Let Go a Little (Then a Lot, Then All the Way)

If you told my 35-year-old self, in 10 years, as you approach turning 45, you’ll be happily married to a fabulous woman, making a living through writing and coaching and being yourself, and watching your kids become young adults before your very eyes, what would she say?*

I bet she’d be intrigued, excited, relieved, and a good deal terrified, knowing some big shit awaited her but also that somehow she’d get through it intact.

So maybe, today, my future self can come visit me and say:

Sweetie, you’re good. You’re learning the same lesson over and over again, which is not to be so hard on yourself.

No matter what you do or feel, your life is unfolding in just the way it needs to. You don’t have to push or force or worry so much about everything. Things are more solid than you realize.

Best thing you can do is be fully in it, love who you are now, not who you used to be, not who you’re becoming. Just you in this moment.

You with the happy light on the last day of November.

You with the real cream in your coffee and the 10 pounds you gained since you quit smoking three years ago (good job!).

You with the body you have today, the fitness level you have today, the income you have today, the relationships you have today, the fears you have today, the ideas you have (or don’t have) today, the kids you have today, the home you have today.

Let it all be ok. Let it be and you’ll see, I know you’ll see. You are doing everything right. You don’t have to walk such a tightrope act to maintain things.

Let go a little and then a little more and then a lot and maybe for a moment let go all the way and let yourself fall and fall and see what it’s like to be held by that wide open space.

* inspired in part by this piece