The other day I was thinking lovey thoughts about a dear friend and shot her a quick text to say, simply, “I hope you have a day that is good for your heart.” But what I wanted to say was so much deeper.
Because I have wishes for her. They’re the same wishes I have for my daughters as they grow, for all of you, for myself – for every woman doing the hard work of being a woman in these times. Because it ain’t easy… but it can be spectacularly good.
My wish for you all today, and tomorrow, and the tomorrow after tomorrow, is that you:
• Witness something that sparks awe in you, especially awe in the ordinary – the way the cat sneezes, the satisfaction of getting a stain out of your favorite shirt, the promise of a brand new notebook that waits for the ink of your pen, the perfection of storm clouds moving across the sky.
• Have the chance to belly laugh. Not just a snort or a guffaw, but the kind of laugh that steals your breath and makes your face hurt.
• Can bring your troubles to the circle and let trusted souls hold them with you, so you can be seen as who you are without being judged, rising unburdened and free.
• Are safe, in your home, in your skin, in the memories of your past, on all paths and in every scenario of the future. May you be protected and (relatively) fearless.
• Recognize that feelings come and go, ebb and flow, but are not facts and are not forever. You are never just the intensity of one moment.
• Cultivate a body you can trust or, at least, forgive and embrace.
• Know that chapters and seasons, endings and beginnings, fallings and risings are all part the deal and respect them, each of them, for the joys, sorrows and lessons they present. Waste not a single one.
• Feel your boundaries respected and words heard. And, even if they’re not, that you possess the courage to speak them anyway.
• Find yourself on the receiving end of the kind of grace that, if you drop the meatloaf while taking it out of the oven, your family will have a good chuckle and eat it anyway. (This specific thing may happen more than once, in my experience.)
• Hear the moment when someone loves you enough to call you out on bad behavior not as an attack but as the gift it is.
• Trust someone enough to share your most shameful secrets, and they trust you with one of their own.
• Have a standing appointment with an excellent therapist who will refuse to let you gloss over the things you don’t want to feel.
• See the eloquence of your own shadow.
• Never feel intimidated by your light or back away from your own significance, that you recognize the limitless possibility of you for what it is.
• Believe your own instincts and listen when the gut shouts out, that you heed every “NO” and “NOT YET” and “NOT THIS” and, even more, that you snap to it when she screams “HELL YES!” May you hear your own pleadings and oblige.
• Don’t ever forget, even when the world is coming at you hard, the unshakable spirit that resides beyond your tissues and marrow. The one that rises above the clatter; the one that is your birthright; the one that is your essence.
• Remember that you are more than seed, more than spring bud waiting for its moment. You are the promise of the seed embodied. You are mighty oak, beckoning flower, wavy grass dancing in wind.
And, if you ever feel like there is no one in your corner, know that I am here and cheering you on, always.
