The Delicate Arch

image source 

When I was twelve years old we took a family vacation to Arches National Park. If you are reading this and don't know what Arches National Park is then this is the moment we will pause for you to google.

Go ahead.

This one too. 

And now I will say this: Yes, those pictures are really something, but they don't even begin to touch on the majesty of those formations. To see those rocks--yes, rocks--up close is magic. Absolute magic.

So at the age of twelve I set out with my family on a short hike toward the Delicate Arch. But as the mid-day sun rose, we were still trekking. The land was so flat and the sun was so hot and I couldn't see the thing in the distance. I remember thinking it would never end--that we would never get there. And then, just the moment I thought all hope was lost, we turned the corner on a rock bluff and there it was. 1,000 feet away and free-standing and surely crafted by some divine force. 

It was...that experience of first laying eyes on it...only a few times in my life have I been moved by beauty in such a particular way. Eighteen years later and the memory still leaves me breathless. That particular formation is the intangible made manifest and to tell the story of it is to feel keenly the very particular way in which language fails. 

But the story of first seeing the Delicate Arch is really the story of trekking towards it. It is beautiful, no doubt. But it was so startling to behold in large part because the journey to get to it was so arduous. 

This week a very lovely reader sent me the following question: 

I was curious, but what book(s) and film(s) would you recommend to your twenty-one-year-old self that might have said or illustrated something that you wish you would have known earlier?

And I had such a knee-jerk reaction to the question that I asked her if I could share my answer here. 

If I could write a letter to my twenty-one-year-old self this would be it: 

It gets better.

That's it. Those three words. Signed and sealed and winging its way into the past. 

There are so many great articles on the internet that read something like this: 21 Things I Wish I'd Known at Twenty-One. But I'd like to posit that the title should actually be: 21 Things I've Learned in the Time Since I was 21 (and that is just as it should be). 

There is not one thing I wish I had learned sooner. There is not one thing I think I was meant to know before I was meant to know it. There is no short-cut to growing up. I am so grateful for how arduous the path has been. I am so grateful for how long it took me to understand Rilke's words about loving the unsolved questions. I am so grateful for sadness and heartbreak and the mornings when getting out of bed felt more impossible than not.

I wouldn't tell my twenty-one-year-old self anything other than it gets better because I needed to learn every last thing on my own, and in my own time. Because it has been how I have learned each thing that has shaped the woman I now am--and the woman I'll be tomorrow and the day after, and the year after next. And I'm pretty okay with that woman. 

One's only job is to stay open. To want to learn more and get better. To be engaged in the trek--aware that one is moving and climbing. To ask for help and offer it when able. Because we learn about trusting our gut only after we haven't. And we learn about love in the trenches of heartbreak. And we understand the value of showing-up only after we have failed. Cheryl Strayed wrote in Tiny Beautiful Things, "Every last one of us can do better than give up." And I rather think that's the point. To, as she says again and again, reach in the direction of the life we want. That's our job. 

Because the experience of the view is shaped by the difficulty in getting there. And that is a very, very lucky thing. 

photo by The National Park Service

And should you want to know more about my particular trek:

Magic Shoe!!

There was a game we played at Juilliard (we actually had a "games" class). It was called Magic Shoe.

And it went like this: one person threw a shoe, we all sang a little ditty, and then a person who had previously been blindfolded went and found said shoe.

And the whole point of the game wasn’t to spread out your arms and cast your net as wide as possible (which is, of course, what we all attempted), it was this: to walk confidently in the direction of the shoe, as if you knew exactly where it was. And when people did that--when people actually gave that a go (which is so much harder than it sounds)--they always came within inches of the thing.

It was incredible to behold.

I’m starting to think life is more like a game of Magic Shoe than first imagined. Which is hilarious and fun and deeply comforting.

The reason it's so hard is because it is blind faith (like, quite actually!). Because one must risk failure. Because we don't. actually. know. Because we might look like a fool. Because those on the side watching might laugh at us (but, and this feels important to note, the people on the side want us to succeed--it is fun to watch, to cheer, to share in another's attempt. And if they don't {as is sometimes the case}, it has more to do with them then us). 

It's about walking confidently in one direction and giving it a go. And sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't, but certainly it is a hell of a lot of fun. And whether we "get" the shoe or not, it usually moves our life forward. 

---

I wrote a book! (in case you didn't know): 

I Wrote A Book. (And I owe you all so much).

photo by Sam Shorey

NOTE: Places I Stopped on the Way Home can be purchased by clicking here or by clicking above on the "ebook" tab just under the blog title.

I didn’t think I could do it. It feels important to say that now.

Perhaps that sounds ridiculous. It’s just about sixty pages. I didn’t reinvent the wheel. And yet I didn’t think I could do it.

For a good long while there I’d have to sort of trick myself into opening the word document. And then opening the word document became a habit. And finally a pleasure. And here we are.

It was like chipping away at stone. That was the experience. It all seems so obvious now, but for much of the process I hadn’t a clue what I was doing.

And then the process became the thing. The most magnificent, difficult, wonderful daily struggle.

It was worth it for that alone. It was worth it because doing things you don’t think you can do may very well be the most exceptional feeling in the world. It was worth it because moving through fear is a thing that no one can take away from you.

I walked to work yesterday without a stitch of makeup on my face, my hair pulled into a messy ponytail, two very real (and large) blemishes on my cheeks, but I felt like the most beautiful girl in the world. About this a friend said, the-happy-girl-strut is the best. And yes, I do believe she is right. The happy-girl-strut is the best.

