Changing My Life Right Now: Marching Forth
How jelly bracelets and truffle popcorn are helping me through the hard
Changing My Life Right Now is my monthly splash of things—books, apps, podcasts, ideas, routines, accessories, snacks (mostly popcorn)—that are helping me through the hard at the moment. Haven’t done one in awhile but excited to bring it back this month!
It’s March! The only month of the year without a major holiday. Unless you count St. Patrick’s Day. Which, as a non-Irish, non-drinker, I personally do not.
Today is also the only day of the year that is also a verb. I learned that from Gretchen Rubin, who uses March 4th as a catalyst day to start new habits.
I will not be starting any new habits today. It’s challenging enough trying to keep up with my old ones.
But here in California, the sun has been shining. The birds have been chirping. And I hear Spring whispering, Soon.
Nature always seems to show up just in time, yeah? The tender buds and rushing streams pulling us back to center, reminding us of the beauty and connection always available to us.
What’s hard right now?
Human finitude. Two dear friends have lost close family members this past month, and my dad’s Parkinson’s is markedly worse, necessitating a new care plan. I’m doing a lot of work with holding “both/and”: I’m alive and healthy, my kids are thriving, and nothing and no one lasts forever. I don’t have much to offer here right now beyond—it hurts and sometimes it’s just hard.
Injury. I was training for a half-marathon and strained a calf during a speed workout. I took a solid week off to heal, then one week easily slipped into two. It’s been interesting to observe how being knocked out of routine can happen so quickly. I’m resetting my race goals now and trying to ramp back up mindfully.
Disappointment. We had a few family disappointments this month, with both of my kids not getting into programs they were hoping for. And as a follower of the news, disappointment is definitely one of the myriad emotions I’ve felt over the last month. It’s been a triggering emotion for me since childhood; I really struggle with it. BUT, my experiment last month really helped me manage it.
Which brings us to what’s helping me through the hard…
Ideas that are Changing My Life Right Now
I had an incredible experience with Judgment-Free February and running the Judgment-Free Sprint this past week! Here’s the original experiment if you missed it:
All of my experiments are dear to me, because they all teach me something, but this one seemed to have a particularly deep impact—for me and my fellow sprinters.
By the end of the month, I’d narrowed my process for handling judgments down to a cute rhyme: Ugh-Because-Chug.
1. Notice the judgment, the ‘ugh’.
2. Uncover the because, the unmet need or value beneath it.
3. Let the judgment chug on by the station.
Some days easier said than done, but practicing this process every day really helped when my kid got a ‘No’ from a much-hoped-for program. The judgments—of myself, of the program—were flying, but I was able to catch them and transform them as I uncovered my real needs. I want my kid to feel successful. I want us to stay connected and talk about our feelings when things are hard.
Tech that’s Changing My Life Right Now
Flow Club continues to be a rock star in helping me get to work and stick to work these days. They have sessions all day long. The checklists I create in the app help keep me focused during working/writing sessions. And now, they have a goal-setting feature where you can track how many Flows you’ve worked on a specific goal in a week. If you’re a person who’s easily distracted, it’s worth checking out.
Writing that’s Changing My Life Right Now
This interview on Write More, Be Less Careful with the poet Rachel Richardson about poetry, motherhood, and more had so many powerful moments. Her latest book, Smother, about mothering in an age of climate grief is life-giving.
This essay by
on how to shift negative emotions is 100% worth reading. The 3 ‘what if’ questions are brilliant!This essay about the bittersweetness of watching your kids grow up and grieving how quickly everything is passing is built on a familiar premise but is just so damn well-written it will give you all the feels.
This essay by my friend Amye Day Ong deftly weaves together Monopoly, one Southern family’s money story, mental health, and so much more.
Consulting a medium to help you write your memoir? Fascinating story by Julie McGue.
And the responses to
’s question What do we do when we lose it with our kids? 👀 are worth reading over a few (or seven!) times. My response is included in the round-up and is pretty much what you’d expect—practical and little weird. Her Substack newsletter A Wonderful Mess is worth subscribing to, a brilliant place for parents to connect around stories and tools in the fantastic mess called parenting!Jewelry that’s Changing My Life Right Now
These buddha bracelets I picked up in Paris last fall are lightweight and feel like fancy jelly bracelets (remember those?). They go nicely with this ring I get a compliment on every time I wear it. (I have no idea where I got it.)
Snacks that are Changing My Life Right Now
In no particular order:
Thin rice cakes (I like the texture!)
Pistachios (My daughter made me get a bag at Trader Joe’s last week and it was an excellent call.)
Olives (usually green—classic)
This truffle popcorn (though I’m not sure how I feel about the “mini” kernels?)
This Month on Living the In-Between Times
My interview with
for the Mothers Who Make series covered:The weird recess games fueled by my childhood imagination
How being busier actually supercharges my creativity
Why I completely quit writing when I became a mom
The 'woo' practices that keep my creativity flowing
Judgment Was Sucking My Life Dry. how and why I launched my Judgment-Free February
How Do These 6 Substack Writers "Do Life" with More Meaning and Less Futile Striving? (Hard to believe it was just one short month ago that we wrapped up our Meditations for Mortals Wonder Club! This was such a fun end-of-month celebration.)
That’s it for now. I’m off to the airport to pick up my oldest kid from a 10-day trip to Panama with his class. I hope I still recognize him when I get there!
Love this, thank you! What's hard: one of my 11-year-old twin daughters has an un-understood constellation of symptoms for which nothing has helped; what's helping: her twin sister is a ray of sunshine. I see myself in each of them, and try to hold both of those things at the same time.
A lovely piece, sorry to hear about those tough moments - I admire the way you approach things, it's inspiring and uplifting and your judgement-free practices are great.
As tough as everything is (life, the news, etc) I do my best to laugh as much as possible, I try to see the funny side if I can, though it's not always easy. To be honest, there's so much uncertainty in life now and I'm trying my best to live a day at a time (forgive the old cliche). I try to focus on silver linings. And no matter how bad things appear to be, as long as my daughter is happy and healthy, that keeps me going. Thank goodness for her - speaking of which, that post from Stephanie Gilman mirrors my thinking to a T and it really is so bittersweet with the kids growing up quickly. Interestingly, no other fathers commented on that post, which is...intriguing.
Thanks for sharing all the links, I like this kind of stuff, and I hope your son had a lovely trip to Panama - that's one hell of a field trip!