surrender-ing

The nice thing about not letting my mind get clouded with the incessant chatter of toxic media is spending my evenings with my own thoughts. Some might argue that I spend plenty of time thinking about myself already and don't need any encouragement, but I'm ignoring them right now, too.

I write every morning. I wake up ridiculously early to do so, with a routine that doesn't vary much. Hit the the alarm, brew the coffee, march back up to bed with the coffee, nestle in and begin scribbling away in my notebook. It isn't crafty or concrete or literary writing. It's dumb stuff about what's going on in my life, what I'm feeling about it, and what I plan to do next.

You know what they say, though. When we plan, God laughs.

I've got what has been called a "rich and textured inner life" that can seem as real to me as my actual experiences, and that is where my planning happens. If this, then that. When one person does this thing, that means such and so will happen and then what will I do? Since I was raised by a family of worry-ers, it has taken me leagues of practice to learn how to not write myself into a big fussy mess about something I can neither predict nor control. Who doesn't have the instinct to not worry over something that seems incomplete? If it's you, I'll buy you a cup of coffee for a concrete explanation of detachment and balance in daily life.

In any case, the desire to feel safe, to be in some kind of control of what is coming, to not feel like a beach ball tossed into an often stormy tide comes out strong and proud in my writing every day. The idea that I should be able to do something MORE about this than I'm already doing hits. And I write myself in circles trying to figure it out. In a journal that no one will see but me.

But then I remember that I am doing enough. I'm doing fine. I have everything I need and nobody knows what is coming next. As much as I'd like to have a map, there isn't one detailed enough for my inherent appreciation of clear and precise planning.

So today, my thought is to surrender. To God or to the Universe or to whatever Power Greater Than Myself is out there with an understanding about what things are going to happen next. Today, I'm giving all of my longing and my fear and my uncertainty to that power -- along with all of my trust that something good is bound to happen.

I've been incredibly lucky in this life -- I've got a great education, a reasonable amount of talent and not-too-unfortunate looks, a job that I absolutely love most days (with the exception of paperwork, which is a drag, but whatever), and more friends than I've ever had in my life. I have a spiritual community that welcomes me no matter what. I have the amazing privilege of being able to shut out the war and the famine and racism and suicide and even elections for a week or more without it causing any significant impact on my life. There are a million little ways that I've got it good and sometimes I wonder if I'm so comfortable, complaining seems like the only way to let off steam. Because as a human being, the steam is there no matter what. That's just the way it is.

My desire to know what's next, who's next, and when is just greediness. It feeds my curiosity as a writer and drives me to chip away at my past for answers, for patterns, and for clues about what might happen after this thing that is happening now. It pushes my buttons and fuels my seeking. If having too much time to think is my problem, I've got it really, amazingly, fortunately, luckily, gratefully good.

Today, I let go of all the little things that I don't know. I surrender my desire to know what's next and affirm again to the world that I want to write for others, not just for me. I'm picking up my book again, dusting off the notes and I'm going to write the new draft by the end of this winter. Michele Campbell is going to have a book out, come hell or high water, because that is something she can DO with all this thinking. And it's gonna be a damn fine book.

Just you wait and see.