Advice on Bends in the Road
It's my second time through a book I am reading for a book club. My first time through it, 10 years prior, all of Heaven opened up so I could heed the call of my heart in a season where the path towards my personal journey's story had forked. I cannot help remembering the little confirmations that came as I go through it this round, nor can I help but assign anticipation to what might open up now.
In the club discussions, my inner dreamer wants to communicate that I took that risk at a bend in the road and continued. Yet, I'm wise and discerning enough to know I cannot make a rule of risk-taking because, for some, it might be selfish or immature to do so. So, while I hope the effect of this book on the book club members is life inspiration, I've noticed a change in how I show up to communicate.
Now that I am well into adulting, this second read-through might produce a lesson from the people around me who planted roots in one season and stayed, and that was right for them. Perhaps that was their risk at the fork in the road. For example, love asks you to leap, yet at the right time, it asks you to forsake all other options.
'Pioneer' and 'forerunner' have been compelling words that attracted me to leadership roles in the same way that 'different' drew me to clubs and activities in high school. These words were a lens I looked through whenever a risk or opportunity came. Presently, something has changed in me that I measure the anxiety in my gut and wonder at the cost to my dreams, commitments, health, and energy before I leap at what comes along. I have the luxury of doing this because I know my purpose and who I am. When I was younger, I was still on the path of discovering how specific our individual journeys are in their design.
This stroll down memory lane and this personal self-analysis got me curious about how I hold the word 'impact' when it comes to what I create and release into the world every day.
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I had the privilege of attending the Harvard BOLD Conference with a group of young adults. We heard from several women who have birthed noticeably worthy movements in their businesses. In the background of the various speakers was a common thread in the form of a history lesson and added to my reflections.
I was in college over 10 years ago, the same time I read this book club book for the first time. The marketed brand of a powerhouse woman, then, was one who could run a family and a business simultaneously. Then social media took off, at first a friend, that allowed me to connect internationally with people I met in my travels and stay connected. The luxury it gave me was the right not to say goodbye and end relationships. Travel became the definition of a successful woman.
Spoiler alert- in my own capacity, I can't keep people across the globe close. I have to make room in my heart for the one or two who can walk with me at the end of a hard week. It causes me to wonder about the people who lived overseas a decade ago who had to say goodbye to their families and start over. In the goodbye, was there more relationsional health in people because there were limitations?
While I chased the marketed pathways, eventually, I learned the cost was too much for me.
Social media is now like a game of whack-a-mole. If I want my business to be noticed, I must post more than I can do due to natural time limitations. This pressure locks out creativity and pushes up against performance, and I immensely dislike it. I want to rewrite the rules of these tools in favor of stewardship and the algorithms in favor of small business. Especially when I see a high schooler paid for what they post (total of content that would have got me grounded in high school) throwing large chunks of money out on superficial whims. I struggle to find empathy when I see teens bullying teens on social media or girls suicidal because they think their life is boring compared to all the other lives they see. I wonder, for them, what images they are being marketed with for their own definitions of successful women.
These Harvard BOLD women in business leaders, now in their late 40s described to an audience of young women their careers and ideas in such a way that helped me fill in that picture. Two speakers discussed how they believed it was possible to have it all in their early careers. Yet, in hindsight, they wished they could have spent more time with their family. I hoped that a spotlight from Heaven would drop on that sage advice so others in the room would know and save themselves time and trouble of following a prescribed blueprint. It confirmed what I discovered on my journey: everything has a cost, and some things are unsuitable for me. One formula does not fill all.
In our wrap-up Harvard discussion, I further emphasized the cost of risk-taking. Day to day, something by active choice wins and loses. The trick is being willing to choose which things and when. I risked and paid for my leaps of faith, and I trust they were God-led.
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My choices I do not regret. I have seen some beautiful places and met people I will remember and treasure. I learned how to overcome a whole lot of fear. And, it cost me the classic American, culturally defined dream, financially and relationally.
I want to be a voice on the path near those bends in the road, encouraging kindred spirits to step off what is sold as "the way" and to look for a more uniquely specific design. Many of my art pieces and classes start with this simple hope. It's this impact I hold like a match before an unlit lamp. If I am reckless, the wrong path gets taken. If I am too cautious, my heart breaks as I watch those marked with my same gumption, never take the leap.
When I look inside me, I see a woman who loves business and functions doing many creative things at once. At this point, I find myself holding up to the light my own branded assumption of what my life and career should be because history has taught me to do so. I am looking to see what is true and accurate and what is simply a fantasy I've been peddled. I long to give a legacy to the people I encounter through my stories and way of seeing the world with all kinds of wonderment. Impact.
In reading a second time, the book that launched me off the path, I wonder if I am superimposing a desire to pivot again onto the experience. In a possibly overthinking fashion, if my gut instinct is correct, I am learning to deepen. Will the light reveal the fantasy for me now is the pressure of 'impact,' or will it prove to be a true definition of who I am.
It might pain me to lose this word image filter when I face new opportunities or ideas, as it would mean choosing to do things without the pressure of sparking life. It would mean doing something that brings me joy and deepens my life experience simply from a place of being.
Born with a person-manual I cannot read, but God can reveal, I wonder about simply being. Is that enough? Is it enough to just let God enjoy me? The purpose of rose is not in what it does.
I am an introvert. I think deeply. I prefer quiet spaces and one-on-one mentoring. I like international settings with diverse people. I like labels breaking and people being open-hearted. I enjoy spending my time in something fun and creative and prefer to look at life optimistically. I am kind to myself with what I try, even if I'm not producing glamour and well-known things. I am still figuring it out. I'm still listening, watching for the bends in the road, and waiting for what God will reveal to me about impact.
I have chosen a path of legacy, and I want to tell the young adults, "Take the value of your youthful energy and sew it into the path God opens for you so that you learn to trust Him. Fail fast and learn from it. Don't rush back to safety when things don't seem like what you thought. Don't accept as law someone's prophetic word for your life. Stay grounded and listen to God for your unique story."
