Dare gioia – give joy. Dare to be happy.
Some of you know that this word is more than a word for me. It is also a vision statement. A name.

I chose gioia to be my word for 2012 – and it was no coincidence. I do want to choose joy this year, but bigger than that is the fact that I am finally getting to open my very own, organic hair salon: Gioia. Gioia was the original idea that got me into this hairdressing business in the first place. Gioia has existed within me ever since that cold January day seven years ago when my life got a whole new sense of direction.

My thing? It happened. I got my Plan A. The little shop across the street from where I work now, the shop I almost rented three years ago, is mine now. I signed the lease today. I will get the keys next week. My thing will soon become Salong Gioia.

my secret garden
is not so secret anymore 

When I was a little girl, I used to get frustrated with other children when we were threading beads on strings to make necklaces and they had no pattern but just took whichever bead was closest, whether or not its shape and color matched the other beads on their string.

I didn’t remember this, until when a week or two ago I got a sudden, unexpected urge to buy beads and started to thread them.

ba-da-bing, ba-da-bang, ba-da-bum-bum-bum
ba-da-bing, ba-da-bang, ba-da-BAM

is the pattern, the rhythm, the melody of my beads.

I do this, always. I find rhythms and patterns where other people do not even think to look for them. It is part of what makes me who I am.

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I thread sparkling beads on a string for no particular purpose, but because I think they are pretty.
I melt soy wax and make scented candles.
I paint chairs and sew furry lampshades.
I make a thousands hours long lounge music playlist on Spotify.

I am ready, waiting.
My thing can’t not happen.

Two years and ten months ago, I wanted a thing. I almost had it, but made a grown-up decision for once and decided to decline the offer so that my husband could go to school and get the education he wanted. We said to each other that if it’s meant to be, if the thing was mine to have, it would offer itself to me again when the time was right.

Fast forward two years and nine and a half months, and the thing became available again.

Oh, I said. Dang. Now what? Eek! I WANT IT!!!

Before long I was back in that crazy desperation that sent me into full-fledged panic every time the phone rang because I was so worried that someone would say that I wouldn’t get my thing this time either.

Then someone said that maybe I’ll get it, maybe not, they can’t really say. And I panicked.

I turned to my friends, my wonderful circle of amazing women.

- You have created the basket that holds only one egg, one said.

- Find something else… you never know, it might even be better! said another.

- Annika, wanting something that much throws everything out of balance. Don’t ever be afraid of an answer being not the one you want. Things work out the way they do for a variety of reasons that we cannot know, said the third.

- Get away from it. Let it come back to you without forcing it – and you will find that in having moved away from it a bit, you’ll see things more clearly.

So I did. I got away from it. I looked for something else -

- and the weirdest thing happened. By leaving my Plan A to its own for a while, by exploring the idea of a Plan B or even a Plan C, the panic and desperation left me. I rediscovered my serenity and my faith in fate.

To be completely honest, if I end up actually getting to choose between plans A and B, I might choose B. Not because A isn’t good, but because B might be even better.

I love my thing, and I can’t help but feel that it can’t be a coincidence that it opened up for me again now that the time is right, but maybe its purpose was not to be mine, but to act as a catalyst. If it hadn’t offered itself to me again, I might not have found the other thing.

And if I end up not having A nor B, I am fairly confident that a C or D will present itself and turn out to be just perfect.

- Let things come to you. Good luck and breathe, a fourth friend said. For now, that is all I can do.

And you know… if nothing else, all of this has taught me so much about friendship and the importance of reaching out for support and advice.
That is quite fantastic in itself, and I am so, so grateful.