When it's hard.

A prompt for you this week.

It was hard, but I sat down anyway and opened my notebook— but I just felt blank.

So I made myself pick up my pen, I uncapped it. I held it for a painfully long time over the empty page… then thought, well… shit…it’s going to dry out. So I capped it again.

I sighed so loud I woke up the cat.

I started to cry again.

My sleep had been trash and I was tumbling ass-over-tea-kettle in a vast undertow of overwhelm and desperately wishing I could just start my day in the refuge of my notebook feeling poetic and free before I slogged off to my checklists and inbox and 17 unread text messages— but it wasn’t happening.

It’s felt like this lately. And I’m guessing you probably know exactly what this feels like, too— like you’re ass deep in quicksand still trying to run a marathon.

I was miserable and just could not write, so I bargained with myself — All you have to do is put down one simple sentence about something you did this morning then you can carry on hyperventilating about everything in the world while you drink that coffee, Lisette.

So I wrote:

“Today I watered the plants.”

I think, yep, ok, good job, just go with that…

So I continue, “I misted their leaves and touched them and spun them around in their puddles of sun.”

And then I’m dropped in just enough - the resistance is lower and the pen is finally moving and so I just let it be whatever it is. It doesn’t have to make sense, I remind myself while releasing into the feeling of it. One sentence to another. My thoughts drifting while writing, allowing whatever wants to be there to be there.

Half a page in and I’m crying again but I’m not frozen now — the pen is moving itself at the speed of thought and I’m sort of just along for the ride. The tangled lump living in my chest is suddenly unspooling itself across multiple pages while I try to keep up. I have a major breakthrough that stops me in my tracks for a few stunned moments then I plunge back in and keep the pen moving until the last words finally dry out of this sudden fountain. I’m done crying, I have no idea what I wrote but I feel blessedly empty and amazed at how much was right there waiting for me.

I close the notebook and take a deep breath. I drink some bubbly water. I start my day…

Something profoundly mystical happens inside a closed notebook.

Close your eyes & put your hand on the cover of a closed notebook and I think you can feel it, too. It’s doing something in there. Some magical digestion. I’ve felt it. And I’ve seen the evidence.

Because the world is loud and it’s very easy to get pulled off my path if I don’t follow the breadcrumbs I leave for myself, I make a regular practice of reading back over the preceding several pages of my notebook. So today I flipped back and I read over those stream-of-consciousness pages that started with “today I watered the plants” and incredibly they made complete sense. Suddenly it was this whole gorgeous, articulate story arc from top-to-bottom that pulled together themes from years of personal inquiry and wrapped them in a poetic extended metaphor. Bold truths and loving insights had appeared as though the author knew me better than I know myself. I choked up at one point, I thought— God, thank you, this is just what I needed to hear today...

Seriously.

A prompt for you…

Whenever you could use it, remember that starting with the simplest thing you know could be the gateway to everything you’re trying to figure out. Write down the simplest thing you know and let it go from there.

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I’m with you on the journey, friends.

xo,