There are moments when life just doesn’t make sense and the questions seem to pile up faster than any answers.

For some unknown reason, that seems completely silly to me at the moment, I had assumed that by mid-40’s things would have fallen into place. Sure, still plenty of hard work to do and hard life moments, but the sense of unknown and uncertainty would feel easier to navigate. Life would feel more stable to help withstand the storms. I’m not sure if it’s just me and I’m really banking that it’s not, but this stage of my life feels harder than I thought it would be.

What do you start to do differently when it seems that you’ve already done all the right things - went to school, good job, doing the family thing, trying to make smart decisions about the future, taking care of a home…it’s all pretty standard. Why does life sometimes feel anything but? Do I do more? Can I do more? I can’t imagine that doing less is the answer when already doing so much often feels like it’s not enough. It’s exhausting out here - both the doing of all the things but also the thinking about all the things. And I find myself stuck in this place of constantly moving between more and less.

Parent more here but also way less over there, as she needs the space to run and figure it out.

Save more, spend less, but there’s more important things to spend more on. Need less? Want more?

Eat healthier, eat more this, eat less that, drink more green tea, less caffeine, walk instead of run, lift heavier instead of lighter.

Work harder, work smarter but less days, less hours. Work more here to work less there.

Spend more time on this relationship, less time on that relationship. Less time, more quality. Small amounts of meaningful time. More time away, more time home. Less time to give.

Put in more energy here, less energy there. I feel like I can’t keep up with where to put in more and where gets less. Where do I hold on to more for myself, which means I put less into something but what?. I feel dizzy and overwhelmed trying to figure it out so by default I keep doing what I’ve been doing but that doesn’t seem like the answer either.

So here’s what I’m trying to figure out. How do I let go of the idea that it should feel different than it does and that there’s something that I should be doing different and instead do whatever it is that feels right, right now? It’s letting go of a lot of strategies that have helped guide me well in the past and that’s not easy. It’s starting over and keeping going at the same time.

So what’s the point? Here’s the reason I share all this. First I know it’s so easy to look around at other people and believe they got their shit figured out. Because of what I do and the privilege of listening to other people navigate their lives, I know that’s not true and even then it’s easy to get seduced by the idea that other people have it easier. They don’t. Life is hard, in a multitude of different ways for all of us. But for all of us, sometimes life is hard. I also share to say that although it’s feeling hard right now, it’s not all bad. It’s on the cusp of some pretty amazing things that are coming - big things, small things and things I don’t even know about yet, but know they are coming too. So like so many other things I manage to write about, it comes back to the Both/And of life. It’s hard and it’s good. It’s hard and yesterday was perfect weather that I soaked up. It’s hard and there’s plenty of room for laughter - either out of survival or joy, it doesn’t really matter, laughter is there. It’s hard and worth it, even when I don’t understand in the moment why.

So for anyone also feeling like life is on the hard side today, I encourage you to keep going. You aren’t alone in the hard stuff. I’ll keep going too. Rest well my weary friends.

With a tired but hopeful heart,