I know exactly what my perfect day looks like. The only problem is that perfect rarely ever happens. If we dig a little deeper, maybe the real "problem" is thinking that perfect is the place that we want to end up. I love lists, and I especially love to check them off. But lately my lists seem totally futile. There is way more to do than could ever be done. I could I tick every box right on time, and there are still about fifty other people who have overlapping lists that may not even match mine...
My son is applying to high school which is a special kind of hell reserved for people who live in big cities. Usually you just need a body temperature in the nineties to go to high school. But in ultra-competitive NYC you have to be first to even sign up for school open houses- they reach capacity within 45 minutes of opening the registration. The whole process is capital C crazy, and it is choking our lives. The most daunting reality is that he could have the perfect profile, we could do all the right things, and that might not matter one bit...
This realization invites an incredible opportunity to clarify and shift. There is no perfect outcome. Whatever perfect outcome we choose to obsess over is not even guaranteed to happen. While we are striving to achieve our perfect outcomes, we may end up missing the really important moments. When we finally have all of the pieces perfectly lined up, along comes the unexpected and completely changes our course. Did you miss my October newsletter? Oh right, I did not actually send one because our entire household ended up getting COVID and falling into the black hole of quarantine...
I do not indulge myself with much complaining, however. We are healthy. We are fortunate to be able to choose our paths in life. We have the privilege of safety and security that many do not. I am simply laughing at the idea of perfect. I am crying at my silly obsession with trying to get it just right. I am pondering what principles I have been using to guide my life. I am learning something new about myself: I prefer a little bit of chaos and a lot of freedom over all of the best laid plans...
Catch you on the flip slide.
Valarie