What does your to do list have to teach you?
Most humans struggle in the face of paradox. Ironically making peace with paradox is a key to our freedom. In a primal desire for simplicity we resist that which is complex, but as we complete a quarter century of the 2000s nothing is truer than the fact that we have evolved to be a very complex species living on a beautifully complex planet.
Being human today is hard, but there is proof of our ability to do hard things and it is hiding in plain sight.
Today my to-do list among other things includes:
Make school lunch
Find Sexual assault lawyer
Let friend’s dogs out to pee
Coach client
Finish fuel assistance application
Print recipes for grocery shopping
Buy green beans
Attend meeting “Progressives fighting compassionately”
Read another way:
Life is life-ing; I am okay
Life is suffocating; I am not okay
What could be more real and true in the life of a human than a to-do list. It screams vulnerability, “This is who I am. This is what I do. This is how I show up to the world.”
The simplicity of our daily actions is an opportunity to examine what we value, what we stand for, who we are. Not-a-one of us is simple, easy, or clean. By our very nature we are messy, contradicting, and complicated.
For decades I’ve been showing up to the insurmountable task of making this world a better place for women. In the last eight years not a day went by that I didn’t speak to the paradox inside of an abortion: I loved her. I let her go.
Everyday I learn more of how little I know, but I also learn that not knowing isn’t a problem. This morning a friend was helping me understand my daughter’s sexual assault case which is in the hands of the Colorado D.A. The legal jargon has felt paralyzing, but I know my lane and when I remember to stick to it we all grow. Paradox says: I’ve got this I can help. I have no idea what I’m doing. And both are true.
We all know paradox, but when we forget that we know it we fumble. When we slip into black and white thinking we lose our balance because nothing about being human is black and white. To thrive we must play in the grey. 🩶