We live in a society where only “big success” is acknowledged. We don’t care about the small steps. We don’t hear about the stumbles. Yet it takes outrageous courage to be in the middle of your journey. The middle is where it’s at, baby.
Maybe you’re growing a new business, writing the book of your dreams, or healing from a necessary divorce. These are the times when alligators are nipping at your raw feet, the rain keeps beating down, the moon is fading, your mother is calling, and you wonder if you are going to age in poverty with hopes that never came true. Yep, these are the moments that need celebration.
These are the times we need applause and ribbons and massive hot fudge sundaes and witnesses to our magnificence. These are the times we must love ourselves through the hunger and exhaustion. These are the times when we must celebrate our courage, the power, belief, and stubborn pluck it demands to just keep lurching and wobbling forward.
Please give yourself the benefit of true perspective. Do not reject yourself for “not being there yet,” wherever that great “there” is for you. You are on the path. You are on the path. You are on the path. The path begins wherever you are, when you embrace your life with honesty, patience, and compassion.
Don’t join that dismal bandwagon of thieves, those silly addle-brained fools in the streets who only believe in the gods of People magazine, or the ones who believe that it’s more successful to just tack things together than to be naked on the path of pursuing your truth. Don’t accept the measurements of those who uphold flawed and obsolete standards. Do not borrow knowledge from the ones who do not dare. The ones who dare—absolutely know the pain of being in the middle of things. If your life is unsettled, imperfect, unpredictable, wild at the core, stuck, or yet to “come together,” congratulations. You’re one of the awakening tribe. You’re in the stream of being holy alive.
