Friday reflection

The story you can't yet see

A hazy path

Hello,

This week I got the most amazing text from one of my oldest friends. In it, she told me how the opportunity to interview for her literal dream job as the head of a literacy project had just dropped into her lap:

“It takes all of the skills I’ve accidentally accumulated and mixes them with all of the things I care most deeply about and devote my entire life to and ATTACHES A PAYCHECK TO IT.”

And I replied,

“Yes, the story has been unfolding, you just didn’t know it.”

Believe me, I don’t always assume a Yoda-like posture with my friends (!), but in this case, the truth was so abundantly clear to me. She had been taking right action and right action, over and over again, for years. Along the way, life put some immense challenges in her path that threw her off course from the story she’d chosen for herself; in the face of these setbacks, she improvised, being as authentic and wholehearted as she could, within constraints, every step of the way. And she didn’t know it, but it was all leading up to this. Later in our text exchange, she wrote,

“Even just seeing the seeming randomness of the hemorrhaging of my time for free/cheap for the last decade come together in a resume was pretty therapeutic.”

There are plenty of moments in our lives when the threads don’t seem to come together — but then, sometimes, they do. And it’s beautiful. If you’re feeling like there’s no narrative through-line to your life or career, I hope this story buoys you. You never know when one small thing will shift and then all of a sudden, you’ll be able to see the story that was unfolding all along.

You are a mighty force -

Amanda