by Joey | Aug 18, 2016 | Throwback
At the end of July, football wives around the world kissed their husbands goodbye as they walked out the door for the start of training camp, the beginning of another season.
July 31st was an important day in the Hodges household, too. It officially marked an entire year without football. For one whole year, I’ve known when my husband would be coming home. I didn’t eat my meals alone, and our Saturdays were filled with laziness and coupley things. All things I longed for all five years we wore the football title.
Normalcy. Regularity. Stability.
Our year without football has been one of the hardest years of our marriage to date. A year full of transitions, shifting responsibilities, new beginnings and broken hearts.
It feels weird to confess this to you, but I miss it; the world I wasn’t ever sure I wanted. What woman wants that life?
I did more than just get used to it, I grew to love it. Mid-November breakdowns and single wife dinners aside, the world of football is filled with hope, determination, excitement, hard work and lessons learned.
Once in it, I never really saw our lives without it. In fact, remembering our marriage pre-football is hard for me. For almost exactly one year, we cruised the onramp to marriage without football, and it felt like everything we did that year was leading us to pigskin and scoreboards.
Filling the space football used to consume in our lives has been harder than you’d imagine. We made room for it, all of it, in our marriage. When people say they’re married to the game, that’s a real thing. Silly as it might seem, there’s more to football than four quarters and referees. There’s family and understanding, community and a sense of belonging.
For one whole season, my husband hasn’t been Coach, and I haven’t been Mrs. Coach.
And we’re still figuring out what that looks like.
To those wives knee deep in it, already missing their husbands as they eat their dinner alone and crawl into bed solo, I’m standing with you in spirit, missing every minute of it, cheering you on.
by Joey | Aug 16, 2016 | Throwback
Okay, so I’ve been a little MIA for a hot minute. Apologies, really. I could give you all the standard excuses like I just launched a business or I’ve been writing my little heart out elsewhere, and while that’s all true, it’s not why I haven’t been here.
If I’m honest, I did exactly what I promised myself I’d never do with blogging. I let the rules box me in until all the creativity dried right up. It happens sometimes, and I’ve been here before. But the only way for me to get out of that slump is to stop, step away, and see what floats up to the top of my priority list.
So hi. I’m back. Sort of. I can’t promise you what you’ll find here on a daily basis anymore. While I really enjoy writing important, meaningful posts, sometimes I just want to pop in and talk to you, my friends, and share what I like or what’s been happening.
One of the services we offer at Bliss is getting people set up from idea to launch with their blogs. Being immersed in that world again, soaking in that genuine excitement that comes from starting something new, has me all juiced up again. It has me missing this space something fierce.
I’m in this place where everything feels incredibly exciting and absolutely terrifying. Not only am I knee deep in business these days (yay!), I’ve been throwing myself into writing in a whole new way. All those years I was looking for validation and then suddenly everything just started happening. There’s real truth in the phrase do what you love and the money will follow. So whatever it is, just keep doing it.
I can promise you this, you’ll still always find the truth here. And with all that’s been going on, I’ve been battling fraudy feelings something awful. I flipped my life upside down and drastically changed what my every day looks like. It’s fun and exciting, but I have no road map and so far I haven’t found any two days to be the same. I love it don’t get me wrong, and I promise I’m not complaining. I’m just being real. Changing your life on purpose is an experience like no other.
With that, I’ve been toying with the idea to vlog again. I miss youtube and that community. I went as far as acquiring a new camera and shooting some footage, but I haven’t committed to the idea just yet. If someone I know and love was saying any of this, I’d kick their ass into gear and ask them what the hell was stopping them, just go for it, I’d say. And the truth is, I will, I think. Maybe.
We’re halfway through August, the first month in a long time I’ve set monthly goals. The two most important/challenging have been 1) to run 25 miles and 2) write four chapters in my current work in progress. I’m happy to report that despite how I might feel on any given day, I’ve forced these two into priority status. Progress, people. Not perfection.
I guess that’s it for now. I didn’t want to just throw myself back into all of this without some kind of reintroduction/explanation, not that either of those were truly necessary. But either way, hi. Thanks for sticking around.
by Joey | Jul 28, 2016 | Throwback
I’m going to be really honest here. Until recently, I didn’t think I was worth all that much. That might be a harsh thing to admit, but if I felt that way, chances are someone else does, too. And I think it’s important for me to share this story if that’s the case.
Inadequate. That would be the one word I would use to sum up my total teenage and young adult existence. I was never the prettiest. I was never the smartest. And I most certainly wasn’t the most successful. In the great game of comparison, I came up shit every. single. time.
I accepted that life, that role. It never occurred to me to challenge it. Not good enough.
I started seeing other people doing the things I wanted. That only fueled the downward spiral. How come they could have those things but I couldn’t?
