Tweed Jacket (sold out, but this similar one is on super sale right now, and this one too!) // Faux Leather Leggings // Silk Scalloped Camisole // Cuyana Blush Hobo // Leather Heeled Boots (I love mine, but I might love these even more…)

I hate to admit this (especially as a once upon a time English major), but I never have time to read. I desperately want to be one of those amazing people who reads a book a week, is part of 5 book groups, and quotes poems and all that magic-ness, but I can barely read the New Yorker when it comes in the mail each week. So whenever I get to go on vacation, I always try to buy a fresh new book to read on the plane, the beach, or before bed – since vacation is the perfect time to dedicate some real time to reading something new.

And while it’s not very glamorous (and Tom makes fun of me every time we go to the book store), I LOVE self help books. Whether it’s about leadership, or being an entrepreneur, or creating successful habits – I gobble advice up like it’s champagne going out of style. I don’t know if it’s that I love feeling like I’m being productive while I’m reading, but self help books are my jam, even if that might make me pretty un-cool.

This trip, I devoured Brene Brown’s Daring Greatly, and I actually couldn’t put it down. I was on a 8 hour plane ride each way, and I nearly read it twice it was so good. It’s a book about being vulnerable, and allowing that vulnerability to help make yourself a better leader, friend, parent, etc. and embracing wholehearted living. There was quite a bit of head nodding, and “YAS QUEEN YASSSSS!” going on as I read it – and too many earmarked pages to count. It’s good, so if you happen to be a person who reads vivaciously  (or you’re going on a vacation soon!), I highly recommend.  One thing that Brown talks about is society’s struggle with scarcity – this feeling of “never having enough _________.” She quotes global activist Lynne Twist who writes in her book The Soul of Money: 

“The thought of not enough occurs to us automatically before we even think to question or examine it. We spend most of the hours and the days of our lives heading, explaining, complaining, worrying about hat we don’t have enough of…Before we even sit up in bed, before our feet touch the floor, we’re already inadequate, already losing, already lacking something. And by the time we go to bed at night, our minds are racing with a litany of what we didn’t get, or didn’t get done, that day. We go to sleep burdened with these thoughts and wake up to that reverie of lack….This internal of scarcity, the mind set of scarcity, lives at the very heart of our jealousies, our greed, our prejudice and our arguments with life…”

Ugh. So true, right? We spend so much of our time and our energy thinking of what we don’t have enough of that we don’t appreciate what we do have enough of. I hate to admit it, but I do this all the time too. I’m constantly talking about how I don’t have enough time, energy, etc. to do something, and I spend so much time worrying about it that I don’t take the time to appreciate the better things I’m so fortunate to have enough of every single day. It’s become this vicious cycle in our society to play the “busy card” or scarcity card, rather than celebrating the wonderful things we have enough of – and breaking the cycle of feeling like we’re not enough, or doing enough from morning ’till night.

So, I’m getting rid of the phrase “not enough _________.” from my vocabulary – unless I don’t have enough sugar for cookies, etc.  I’m trying to embrace the imperfection a little bit more, be kinder to myself, and know that I have enough (and that I am enough too!) Call it hippie-dippie, self-help-y of me, but I’m hoping that it breaks the cycle of scarcity that I often find myself stuck on – I’m hoping it might help you out too! I’m sure I’m not the only one 😉  Okay – less self help for this part of the post, let’s talk about this fall outfit that I’ve been living in these days – and attempting to wear on weekends and at work (the work part is a little tougher, but still – I love it). I’ve owned these faux leather leggings for years and I still love them, and bought this Rebecca Taylor blazer last year at Sak’s Off 5th that I adore.

But the real stunner of this look is my new Cuyana hobo purse for fall that I’ve been wearing on repeat the past few months. I’ve been such a huge fan of the brand for years (seriously, I wrote an embarrassing  post about my love for the brand in 2013 when they were just getting started, which seems like ages ago!) and I’ve been a die hard ever since then. I love their bags (and really, everything they sell – and the fact that they’ve championed fewer, better things since their start. This blush purse is everything I need in a bag – the perfect classic shape, the best size for all my essentials, and it’s impeccably made to last forever. Just when I thought I couldn’t love a piece of theirs anymore, this bag showed up in my life and now I’m completely smitten all over again 🙂

Anyways – hopefully my long rant was somewhat helpful to you as it was to me. Everyone always told me that Brene Brown was a magical lady, and now I totally get it…I’m already planning on ordering her new-ish book this week so I can dive into another next time I find myself on vacation! xx