Last week was a phoenix week, and, boy, the phoenix does not fuck around.
It felt like everything was being torched into oblivion: my family, my business, my bank account, my relationship, my energy, even my car.
Burn, baby, burn.
What I’ve noticed about those deeply uncomfortable, everything-is-disintegrating times is that, once you give up the illusion that you have any say in your life whatsoever and breathe through every awful feeling - sometimes that's when you get the biggest breakthroughs.
My week featured exhaustion, being ready to throw in the towel on this business I love, knowing a final breakup was imminent, bad-news-of-the-your-car-is-dead variety, shooters in my town, and my bank account yelling code red before gasping and dying a pitiful death.
All I could do was throw up my hands and surrender. By Tuesday, I was still clinging to my shreds of control. By Thursday afternoon, I had given up completely.
By Saturday? It felt like everything had shifted. Even my car was revived.
Sometimes when you let your life burn to the ground, you create space for rebirth.
It’s not comfortable. In fact, it’s downright terrifying. It feels like everything I depended on for stability, for safety, was crashing down around my ears.
In these moments, the world is asking you to trust, to let go of control. Mostly by wresting away the illusion that you ever had control.
Trust becomes the only option if you don’t want to a) find yourself rocking in the fetal position or b) hitch a ride with the first spaceship off this planet. (Sometimes you rock in the fetal position anyway because that's the only option.)
When you trust, when you truly surrender - maybe in a way you’ve never surrendered before - something opens up.
My whole life shifted in a day. I even got my beloved car back.
Sometimes the best thing you can do is let it all burn, knowing that you are safe, you are supported, no matter what it looks or feels like in the moment.
As humans, we have a limited perspective. We can't see the path ahead of us. The path behind us is littered with false beliefs and skewed memories and wounded stories. All we have is the present moment.
When I remember to step out of my head and just breathe through whatever's happening, with curiosity and faith that everything will ultimately be okay, that gives life just enough room to cough up some magic.
Then you get to stand on a mountaintop, spread your arms in triumph, because you are a goddamn phoenix rising.
Also, you still have a car.