishly overlooked the fact that I was able to escape my hometown and get away from the toxicity of it. If I am being honest, the reality of running away and starting a new life so to speak, didn’t hit me until recently. Damn near a year later. A majority of my time here in the beginning, I kept myself hidden in my apartment and refused to venture out with others. I would take myself out or wander the city alone. Solitude was something that couldn’t disappoint or hurt me. At least, that is what I thought. It was slowly eating away at me from the inside out. It took me quite some time to peel away the security blanket of my loneliness and to climb up and peer over the tall walls I put up around myself to see what I was missing out on. I have been meeting new people, making friends, and stepping out of the comfort of my aloneness and telling myself that it is okay to allow people into my life. Am I scared and anxious? Absolutely. But at least when I part from this realm, I can look back and be proud that I did not allow my misanthropy make me bitter, angry, miserable, and utterly alone. #freedom #independentwoman #solitude