Lotus Tattoo

I got my first tattoo at the age of 50, an act my son described as my mid-life crisis. Actually he tells everyone the entire yoga thing has been my mid-life crisis. I think he says that with a certain amount of pride or I like to believe he is somewhat proud when he makes that joke. When I was picking an image for my first tattoo, I knew I would be picking some version of a lotus. This mystical flower with its roots based in mud, submerges every night into murky river water, miraculously re-blooms the next morning without residue on its petals. For me the lotus flower's daily resurrection symbolized my own journey of experiencing something incredibly challenging and somehow coming out on the other side, some would say as a better version of myself. I also connected to this delicate flower’s refusal to accept defeat, which signifies an unwavering faith in the possible, but most importantly the faith we can discover within ourselves. The biggest challenge in getting a tattoo was my fear of needles. I can say that the first tattoo was less terrifying than the buildup to getting it. As such things go, I ended up getting a second tattoo of a butterfly on the other wrist. Like the lotus I picked the butterfly to signify the rebirth of my own life after my breakdown. The designer of my new logo had created a new logo around a lotus, which offered us an opportunity to use my tattoo in the design. I would never have thought I would get a tattoo, much less two. But like much of my life today, all of it has been unexpected and yet somehow so meant to be.