The Yellow Door Life

When I started working with my dear friend and wellness coach, Michele, in the spring of 2022, she asked me to imagine my life in 5 years.

We were on the phone and I was sitting in my home-office on the second floor of my Colorado house.

She asked me to close my eyes, sit comfortably with my feet flat on the floor, and she asked me to envision my life 5 years from that moment.

It took mere seconds and the picture was in my head – I was standing on the back porch of a farm-style house looking out over rolling green hills and pastures. My person had his arm around me and there were kids standing beside us. There was a light breeze and a familiar smell of flowers. The sun was setting. In this vision, there was not perfection, but there was peace and a whole lot of God.

Michele didn’t ask me what I saw, rather, she asked me, how it felt – in my body- what did I feel? Did I see any colors?

I told her that I felt a warm sensation in my chest above my heart and the color I saw was yellow. The feeling I now describe as the “the yellow door feeling.”

This was when we identified my heart as the compass that was going to lead me to that vision.

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I had that vision long before I visited Tennessee and long before I ever found the house with the yellow door. Even that day, it wasn’t really new. My whole life that is what I have always wanted. A quiet life in the country with people who I love unequivocally.

The choices I made from that day forward though have led me closer to that vision than I have ever been before. And even though I’m nearly 3 years into that 5-year dream, I still have tremendous faith that God will get me there.

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My dream home isn’t necessarily a place.

Sure, I want nothing more than to have a lovely house on some property in the country. I dream of having a wrap-around porch, some chickens, maybe a creek or pond, and definitely goats and a donkey. I would love to have a dog room and connected, outdoor dog run.

I can see myself planting a garden.

I want a porch off my bedroom so I can set up a telescope and watch the stars.

I’d love a kitchen with a big island so I can prep all my healthy, healing food.

I would love a big, beautiful fireplace for hanging Christmas stockings.

A Beauty and the Beast-esque library is a must for all my books.

The list could go on, but honestly, none of those things matter if I have no one to share it with.

I can dream as big as anyone when it comes to a “dream house,” but my dream home is a whole other story.

It’s being with people who make me laugh. Who know my whole history and still love me anyways. It’s sitting around playing board games and no one is worried about checking their phones. It’s building a fire outside and telling stories while making s’mores. It’s praying together before eating a meal. It’s dancing in the rain and waiting anxiously for a double-rainbow to appear in the sky. It’s showing up for each other despite all the messy, chaos that lives within each of us. It’s feeling safe enough to cry and ask for help and be yourself. It’s driving with the windows down and everyone singing full blast. It’s trusting that no matter what, you will always have each other – good days or bad.

I don’t care where my physical home is located. Heck, it may not even be in Tennessee. It could be anywhere, as long as I’m with the people that make my heart full and give me that yellow door feeling every time I’m with them.

My dream home is being with my people and doing the work God has asked me to do.

My dream home is finding all the people that go along with my purpose, and until I do that, any home I live in is just another house.