In a few days, I will have lived in my new place for a year. Some days, it feels like it’s only been a few months. But as I looked at my dusty baseboards the other day, it definitely looked like I’d lived there much longer than a year… a lot longer. So last week, I decided to do some much needed spring cleaning. I started with the bathrooms, scouring the tub and installing a new shower liner. Then I tackled those dusty baseboards, and when those were done, it was window time.
I started with my daughter Zoey’s windows—I even saw marks from her snow day wishing that I had somehow missed—and moved on to the living room. I pulled up the blinds, and because it was such a beautiful day, the outdoor light quickly filled the space around me.
The bright sunshine forced me to close my eyes, and for some reason, a wave of nostalgia washed over me. But the nostalgia wasn’t for something I’d once had, it was for something I’d once dreamed about.
In that moment, I remembered the way as a young girl I envisioned my future: I had pictured that, as an adult, I would live a blissful, light-filled, love-drenched life. After all, isn’t that what we all hope for? Complete and utter happiness?
Yes, in that moment, I remembered my childhood and young-adult dreams:
I dreamed of a home where sunlight poured in from floor-to-ceiling windows.
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I dreamed of days where I I would stay at home, raising a handful of children that I watched from the kitchen window as they played outside, laughing as they ran and danced in the dinnertime dusk.
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I dreamed of filling my spare time by writing and illustrating a children’s book, one that I would read to my own children.
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I dreamed of having a partner to love and who loved me back for who I was, someone who I would spend my days with, someone who I could talk to about anything and everything, someone who would hug me and hold my hand and tell me—no matter what—that things would all work out.
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But as I grew older, my life took the usual twists and turns, and I slowly changed what I thought I wanted, telling myself different stories as a way of accepting where I thought my life was going: Being married wasn’t a priority. Having kids wasn’t necessary. The house I dreamed of probably didn’t exist. Writing a book would simply be a silly dream of a naïve child.
And then, the story changed again, and it all became a blur: A marriage. A house. A child. Pressures. Work. Obligations. Responsibilities. Demands. And then divorce. All the things that brought me to where I was right now, standing in my apartment, alone, cleaning my windows, once again feeling wistful for a life I thought would be mine.
This unexpected, unplanned life I’m living is far from those childhood dreams. For the most part, I’m a happy, well-adjusted, healthy, positive person, finding the best in every situation. But some days, if I let it get the better of me, my reality paralyzes me. I get caught up in the want so much that I briefly forget about what it is I have. In those moments, I focus on the things that make my heart ache instead of thinking about the things that make my heart full.
It’s the part of nostalgia that can lead you down a path of woulda, coulda, shoulda. The part that makes you sad and long for better days gone by . . . or perhaps better dreams gone by. It sometimes happens when I am alone, and this week, when Zoey was not with me, it did get the better of me.
But when Wednesday rolled around and Zoey was back with me, I felt less unsettled, and we were happy to be with each other again. We ate dinner, chatting happily about our days and, eventually, our conversation turned silly as it always tends to when it comes to us. Zoey told a goofy story about her imaginary friends that left us laughing.
“You are silly,” I said, shaking my head.
“You are magnificent!” Zoey exclaimed. She loved doing things like this, turning our ordinary conversations into games. It’s one of my favorite things about her, her cleverness and creativeness, her ability to turn the ordinary into something more.
I happily took the bait. “You are marvelous!”
“You are spectacular!” she giggled.
“You are simply stupendous!” I said, as I gave her a high five.
And then, before I could move my hand away, Zoey grabbed it with her own. The motion made me think the game was over, but then she leaned in to kiss the top of my hand. When Zoey looked back up at me, her smile spread ear to ear and her eyes shone bright with happy tears. And then, in her sweet 5-year-old voice, the one I’d been missing this week, she spoke these words.
“You are my life.”
Her unexpected statement took my breath away. Zoey always seems to know the right thing to say to me, especially when I need it most. Her unfiltered, innocent thoughts tend to clear up the muddiness of my own. It’s not about what we want, it’s about what we need. Right there, at that kitchen table, in that moment, Zoey had everything she needed…and so did I. My dreams that had not matched up with reality became entirely insignificant.
But, funny enough, as I thought about it more (after I wiped my own tears away), I realized those dreams I had actually have manifested themselves in my life, right underneath my nose. Those windows I cleaned last weekend? They really are floor-to-ceiling. My home is filled with light and life. My daughter’s spirit and heart truly rival those of a houseful of children. Though I might not have a partner to go through life with yet, I remain hopeful. And I am writing the stories I dreamed of writing; one day, I will be able to read them to Zoey.