If no one had ever read it, it still would have been worth it. If no one had ever bought it, it still would have been worth it.

I was listening to Elizabeth Gilbert’s Magic Lessons podcast (episode 12) a few weeks ago. In it, she and Brene Brown speak about creativity and the process of making things. About Art (yes, with a capital A) Brene Brown says, “Without it, I am not okay. And without everyone else’s we are not okay.”

Much of the work Brene Brown does--and so what they discuss in the episode--has to do with redefining success. The victory is in the attempt--the leap, it has little to do with the result. Liz Gilbert says, “When did inspiration promise us that it owes us anything? It owes you nothing, except the transcendent experience of working with it at all.”

Sixteen essays. Sixty pages. Not so much. And yet, at times, a transcendent experience.

It was worth it for the process alone, and yet each time a person buys it--each time one of you tweets or instagrams or sends me a wonderfully encouraging email, I am buoyed by that action. Life is hard and the leap is worth it, but landing on the soft ground of your encouragement is an experience unlike any I’ve ever known. And so I offer you my humble thanks--my deepest gratitude.

Purchase Places I Stopped on the Way Home here!

PLACES I STOPPED ON THE WAY HOME

I've written an ebook.

I suppose I should have let on about this before now as it'll be released Tuesday and it is already Friday. But here we are and Tuesday is days away,  so...SURPRISE, I WROTE A BOOK!

This project began as a thought about a year ago. I culled together 10 or so of my favorite blog posts, printed them off, and then set about some basic edits. I very quickly realized that if I wanted to make something that felt whole and cohesive it was going to take a hell of a lot more work than that. So obviously I put those pages away in a drawer and didn't look at them again.

BECAUSE FEAR IS A THING. And facing a word document day after day is occasionally terrifying.

But in May a guy that I liked only-a-little dumped me. Which, if you think about it, is a bit like having your birthday--everyone else tells you exceptional things about yourself! 

 And man do I owe him. Because 1. he actually did a very courageous thing  and 2. that very courageous thing got me writing again.  A mild case of heartache can be an exceptional motivator.

So I set about creating a whole piece. Which was quite a lot like chipping away at a very large stone.

The ebook consists of seventeen essays. Each one began as a piece on this here blog, but with the exception of one or two, they bear little resemblance to the what you may have previously read. These seventeen essays map out my ten years in New York and I am so incredibly proud of them. 

It is my great hope that you will both enjoy and find meaning in them. 

This book is my love letter to what has been and what will be. And it is, in part, a humble thank you to you all after so many years of reading. 

It is not a perfect book, but I do believe it has a quite a bit of heart. It is my little-ebook-that-could and I am so excited to share it with you all in a few days time.  

Bearer of Goodness

Occasionally you meet a person and you think, this person is touched by divinity. Elizabeth and I met five years ago now--and only once--but I have marveled from afar, all the time since, as her life has tumbled forward. She has an exceptional mind (in that I think it works in a way that very few do), and an exceptional heart. And if I am very honest, her writing often causes me to set down my pen for fear that I'll never write anything as good. (But it also drives me to write more in the hope that I will). 

And, as is evident, from the photos above, she is a visual artist of some small amount of talent (those are paper crowns). 

In her nearly perfect corner of the internet she posted about her sixth grade class and their birthday tradition. I emailed her today to ask if I could share it here because what follows puffed my chest full of hope this morning:

"Before we collect our crowns one final afternoon in May, I gather my subjects to me in semi-circle. By luck my birthday fell last in the school year, and I wield my queenship to keep a captive audience for one final address. The room is quiet, hushed and still, and there is a sacred sweetness to our parting that floods my whole being in what feels like pulsing, radiant light. You are kings and queens, I tell them, and every day you establish your kingdom. I hope it is a good and a peaceable one, I hope it is a stronghold to you and a place of refuge for others. I hope you reign long, and well. I hope you rule with a sense of wonder, an abiding joy, and the unyielding banner of kindness."  

I believe in self-love. I believe in honesty. I believe that the most profound thing we can do is cultivate a meaningful wholeness within ourselves. I think the greatest successes are often deeply personal. I worry sometimes that as a country--as a culture--we think self-care is selfish, unnecessary. That we believe to spend too much time thinking about ourselves is inherently egotistical or narcissistic. But what if as sixth graders every last one of us was taught that we are a kingdom unto ourselves? And with that great privilege comes great responsibility. To govern well, to till the soil and improve the land, to create a safe harbor for others. What if the idea of a "kingdom" creates just enough distance from ourselves that we can actually get behind caring for and bettering ourselves? We believe monarchs and leaders to have agency. What if all sixth graders were asked to cultivate their own agency? What if we were taught that caring for ourselves (our kingdom) is actually how we care for others? 

Last year Agapi Stassinopoulos wrote the following: "The Greek word for the state of happiness is 'euphoria,' and the noun 'euphoros' means the bearer of goodness. One of the fundamental elements to finding euphoria is to be that euphoros -- bearer of goodness -- for yourself and for others. This means radical generosity, starting with yourself. 

If we see ourselves as the bearers of good, wherever we go we will create an atmosphere of goodness around us, and we will spread a sense of well-being to others. We will start to do good things for ourselves without thinking about it, and we will start having good thoughts about ourselves. We will experience positive emotions and produce positive outcomes because we will be connecting to our innate goodness. And from that place we will bring it to others."

"I hope you rule with a sense of wonder, an abiding joy, and the unyielding banner of kindness."

What good might happen if we all approached our lives in this way?