An Anniversary - The 40/40 List FIVE Years Later

Vintage birth announcement

Today I turn 45. I am middle-aged. It's ridiculous to consider. It's also such a gift, a privilege to be able to add more years to this life.

I finally arrived! TWO weeks after my due date.

As the weeks and days have ticked by to this day, I've thought a lot about who I am now, and about all of the versions of me that have brought me to this point. I'm still slim, but not thin-skinned. I feel my introverted tendencies more acutely as I raise a strong-willed extrovert. I still love reading, and keep finding ways to read faster to consume more information. I am even more interested in telling stories, so I study how to do it. I am curious, but have a lack of it when it comes to what people think of me. I trust myself, and really like the woman I have become. I feel good in my skin and love the decision to whack off my hair three years ago. I love my own company and crave it more and more. I'm not afraid of being alone, and the abject loneliness of a few years ago has dissipated. I am grateful that I set out to date myself in the early months after my divorce and came to know myself and like myself in new ways for the first time in my life.

Of the things that are most different about me, it is my ability to metabolize fear. I lived nearly 40 years paralyzed by it. I stayed firmly within the confines of what kept me safe and sound—or at least what I perceived as such.

My Grandpa taught me to step over the wires that electrified the rides at the State Fair. I watched other people step on them and nothing happened to them. Protecting us from danger—perceived and real threats alike—was his love language. So I followed his advice and stuck to what seemed safe. I was the child who also didn't like Dr. Seuss's Green Eggs and Ham because if ham was green, something was WRONG with it, and we SHOULD NOT BE EATING IT. You see where I'm going with this? I took reasonable precautions to their outer limits. I went overboard on being safe and I didn't risk anything—not adventure or healthy risk. I stayed at jobs too long. I didn't travel to places I wanted to see. I stayed in relationships past their expiration dates. My sense of safety became inverted.

And then I felt things shift. I was getting divorced and turning 40 and the way I'd always done things didn't seem to be working anymore. I took the advice of a twenty-something and made a list of things to do in celebration of my birthday. It turns out that list changed my life.

I tackled the list like a military operation, or so one friend observed. I put things on that list that scared me. I also used the list to inspire, stretch, and teach me. All of that happened. That list was like throwing a rock into the lake of my life and watching the ripples widen. I am still feeling the effects of disturbing the waters of my life.

Malcolm Gladwell explained in his book David and Goliath – Underdogs, Misfits, and the Art of Battling Giants that during the Blitz in World War II, Londoners didn't behave as the government expected them to. After the war, a Canadian psychiatrist named J. T. MacCurdy studied reactions to the unrelenting bombings and described his findings in a book titled The Structures of Morale. MacCurdy wrote:

“We are all of us not merely liable to fear, we are also prone to be afraid of being afraid, and the conquering of fear produces exhilaration....When we have been afraid that we may panic in an air-raid, and, when it has happened, we have exhibited to others nothing but a calm exterior and we are now safe, the contrast between the previous apprehension and the present relief and feeling of security promotes a self-confidence that is the very father and mother of courage.”

As I think of my life at 45, MacCurdy's words resonate. I haven't been through the Blitz, but I have navigated emotional disturbances that felt explosive. In the years before my divorce and my 40^th birthday, I was paralyzed by my fear of being fearful. Working my way through my 40/40 knocked all of that loose. I didn't become fearless. I was afraid and proceeded forward with my fears in tow. And then I looked around and noted that I was still standing. That I had survived whatever dangerous, scary thing I had imagined was coming after me. The more I tested the waters of my own courage, the braver and sturdier I became.  

I flung myself off the platform swinging on the trapeze. I pushed my skinny frame toward the finish line of my first race. I challenged old stories I came to believe as truth. I baked fancy desserts, and didn't set the kitchen aflame. The list was my life. I was burning away the old stuff that no longer served me and cleared the path to head out on new adventures.


I have become familiar with the exhilaration too, and it feels GOOD.

As I celebrate the ups and downs of this precious life, I am living proof that “the present relief and feeling of security promotes a self-confidence that is the very father and mother of courage.”

