2020: Year In Review
I usually do a year end wrap up in January but this year I’m not feeling it. Taking a look back at our stats feels a bit like trying to put a big ol’ shine on a smelly turd. I’m not a big fan of positivity for positivity’s sake.
I did want to share two things that capture some of what I’m feeling about 2020 though.
Image description: a newborn baby is swaddled, in a clear-sided bassinet, with a toque on their head.
The first is this incredibly beautiful post, written by Jessica Martin-Weber of The Leaky Boob, to their baby born in 2020. For those of you whose little ones arrived in 2020, I suspect it will resonate with you.
The second is a poem that my business/soul coach, Kristen Kalp, wrote:
A Prayer for the Liminal Space
Let me be certain
that there is no shame in uncertainty,
even as I am sure the lack of knowing will kill me.
Let me know I am safe, loved — beloved even —
without knowing how I will wake up and walk
tomorrow, or even in the next hour.
Let me crawl toward the light, then,
when my knees are too weak to hold me,
and my heart too heavy to bear.
I actually have this printed out, on the wall by my desk, because it spoke so deeply to me about the challenge of the in-between time.
To me, 2020 felt like one giant liminal space – the perpetual not knowing, the uncertainty, the inability to truly plan anything at all – it was right up in all our faces.
And I don’t know about you, but my ability to handle the in-betweenness of anything in life with grace is pretty minimal.
This poem reminded me that I don’t actually have to do it with grace, or ease, or even competence.
I can do it messy and uncertain and scared. All I need to do is commit to the light. No matter how slow. No matter how ugly. Just turn toward the light.
Just that.
Toward the light.
I think sometimes, this is what the most challenging parts of labour and early postpartum are like. We set these expectations for ourselves to do it with grace, ease, control, competence. And when the process brings us to our knees, we berate ourselves for “failing” or “doing it wrong” (whatever that means).
What if all we’re actually tasked with doing is turning towards the light?
What if all we’re actually asked to commit to is turning towards the light?
I feel like this is something I can do, no matter how murky, no matter how hard the task.
So simple, but not always easy.
Which is why I have it taped on the wall next to my desk. When I start spinning, thinking about how I should be doing it better, more gracefully, with more competence, or whatever other bullshit my asshole brain kicks up, I read A Prayer for the Liminal Space and remember – I just need to turn towards the light.
Just that.
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