Breathing through the anxiety of watching the sun descend below the endless horizon into utter blackness and waking up in the murky blue black of the early morning for two straight weeks didn't totally cure me of my fear of the dark, but two years later, I'm more comfortable with the unknown of night than I ever was before.
Personal Writing
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June 28, 1972
This isn't a post about choosing life, despite the fact I am here and I am a mother because that decision was twice made. This also isn't a post about the pro-choice side; I have private feelings about abortion, but I intend to fight this decision in as many ways as I can to ensure that every woman has the right to make that decision for herself. If the Supreme Court can change its mind once, then it can change it again.
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1-2-3…LEAP!
I'm standing on the edge of a sheer, steep cliff, looking down at the endless ocean, gorgeous waves rolling in against the shoreline. Even as I marvel at the beauty, my stomach roils at the dizzying height. For a second, I imagine falling, tumbling down the steep drop and landing with a dull, lifeless thud at the bottom. My brain tries desperately to comprehend that the people, ant-sized from my perspective, are actually fully-sized humans. They are living their lives all the way down there even as I am living mine.
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Flip the narrative to find your spark
More than three years ago, I conceived of a pretty audacious vacation with friends and family to celebrate a big milestone in my life. Dr Marry and I are providing a fabulous opportunity for people to travel and stay in a big, beautiful house that we're renting as our gift to them. But they still have to get themselves there, pay for food and other accommodations beyond the house since it's just for three nights. While some people have decided, for various reasons, that they can't make the trip work, a number of people have enthusiastically said, "We're in!" Just because I plan something doesn't mean it will work for…
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Why walking not talking really matters
It can be overwhelming to realize that talking rarely changes things. And it adds to the shame you already feel for uttering something out loud that doesn't get better. That kind of "failure" can lead to making worse and more poor decisions.
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Is dreaming asking too much?
The same way I can't comprehend that the Universe is literally expanding and contracting simultaneously, I can't exactly understand this cosmic paradigm either, but I don't need to understand it to believe it. There's no end, no finite amount of more, particularly when it's asked for and accepted in the right spirit: one of gratitude, grace and generosity.
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May 17, 2022…I walked through a new door
But this time, I'm starting off by owning my strengths and talents. I'm not trying to make myself a blank slate to be filled in by someone else; I'm bringing what I've learned and developed up to this point, and I'm setting expectations for myself and those around me. I'm not creating more content in an effort to find the proverbial golden ticket. Instead, I'm trusting that what I've already created is valuable and just needs to be tightened up and strategically populated out into the world by experts who do that work day in and day out.
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Parlez vous marketing?
I said, "I imagine I'm standing in a round room lined with hundreds of doors. I'm opening door after door, desperately hoping that behind the one I'm about to open is the person who can take my extraordinary product and help me scale it up. I'm happy to do the work, but I don't even know what work I'm supposed to be doing to market it, to expand my reach, to take this as far as I want it to go."
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What makes your heart sing?
I don't believe we only have one path to take anymore than I believe we only have one soulmate (and truthfully, I don't believe in the concept of a soulmate at all). We have a life to live; our job is to be curious, ask questions, work through our stuff (believe me, we all have stuff!), ask for help, get as brave as we can and take the next first step.
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Why is it so hard to pause, rest and just be?
But even though I made vows to myself that I would honor the time I gained and the lessons I learned during COVID, I find myself moving back into the frenzied rhythm of the "before times" much faster than I hoped I would. My schedule is packed with back to back meetings, and my time for reflection, strategic thinking and just being is nearly as limited as it was leading up to March
