Out of the blue
Holding the bright and dark hues of this changeable world
Hey friend,
It’s been over four weeks since I’ve written here, and to be honest I have barely got it in me to write today, but the longer I leave it, the harder it is to break the seal. So here I am, trying to practice what I teach, which is: Follow the thread of what is real and true and don’t try so hard to be cute or clever. Remember why you do this—to know yourself better and offer your realest self to others in the name of authentic connection.
Also: When your thoughts and feelings are all jumbled up, it may take more time than you’d like to untangle them on the page, and that’s ok. Writing is a contemplative act requiring spaciousness, and a fast-moving life doesn’t always easily accommodate the process.
Alrighty, compassion and commitment activated! Let’s get into it.
My most recent post was about moving out of my Los Angeles apartment and preparing to set out on a nomad year. Rereading it now, I can feel the electricity of that threshold moment. I was thrilled to be leaping into the unknown.
Well, I’ve officially leapt, having left California one week ago. I know it’s early days, but wow, to be honest, I am discombobulated. I wanted to get out of my rut. But my rut was also my groove, and now I’m skittering around like a marble on a wobbly glass table.
Routines may be dull and creatively stultifying, but you know what else they are? Efficient. You don’t realize what a time-saver autopilot is until you try to get through an ordinary day without it. I am now a person who requires ten minutes to locate her socks. (They’re always in the same place: whatever packing cube1 I happen to check last.)
Have you heard that wherever you go, there you are? Yeah. Here I am alright, along with my crappy sleep, social media addiction, monster sugar cravings, and undisciplined work habits. Turns out my internal baggage is just as heavy as my suitcase.
And another long-lost chicken that’s recently come home to roost: good old free-floating anxiety. If you’ve never experienced this, it’s a bit like when you wake up from a nightmare with a queasy dread that lingers long after you’ve forgotten the details of the dream. It clings to your hair like stale cigarette smoke, and you just know that everyone can smell its stink on you.
This week I’m noticing other free-floating feelings, too. Generalized yearning—for nothing in particular, for everything at once. A drifting, whale-like melancholy. Sticky little burrs of impotent rage attaching themselves to any passing pant leg. Tariffs. Deportations. The spinelessness of congressional leaders who know better but refuse to do better. My fucking 401k. Grrrr…
I’m not, like, despondent, but the world has taken on a blue hue. Are these gloomy feelings even mine? Or am I just reflecting the prevailing mood?
I’m writing from my hometown, Vancouver, where (bright spot) I am petsitting an extremely lovable border collie/husky mix named Maya. The other day, four separate Canada geese hissed at us on a walk. Even the birds are pissed off here! (#elbowsup!)
I guess I shouldn’t be surprised I’m out of sorts. A very close friend is gravely ill here with an out-of-the-blue health crisis that has blindsided our friend group. I was supposed to have dinner, or maybe a bike ride, with her this week. Instead I stroked her feet and prayed over her in the intensive care unit at Vancouver General Hospital.
I tend to get introspective when I’m home for a visit, even at the best of times. Maybe it’s the collision of my lived and unlived timelines. The people and plans I walked away from, the once-cherished things later unchosen. Old me, current me, and never-will-be me overlapping like off-registration colors on a badly printed poster.
Or maybe it’s just the damn rain, which is bucketing down as I type. I’ll never understand why some people find the sound of rain soothing. For me, it is the soundtrack to depression.
Back when I was living here and working at the local paper, Vancouver experienced a longer than usual string of rainy days. Every morning, I suited up in rubber boots and a GoreTex jacket and battled through steely sheets of ice water to catch the SkyTrain downtown, where I’d spend the day cocooned in a carpeted, brightly-lit newsroom.
After three weeks or so of this, the city editor wondered aloud about the historical record for consecutive days of rain, which turned out to be 42. Thirty-nine days into the deluge, a masochistic pride was in the air—this really is just about the worst wet spell ever! At 40 days, we tossed around ideas for a quirky little news feature to “celebrate” reaching a new meteorological milestone. But on day 41, despite the cloud cover squatting so low over the city you could poke it in the butt with the business end of your umbrella, not one drop of rain fell. The streak was broken, one day shy of the record.
As if to mock us, the next day the skies opened up again and it rained for two more solid weeks. (File this under “reasons to move to Southern California”.)