So this life—the life that I’m living now, the life that I will live in all my tomorrows—might not be the exact one I’d planned on living, but it is the one I have. I’ve started my next chapter. I’ve moved on to my Plan B.
* * *
For now, this Plan B is manifesting itself to be a simple, quiet life. One where Zoey and I do things like we did yesterday morning: I woke up early to get some work done, and I curled up on the couch with my computer and a cup of tea. A gentle spring breeze made its way in through the open window, and the smell of pollen and new grass made me smile. I worked in the quiet until Zoey padded into the room, climbed up on the couch, and curled up next to me.
The whistle of a train cried out in the distance. Zoey got up and moved toward the open window to hear it better. As she sat on our tiny window ledge—one that’s only big enough to hold someone as small as her—she placed her hand against the glass and started talking.
“I love our apartment. I love how we can hear the trains. I love how we can sit on our patio and watch the sun set. I love the way that sunshine feels. I love that you’re here with me.”
And then she turned, her delicate features cutting a profile against the light behind her, and again, she spoke another one of her important truths:
“I love where we are.”
I left my place on the couch to join Zoey on that tiny ledge, folding myself up enough to squeeze in next to her. “Me, too, peanut,” I said as I covered her hand with my own, our fingerprints leaving fresh smudges on the glass. I didn’t move to clean them up. Because later, as we went about our day, I wanted the swirls of our fingertips to still be there, a visible reminder of the fact that we had been there in this moment, present and alive and happy and—most importantly—together.
Zoey and I sat there, side by side, watching the day wake up to reveal a Colorado crystal-clear blue sky. It was cloudless, making it appear both empty and full at the same time. It was endless and beautiful.
Just like our future feels like it will be.
Sometimes it takes a quiet, fragile moment like this to help you really make sense of everything. For us, that everything means that we are here—in this life, in these beautiful moments that we call our own—making peace with where we are. We are here in this Plan B, where things are falling into place, and it’s right where we are meant—and where we need—to be.
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Share with us your story: Are you living an unplanned life? Regardless of where your life has taken you, how do you find peace with yourself and where you are in your everyday moments?
Week 14 Suggested Reading
| Tom Fortes Mayer
Discover how to be happy and at peace. Create a connection to your purest state of peace and happiness. Imagine yourself living fully and freely in the moment, utterly fulfilled and feeling vibrantly alive. This is The FreeMind Experience. This book ignites the flame of possibility inside us all. – Pulled from Amazon.com description
* * *
| Eckhart Tolle
Ekhart Tolle’s message is simple: living in the now is the truest path to happiness and enlightenment. Tolle’s clear writing, supportive voice, and enthusiasm make this an excellent manual for anyone who’s ever wondered what exactly “living in the now” means. Within a chapter of reading this book, readers are already holding the world in a different container–more conscious of how thoughts and emotions get in the way of their ability to live in genuine peace and happiness. – Pulled from Amazon.com description
* This post contains affiliate links to Amazon.com. If you purchase a product after clicking an affiliate link (and it doesn’t even need to be the product I’ve linked to), I receive a small percentage of the sale for referring you, at no extra cost to you.*
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What a beautiful story! You and your daughter sound marvellous!
Thank you and thanks for stopping by! 😊
I love this. So relatable, things don’t always turn out how we want them, but they turn out more perfect than we could imagine. Thanks for sharing.
What a “marvelous” story! 😉 I loved the game she initiated and how graceful and heartfelt your daughter is with her words, at five! Kids teach us and remind us of the most wonderful parts of life! Could’ve kept reading and reading!
LOL! Is that my typo you’re looking at? Oops! 😉
I love this post. I’m finding this to be true in my life too. It isn’t quite the way I thought it would be, but it is exactly what I need. You’re an excellent writer. 🙂
I love this! Your posts are always so encouraging to me.
Beautiful post! had me a little teary eyed with “nostalgia” thinking about my mom and I. My mom and dad divorced when I was four and she raised me on her own for awhile and I can say she was without a doubt my entire life. We also used to play a similar game with “I love you’s” and who loved each other more. 🙂
P.S. the power of now is one of my favorite books! so life changing.
xx
Stephanie
http://www.vimandvigor.blog
What a wonderful post! I love it. You should seriously consider writing that book. 🙂
Great story! Very powerful to other women and moms! Keep your head up, you’re doing fantastic!
