This is me raw. No makeup, no attempt to pretty up. Just me, bare and real in the morning light.
Sometimes I need to show up like this, to remember that I can.
And today I’m not going to carefully craft a post, any more than I wanted to put on my game face, because that’s not where the energy lies.
Today my heart is pounding truth, and I want to say every cliche thing I can think of to shake us all the fuck awake. Today I want to remind you of what we’ve all written or known or spoken at one time or another and what we all too easily forget.
It’s all too short, my love, too brief, too rare, too delicate, too transient, too impossible to hold. The whole of this life, our loves, our spirits, and souls and bodies and beings.
Here and then gone. Just like that.
We get to have what we have, and then we don’t anymore, and sometimes there is warning, and we can prepare, and sometimes there is not, and one tsunami of a wave knocks us over and tumbles us up and spits us out on the sand.
But no matter how it goes down, love, none of this lasts forever.
We don’t know how long we get to be here. We don’t know how long we get to love, or laugh or dance or sing or write or cry or show up for those who need us. And while we are here, we’re almost guaranteed to fuck up every last one of those things, just by virtue of being so impossibly, frustratingly human, fragile assholes that we are.
So my god, dive into the cliche with me, right now. Sit for a second and remember how slippery our hold on all of this is. Remember how fucking blessed you are to love and be loved, in every second of every day.
Remember that nothing is promised to you, but everything is possible.
Don’t act out of fear or scarcity. Not out of anxiety or grasping. Just act because it’s all too precious and all too delicate and all too important not to give our all and our everything.
If you love someone, good fucking god, say it and say it and say it again.
If you need to leave to save yourself, then leave and do not look back.
If your heart and soul are forever connected to someone, and you know it in your bones, for the love of all that is holy, fight for them with all you have.
If there is a place or a person or a dream or a love calling to your soul – move mountains to get to where you need to be.
If you’ve lost yourself along the way, claw your way back to your own beating heart with the last bit of strength in your body.
If you have work you need to do in the world, or a story you need to tell, or a truth that needs to be spoken. Do it or tell it or speak it like it matters more than anything else.
Right now, I can’t think of anything more holy than this. No larger imperative, nor deeper truth.
Show up. Like you never have before. Fuck the protection and old wounds. To hell with saving energy for another day, or letting our doubts or scars win the round.
There’s no time for that.
To hell with it. Just go out and love, as hard as you can. Be brave. Reach out and hold on tightly to what matters. Do it like you might not ever get a chance again.
Because you might not. Do you hear me? You might not.