But no weather pattern lasts forever, even rain in the Pacific Northwest. Vancouver is the geographic personification of a mood swing, transforming into a glittering utopia the minute the sun comes out. Everyone gets giddy under a blue sky.
Last Saturday was like that, warm and sunny. I leashed up Maya, grabbed her chuck-it ball, and walked her down to False Creek, a manicured seaside neighborhood whose natural charms took on hallucinatory qualities in the spring sunshine. The darkly flashing water was a pool of quicksilver; the dog park grass bright as absinthe. You could easily forget that thunderclouds exist at all.
I see a young couple pushing a baby stroller under a canopy of cherry blossoms, their upturned faces glowing with the expectation of good times ahead.
A pink-cheeked girl pours frothy oat milk into paper cups on a red and white Coffee Bike cart. The cart has a sign on its side that says: Buy your own Coffee Bike! And for a sec, I think hey, that’s not a half-bad way to make a living. Riding my little coffee bike down here to the seawall and handing out lattes all day. I could do that.
Realistically, I’m sure that little coffee shop on wheels spends much of the year sheltering in a garage. But I hope our girl Pink Cheeks was able to make the most of that bright afternoon.
We never know how many of those we’re going to get.
Where’s Maggie?
Now: Vancouver
Next: New Jersey / New York, April 92 to early May
PS, please send love and healing energy to my sweet friend. She is one of the most enthusiastic cheerleaders of this Substack and never fails to send me an appreciation text. Knowing she is not awake to read and respond to it may be one reason I’ve been hesitating to send this out. Her silence will be booming.
Thank you. xo
Five steps to soothe free-floating anxiety when life feels sad or scary
As I’ve written about before, I am no stranger to anxiety. But where I once found it crippling, I now have some pretty effective ways to calm it. Here’s how I talk myself back to center when life is moving fast and the road ahead feels uncertain.
Notice that you are safe in this moment. Don’t try to convince yourself you’ll be safe tomorrow; in this step just focus on your physical safety right here and now.
Acknowledge that life is full of uncertainty, and that as a human animal, it’s only natural to get twitchy when you’re in uncertain circumstances. Soothe that nervous inner animal with love and understanding.
Remember that you don’t have to put your animal self in charge of your overall outlook. It’s safe and permissible to opt out of rumination, to find a little pocket of peace in the midst of that uncertainty. How? Notice the part of you that was doing the soothing, and be that part. This is a place where you can rest no matter what’s going on around you.
Get out of your head; take some action. Not as a distraction but as a positive, additive step forward into life. What action to take? It depends on the day. Sometimes I find it most relieving to tackle a nagging task. Other times, I just need a walk, a hot cup of tea, or a hug. And often, of course, I write.
Appreciate the totality of your experience, including stress and uncertainty. It’s possible to marvel at the bigness and intensity of life, even if you don’t enjoy every little speck of it.
Do you want to write as part of your inner work?
Do you want to take your journaling to a deeper level? Or expand your practice beyond journaling into writing essays, a Substack, or even a book? Do you long to write with more authenticity, courage, and meaning but tend to get blocked by performance anxiety or perfectionism? I can help.
This is the essence of my creativity coaching practice. It’s not traditional book coaching (although I do some of that, too). But I’m much more interested in the barriers to creativity: Where they came from, the true toll they take on our lives, and how we can dismantle them.
Think of it as life coaching with a writing focus, or writing coaching that may transform your life.
You do not need to have a manuscript or even a defined project to work with me. Your fears are welcome. Bring your meanest head gremlins, your chronic procrastination, your sensitivity to criticism, your shaky voice, your embarrassment about your lack of progress, your audacious ambition, and your back burner of abandoned projects.
Please know that I was once lost in the sauce like you are now. Recovering my creativity has transformed my entire life. As an ICF-certified Wayfinder Life Coach, what I want most is to share the gift of creative liberation with you.
Apply through the link below, and we’ll start with a quick call to make sure it’s a fit.
Publish your book with Wonderwell Press
Do you have a finished manuscript or work-in-progress that you want to get published? Looking for editorial and marketing support from smart, experienced publishing professionals? Submit your project to Wonderwell Press below, and your book could be in stores before the end of this year.
Remind me to show you my packing setup sometime. I’m pretty chuffed with it.
Yes, I am actually already in New Jersey at my cousin’s house… I left Vancouver two days before hitting send on this, but could not bring myself to revise it!
Safe travels, beautiful human. And thank you for the notes on anxiety, holding those steps close.