What a great moment in your life shared so well! I hope I can say the same sort of things in a year after my divorce is finalized. For now I keep moving forward towards the things that seem to be planted in my new path in life.
– http://www.momentsformeonline.com
Well that was charming! Made me feel sad, then happy…. a rollercoaster of emotion! I love it. Zoey sounds like the sweetest nugget… and you can always revisit the children’s book idea!
You are a wonderful writer – so profound and beautiful. I especially loved this line: “The nostalgia wasn’t for something I’d once had, it was for something I’d once dreamed about.” I feel that way once in a while, when I compare the many things I’ve achieved to how I imagined they’d be when I was younger. I’m so happy for you that you’ve found your own kind of happiness, even if it’s not what you could have pictured – and your daughter is as profound as you are!
My life is so very far from what I planned. Most of the change I am happy about, but some of it is so hard that it feels like it may suffocate me at times. So needless to say, I very much needed this reminder to make peace with my now. Thank you for your profound and raw truth.
Wow, so beautiful! That moment with Zoey brought tears to my eyes. Just love this post and I agree, get to writing that book! 🙂
I love this SO much and can totally relate! I also love “Where you are right now is exactly where you’re supposed to be.” Great post!!
Great post! I have always wanted to read the book The Power of Now.
I just sobbed so hard. Thank you for writing this. My life has definitely taken a very different route than I anticipated- but the funny thing is, the core of what I wanted is there, just as it sounds you have realized. There are so many worries in a given day that I sometimes forget to enjoy the things that have gone exactly as I dreamed- even if they look a bit different, they’re real and tangible in every mess on the floor and every night feeding and every morning wake up, in all the dishes and tears and love and laughter that make this crappy little rental our home.
Isn’t it amazing how our children can bring us back to Earth? Kids don’t care about toys and “stuff” they care about us and our happiness and our lives together. They love with the purest, true heart. I loved this!! I love when my daughters tell me “love you more”
This really rings true today. It’s so refreshing and resetting to just stop and think about our plan b, and that it might all be just as wonderful as our plan A. Even if your plan B isn’t exactly like you pictured, it sounds pretty wonderful to me (and to your daughter!).
Even when my life is “good,” and appears well-planned to the outsider, I occasionally experience the same pangs. Things I’m disappointed in, that didn’t work out the way I’d dreamed they would. Taking a moment to be here and now doesn’t come naturally but when I remember it really gives me perspective.
I have read the power of now and it was a great book. I am going to go back and reread it this spring. Thank you for the reminders to take time and enjoy my peace filled life.
Making peace with where you are is one of the hardest things to do and accept. We instinctively are hard with ourselves – seeing things we ‘screwed up’, ways we could do better and a vision of where we should be that always seems to be just outside of our reach. This is a great read – Thank you for sharing!
Britt | http://alternativelyspeaking.ca/
Finding bliss and being happy with where you are at that moment in time makes all the difference…. I find it makes life much more relaxing and calm 🙂
This is so beautiful, thank you for sharing. Zoey sounds like such a sweet and special little girl, what some might call an old soul. It can be hard when our life doesn’t go as we planned or dreamed, but usually the reality is something that we wouldn’t want to trade.
This is absolutely beautiful. I often find myself comparing my life to the lives of others (or at least how I perceive the lives of others), and it’s totally not healthy. I think about things I may have done differently and where I’m at now. And I start to feel really discouraged. And then I look at my four year old and he says something that makes me remember where I am now is important. But it’s still a struggle.
This idea that life will bend and turn and put us in spots we don’t immediately identify as our place – this is what I wish I could convey to grads and anyone early in the journey. Only, there are no words that match the actual experience of thoughts while washing windows, then sharing that space with a child who can sum up our emotions like a champ.
I feel like I can’t fret over past innings that I didn’t do well in, or that didn’t turn out as planned, because there’s always this inning to contend with. It’s futile, also, to keep running from it. It’s human nature to need a break from all that strength and resolve, because it will tap your reserves.
So we pine. We stew. We have to look back on disappointments and consider what could have been, if we’re ever to appreciate the ground we now stand on. I see this so profoundly not only in Zoey’s wise words, but in the thoughts you had writing this post. Great courage and insight.