Until one morning I just woke up and thought, no. This isn’t going to be my life anymore. The limitations I felt weren’t real. They didn’t actually exist. They were all in my head, perceptions developed into a false reality. The only reason I couldn’t have the things I wanted was because I wasn’t doing the things I wanted.
Did your world just shatter?
What you want honestly has nothing to do with anyone else. If someone is already doing it, cool. If someone isn’t, great. I often have fraudy feelings around everything I’m doing because those other people are legit, and I’m just some girl on the internet with a computer.
Confidence comes from doing. I’ve had a lot of people tell me I’ve changed the last few years, and that’s very true. I’m no longer insecure or inadequate. I still have feelings of doubt every single day, but I don’t allow them to stop me from anything. The more I do, the better I feel.
I have a lot of theories about why I spent a majority of my life selling myself short, but they really don’t matter. The only part that matters is that I let it happen. And I was the only person who could change it.
I gave a lot of people the power to determine my worth, everyone but myself. It was only when I took the control back into my own hands that I started to feel worthy of anything. I believe I’m the happiest when I’m being challenged, when I’m learning and growing.
I felt that way with the
book, and I feel that way now with the
business. Those things don’t define me, no. But it was in the journey of the doing that I learned who I was and what I was actually capable of. And there, I found my worth.
by Joey | Jul 26, 2016 | Throwback
While on the phone with a friend last week, she shared that she was really proud of me and Myra, and that she couldn’t believe how quickly our business launched.
I thought about it for minute. Did we really launch that quickly? I thought back over every meeting, every project, every decision and realized that in fact, no. We took our dear sweet time.
The only difference I could see, though, was that from the moment we had the idea, we started doing.
Often times, people get stuck in the talking phase. They seek out approval, sharing their idea with everyone under the sun. They research everything to death. And before they realize it, a year has gone by and all they’ve managed to accomplish is to scare themselves out of starting.
There’s a lot of energy that goes into the talking, and if you ask me, it’s energy wasted. We discussed things, sure, but attached to every discussion was an action step that we held each other accountable for. When I’d get stuck, Myra would carry the weight and vise versa.
I’ll say this, Bliss wouldn’t have launched without her. Where I saw roadblocks, she powered right through. Taking her own as my partner was the missing piece to the puzzle. Once we agreed to go in on this thing together, it was full steam ahead.
We held each other accountable. We held ourselves to a higher standard simply out of respect for our partnership. It’s easy to excuse away letting yourself down, but you’d think twice about letting someone else down. That was the key to our success, I truly believe it.
We each did something every single day that would power our journey forward. Whether it was setting up a page on our website or creating a document that corresponded with out packaging, one little step after another was all it took.
When you look at the big picture, it can overwhelm you into paralysis. Break the whole process down into actionable todos, small actionable todos. And then commit to crossing one thing off your list at a time. Before you know it, you’ll be somewhere new.
I’ve stopped mid project a few times over the last few weeks just to marinate in the feelings of gratitude. I’m so thankful we didn’t stop. I’m so proud that we kept each other moving forward. I’m so proud that we didn’t give up.
My life looked a lot different only a few months ago. But each tiny step, every little todo crossed off our list, brought us here today.
And trust me, if we could do it,
so can you.
If you like hearing about the behind-the-scenes stuff from our business, be sure to follow the
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by Joey | Jul 21, 2016 | Throwback
There’s this thing that happens. First, it’s one negative thought. And then another. And then you find a friend who shares the same thoughts and all you can do is talk about these negative things, giving them energy. And before you even know what’s happening, you’re spiraling down.
Misery loves company, we’ve all heard it before.
But have you ever stopped to think about what that means?
Think for a moment, the friends you talk to the most: are you sharing in anything other than your mutual hatred of something? What are your conversations like? When something bad happens, do you immediately feel that fire building in your heart that fuels you to run to your friend and talk it to death?
I ask because this was once me.
And I couldn’t understand why everything felt so heavy.
Confession: I’ve gotten very picky about who I spend my time with.
It was never something I did super intentionally, but it is something I noticed recently.
I found myself seeking out the company of people I could learn from, people I admired, and people who are generally positive. Slowly, over time, I distanced myself from the friendships that were only developed out of commiserating.
It seems like a simple, obvious thing. But we’ve been trained to talk about the things we hate almost to the point that we can’t help it. If we talk about anything else, we come across boastful and braggy, and society teaches us not to be that way. It’s easy to find people who hate the same things, they’re a dime a dozen. But finding meaningful and positive friendships is harder to do. It requires some weeding.
But a magical thing happens when you start to climb your way out of the negative spiral, one person at a time. You’ll begin to notice that your conversations with those people give you energy instead of draining it. Their presence makes you feel strong, supported, and encouraged. Their friendship forces you to be and do better.
Fire fuels fire.
Which fire are you fueling?
Negativity breeds negativity.
What are you spreading?
