Busy making other plans

2023 had a lot of difficult moments. It felt like a red letter year. My siblings and parents and dear friends had significant health challenges, some really wonderful people in our lives died and our hearts still ache about it. Also a bunch of less big deal dumb stuff too happened like fender benders, whiplash, hail damage, replacing roofs, and vehicles and so, so, so much insurance paperwork. All of this was going on while I was managing another career pivot back to independent work and getting our oldest ready for senior year and post-high school. Whew. 

I felt so ready for a 2024 reset and feeling like I had a clear plan and was working my plan. 

What is that thing they* say?
Life happens while you are busy making other plans

The first week of January, I relaunched my business and new website, scheduled my first international trip in 12 years, and was up to my elbows in dreams, budgets, visions. Almost exactly two weeks later I was diagnosed with early stage breast cancer after my regularly scheduled mammogram. Breast. Cancer. Oof and ugh.

The good news is: I am going to be fine. It is very early and I have great care and feel really optimistic that I’m gonna get through this pretty easily.

And also, there are a million other things I would rather be dealing with right now than this. There are so many things I am doing! I have shit to do, people!

And also, this is the thing I have to do right now. What is that other thing they say? No way around but through. 

Isn’t that life though?
I’m sitting here writing this right now and thinking about you,
and you,
and you,
and you (so many of you).
And I KNOW all that you are managing in your life, have managed in your life, and how you do it with courage, humor, patience, sometimes rage, almost always messiness, and enormous love. I also know how much you are lifting up the people around you - even in the middle of all of that.

You are doing a really good job, even when it sucks. You inspire me, a lot. Just out there being your human self and I want to thank you for the example. I need it.

I debated sharing this news beyond my inner circle, on the internet and whatnot, asked my family what they thought, and ultimately decided that sometimes this is what I do when I don’t know what to do: I write. Writing my experience helps me to process it, sharing it makes me feel less alone, it helps me drop into gratitude instead of fear, because it makes me think of you, and you, and you, and you, and you, and I draw a lot of strength from watching how you show up in your life. And I’ve also clung to other people’s writing and hearing their first-hand experiences to help me navigate these last few weeks. So why not share? 

And I’m curious: what helps you through? What are the things you always come back to when dealing with illness, grief, challenge, fear? What do you turn to again and again when the world or your days feel hard?

What is that other thing they* say? 

Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don’t be afraid. 

---

*These quotes feel so common but turns out they are (in order) attributed to John Lennon from his song Beautiful Boy, Robert Frost’s poem A servant to servants, and Frederick Buechner, a theologian who I really don’t know anything about but now am curious about. Ultimately, I prefer Maggie Smith’s variation on this theme in her poem “Good Bones”. I’m also grateful to have a wee little practice in somatics to help center and ground in the body, loving reading Abigail Rose Clarke’s Returning Home to Our Bodies to contemplate the beauty of how gravity and anatomy holds us all. And I am also grateful these days to Audre Lorde for writing her Cancer Journals, of which she said: “I have come to believe over and over again that what is most important to me must be spoken, made verbal and shared, even at the risk of having it bruised or misunderstood.”

Decide

Sharing a post I wrote back in 2013 that inspired several people to bravely start a business/take that trip/hit “send” on that vision

You think they don't like you. You think they'll never hire you/invite you/pay you/respect you/listen to you/love you. You think they are too rich/too poor/too old/too young/too out of touch/too in the know/too trendy. You think it won't happen. You think you haven't put in enough work or haven't got the right training or don't speak the right language or possess the right charms. You think there isn't enough money or enough time, it’s too early and it’s too late. You think you don't have the right experience or friends or background or network or personality. You think it won't happen. You think things can't be good, surely the other shoe will drop soon? You think it’s dangerous out there. You think even though you did this or that, you still need to do this or that to be seen or known or successful or accomplished or safe or powerful. You think that if you have come this far everyone is going to try and take it away. You think they haven't worked as hard as you have, suffered as much as you have. You think the world is broken beyond repair. You think it won't happen. It can't.

You think it’s possible. You think that everything is trying to help you grow. You think that even if they don't get it, they are trying to understand or doing their best. You know they want you to be healthy and happy. You feel seen. You stand and stretch. You feel heard. You know there is room for you and you begin to share your gifts. You think of time as something to fill rather than something that is running away from you. You think of challenge as opportunity. You think its starting, you think it actually began long before now and you are lucky enough to carry it forward. You think there is plenty and more. You feel it pushing you forward and lifting you up. You expand into it. You listen to your gut and speak from your heart. You gaze at the wonder around you: so much wisdom, so much courage, so much mystery, so much to learn, so many stories. You start connecting the dots and holding everyone around you up. You want to give back. You think the world is imperfectly beautiful and you are so lucky to be right here, right now.