#180: HOW TO SHINE LIGHT WHEN DARKNESS FEELS OVERWHELMING

HOW TO SHINE LIGHT WHEN THE DARK FEELS OVERWHELMING EPISODE #180: In this week’s episode of Confidence on the Go we’re chatting about: * How I dodged a bomb this weekend and what that bombing taught me about gratitude and life. * Giving yourself and others the gift of life everyday * 5 reasons your light is needed and how to let it shine Just a quick hello to all of my Keep the Faith listeners out there – thanks for being part of the community of contagious encouragement. SPONSORSHIP NOTE: I am proud to be an educator and consultant for Beautycounter, a B-Corp company on a mission to get safer products into the hands of everyone.   The lack of regulation in the personal care and cosmetic industry is astounding and it is harming our health in very serious ways. We need more voices to join up on our mission. If you want to put your passion to purpose while being generously compensated, then I would love to start a conversation with you about what it means to be involved in the #saferbeauty tribe that is Beautycounter. Join the movement of #betterbeauty and message me via email to make your voice really resonate for a cause. Learn more at www.beautycounter.com/trishblackwell  THE BOMB AT SEASIDE PARK, NEW JERSEY THE STORY … I have never been close to a bomb before, but on Saturday I was close, too close actually, with my precious little family in tow, but by the grace of God, that bomb didn’t leave a scrape on any of us or anyone else for that matter. Intended to hurt and harm, it has done the opposite for me – it has awakened within me a renewed focus for the gift that is a day. Tomorrow is never promised to us, and Saturday poignantly reminded me of just that. For unknown reasons, there was a delay of the race start, and so we routed our way through the athletic crowd at the start line and ventured back along the Oceanside boulevard next to the boardwalk chatting with one another in a general haze of good vibes, cheerfully extending “good mornings” to everyone we saw. Peddling gleefully, with the ocean breeze wrapping itself around our faces, a loud blast punctuated the peaceful air of that Saturday morning.   It was more than a blast; it was a boom, echoing profoundly like a hundred gunshots combined together at one time. Curious and unable to identify what it was, we continued biking, until we stumbled upon the blast site, just two blocks from where we were when we heard the explosion. A trashcan placed between the road and the boardwalk where we biked was burning, having exploded from the inside out with shrouds of plastic thrown out onto the street. A billowing cloud of smoke snaked its way from the can towards the police and spectators that were beginning to gather.   Caught in a moment of surreal reality, we slowed down, almost to a stop, and then, upon realizing that this really had been a bomb, immediately started back up and worked our way as far away from it as we could, generally avoiding every other trashcan we saw along our way. Sirens screamed from three directions and a two-mile radius of the area was immediately put on lock-down and inundated with first responders and public service agents, police officers, bomb squads and the FBI. Had we paused for just one minute less, we would have been right there...had we biked just a little bit faster, we would have been right there...had we not let Ellie off the bike for a few minutes to play in the sand…had the other two bombs detonated as intended … who knows what might have happened and where my family and I might have fallen into that scene and scenario,