Most days look like this: I fucking love my job more than I imagined I ever could. I love what I do, I love my clients, I am SO SO blessed I get to help the world, help coaches so they can help the world, AND get paid. It’s like Xanadau here on earth. I’m so happy I dance in my kitchen and if I had daisies, I would throw them in slow motion in a field while wearing a flowy dress.

And then shit happens.

This particular shit happened last October. On this particular day it was a culmination about 9 or so months in the making. Crazy dumb shoulder injury that I just had surgery on. Had to quit roller derby over it. My book and book deal which was awesome and everyone is like, “OMG isn’t it awesome!?” and at that time I wanted to say, “NO IT’S NOT AWESOME. I’M STRESSED OUT AS FUCK OVER IT AND IT’S JUST NOT NEW AND FUN ANYMORE”, plus I had the launch of a new program. Which, if you’ve done a launch you know they can be a teensy bit stressful. I was not sleeping well or taking care of myself.

It was a Monday morning. My son was complaining about getting dressed for school. And would. Not. Stop. So, I did what I hate doing. I yelled at the top of my lungs, “EEENNNNOOOOOUUUGGGGHHH!!!” I'm pretty sure I looked like this:

So loud and with such force I’m pretty sure it blew both my children’s hair back. They both got big eyes and were so startled, they jumped. My daughter put her hands over her ears. I felt so terrible I immediately wanted to crawl under the covers and never come out.

With a hanging, defeated head I took my daughter to the sitter after my son’s bus came and got him. I went home to prepare for two interviews that morning. I stood in my house looking at my desk and promptly got back in bed and cried. For 25 minutes straight.

I tried to get my shit together for the interviews (one was on self-confidence, HA!) and feeling even more defeated, emailed them both to cancel.

So, here's what I learned:

• Every time my business is upleveled, I will have one of these breakdowns. In other words, when I'm on the verge of something big, or even thinking or planning on something big, I seem to get tripped up. You will too. So, think of it as a sign. A sign that BIG things are happening.

• I can’t move forward and have a breakthrough without a pretty fierce breakdown. When things are going great and easy, we're really not learning about ourselves or growing. It's when things get hard and there are tears is when the real growth and learning happens. It's really what you do with it. You can stay sad, angry, and frustrated, or you can feel it and then walk away better from having the experience. Your choice.

• No one cares or thinks I’m lame or stupid or a failure or incompetent because I have these days. I used to think I was the only one who had crying-on-the-bathroom-floor days. Or in my case facedown-on-my-bed. What I've come to realize is that we ALL have our limits being human, we reach them and break, then get to start over. That's it. Breaking down is part of the human condition.

• It’s essential, ESSENTIAL I tell you to have friends who can support you through this. The old me would isolate and be so paralyzed in “no-one-wants-to-hear-about-my-sad-clown-face” that I wouldn’t say anything to anyone. And wonder why it would take me so long to climb out. Think about it: if one of your closest friends didn’t tell you they had a breakdown like this, wouldn’t you kinda be pissed? You need people who will just be there to listen to your “human-ness”.

I have one of these massive breakdowns about once every 6-9 months, give or take. And each one makes me a better person.