Five years. There was a time when I was so frightened not knowing what would come next. Now I welcome the unknown and know I am up for every challenge that life throws my way.

Here's to the next five and five and on and on!

Looking back and welcoming what's to come

Happy New Year! It feels good to open a fresh document empty except for the curiosity of what will fill its pages in the coming 365 days. I didn't fully embody my word of the year, enchantment, quite as I might have hoped. My bent toward practicality kept enchantment at bay more than I had hoped and yet I have no regrets about the aspiration to be enchanted. It nudged me closer to this year's word: savor. I look forward to the ways that I can embody this new word.

A friend reminded me that “We are not always 100 per cent.” It was his way of comforting me as I lamented the inability to “get over” something that keeps tripping me up. His phrase has been a mantra this year and a source of self-soothing.

My home began transforming into the space I have always dreamt of it being: a safe place for friends and strangers who need it. It didn't require new furniture or a fresh coat of paint to achieve that status. Only an open heart and the willingness to say yes when the needs arose. Four months later, a friendship is forged that I am excited to nurture and cultivate for months and years to come. It also hosts bi-monthly Girl Scout meetings, and it has recharged my emotional reserves to hear the chatter of twelve- and thirteen-year-old girls who delight in each other's company and work toward their goals together.

The middle school years are proving to be difficult for pre-teen and mother alike. I've been heartbroken at times feeling inadequate in my role as her shepherd through this rough terrain. But since I've begun to see every aspect of life as a practice rather than an expectation of getting things right all the time, I've found space to learn from my missteps, room to breathe, practice patience, and try again.

I continue to feel a sense of wholeness and health that is new—not only post-divorce, but new in all my nearly 45 years. I am confronted by things that have caused me difficulty or consternation, and I am actually grateful when those moments arise because I demonstrate how differently and competently I handle them now. I see how healing from past hurts and feelings of being misunderstood allow me to respond from such a different place than before. I have watched myself initiate difficult conversations that previously seemed impossible. I would freeze and stay in a place of resentment and indignation. Now, I take a breath when the opportunity presents itself, and speak what is true for me with kindness and self-respect. I have seen relationships transform and my life feels lighter and happier.

There is a difference between responding and reacting, and in the new year and new decade before me, I am committed to responding. I have turned so many corners for the better that I see that I am back where I started, but at a new elevation with the benefit of life experience, hindsight, and the love and support of many who have loved me to this new place.

I am loosening my grip on my stubborn approach to paying off credit card debt. Being white-knuckled about anything is an exhausting, counterproductive strategy. We are going to travel more, pay attention to opportunities to say yes when life opens new doors, and respect the moments when saying no is a sacred choice.

I fine-tuned my ability to conserve and expend energy like a banker spends and saves money. I understand how time is currency, and I want to spend it well. I have recognized how my work life has become deeply stressful, and with awareness, I discovered that rest and sabbaths of many kinds were the best way to combat it. By the end of the year, I was able to grant myself these respites with very little guilt. I endeavor to do more of the same in the new year and even go so far as to find ways to eliminate the crushing stress altogether.

Time in my garden reinforced how it—and I—are works in progress, and I am thrilled by the ways I am blossoming along with my crops of zinnias and sunflowers. This season, I tried planting seeds in different places in my yard and was initially underwhelmed. Only two stalks of sunflowers grew and my zinnias sprouted but initially stopped before any blooms came. I learned the importance of knowing how much sun an area gets and was satisfied that no zinnias this year were a small price to pay for understanding that they required much more sun for future crops. I put too many sunflower seeds in the same hole in the ground—another mistake I made that taught me to see this garden as a source of adventure. I feel lucky I got the two stalks I got. But then a month later than expected and a few weeks after I'd considered pulling the zinnia-less plants, nearly two dozen zinnias blossomed after all, which taught me a bigger lesson: that all living things grow in their own time and to not rush the process. I've always considered myself a late-bloomer, but I'm now considering the possibility that I am actually blooming exactly on time—for me.

Welcome 2020! I am excited by what adventures and blossoms await me in this New Year.