The final countdown
Do you know that feeling when something rocks your world, and nothing is ever the same?
When you’re either forced or inspired to prioritize, in one split second, the thing you are going to carry through this moment?
I bet you do.
A lot of times I see this referred to in writing as the “deathbed conversation.” The things you you’d regret “on your deathbed” if you didn’t do.
But I don’t really think any of us need an imaginary metaphor — and no one has to die — for us to be shaken to our core.
I bet you have already had plenty of situations that jolted you into action, and you already know what you’d prioritize if you had to.
The things that force us to these realizations are often painful.
One that comes to mind for me right away? My younger son’s kindergarten interview.
He has autism and ADHD and new situations traumatize the living fuckety-fuck out of him.
He had a panic attack when it was our turn…went fully nonverbal and lay himself down fully on the floor tiles by the door, moaning.
I tried to get through the interview at first. I sat with my spouse and the teachers and tried to get my kiddo to come over and answer their questions.
It didn’t go well at all.
And then I…
…I just surrendered.
I went over to him, sat on the floor, took off my cardigan and wrapped it around him, and gently rocked back and forth with him because I knew he just needed me to be with him without any expectations of how he’d need to behave.
In that moment, I let it all burn.
The kindergarten interview and the questions…
My hopes for him to be able to adapt…
My fears of what it would mean for our lives if he was rejected from this place…
Other people’s opinions of me…
My desire to be “unburdened”
In that moment, my heart said… “I will follow you and hold you and accept you in all the places that no one is going to hold you or accept you, no matter what it costs me.”
…And you know what?
In the end, he adapted to Kindergarten better than I ever expected this year.
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Why did I tell you this story?
Let me ask a different question in response.
What if you truly had your own back in your creative ventures?
What would it feel like if you told YOURSELF “I will follow you and hold you and accept you in all the places that no one is going to hold you or accept you” — every time you were afraid to keep going?
What possibilities might open up if you were willing to “let it burn” in regard to all the fears holding you back?
It doesn’t need to feel like a fight.
It can feel like a giving in…a surrendering of the things you were holding onto because someone said you needed them…in favor of holding onto the thing that you really want. A great relief.
Maybe it looks like you, asking your boss for a raise and being willing to “let it burn” in regard to your worries that it’s a bad time or that you’ll appear ungrateful.
Maybe it looks like you creating a goal of working remotely from Hawaii and surfing in the afternoons, even though that sounds totally implausible right at this moment.
I don’t know what it’s like for you. I only know me.
And what I’ve learned is that every time I’ve been willing to “let it burn” — has been when I’ve leveled up.
You deserve the same ferocity of love and loyalty from yourself that you would give to a small child.
I’ll leave you with that.
-Cathy