Keep Showing Up
Embarrassing stories and how to fail forward
When I was a senior in high school, I told my career counselor that I didn’t need to apply for college because I was in a worship band and we were going on tour.
In my defense, I was dating the world's greatest musician at the time and we (he) had big plans. Big. What else was a teenage girl to do but follow her owner around, wagging her tail and barking loudly?
I still remember sitting in the career counselor’s office, staring out the window, thinking about how cool my life on the road was going to be - while he droned on about how I could probably get into UCLA with my GPA and that maybe it would be a good fall back plan if this whole “band thing” didn't work out. (To be fair, it was southern California, so I couldn’t have possibly been the only student to regale him with their dreams of going on tour with a band - maybe the only one in a worship band, but whatever.)
I don’t remember anything else about that meeting because I had already made up my mind about college and wasn’t listening to anything he was saying.
Now I don’t want to set you up just to bring you down, but - spoiler alert - I did not go on tour.
I fucked around for a semester and then went to community college (as an aside, I enrolled as an English major because I WAS GOING TO BE A WRITER!!!!! When I took Creative Writing and realized the whole class was a glorified book club, I knew I was in the right place). I also got engaged to the world's greatest musician (who was, at that point, also not on tour but working at Del Taco). Then I got unengaged from said musician. I also got unenrolled from community college.
I have often imagined my career counselor pouring back his fifth drink of the night, laughing at how this stupid kid thinks she’s going “on tour with her worship band”. I’ve also imagined getting into UCLA and running over the world’s greatest musician with my two-toned, red-ish Toyota Tercell (that car was a real thrill).
I take solace in the fact that my prefrontal cortex was not fully developed at the time and I could not have possibly figured out that all of my choices were, well… obviously completely asinine. But hey, retrospect is 20/20 (I mean, is it though? I don’t know. I’ve worn glasses since I was 10 years old, so what do I know?)
I was pretty good at spiritualizing things back then though (hence the worship band) and convinced myself that since the ‘ol college door kept closing on me (definitely not because I kept closing it on myself) that god must be leading me into the family business - the Christian church ministry.
Yep, I’m a pastor’s kid (praise be) and I was really good at church. So I did that until I had a complete mental breakdown (shocker) and took a little self-imposed hiatus to write silly little poems. Then I went back to the church because he promised it would be better this time, but that’s a story for another lifetime. For now, let’s just focus on my still-not-fully-formed prefrontal cortex.
I really hit my stride when I moved to the Pacific Northwest and discovered weed, hippies, and reggae. (Full disclosure: I was already well acquainted with reggae music because what kind of almost musician’s wife would I be otherwise? But the weed and hippies really brought the whole trifecta to life.) I got a job at a local insurance office so I could afford my new free spirited lifestyle. It was very business-in-the-front-party-in-back.
By this time, my prefrontal cortex was showing signs of life. I was still making completely asinine decisions but I was, at least, failing forward. I had completed my Bachelors degree through piece mealing together bits of community college, night classes, and online courses. I went with a Communications degree because I felt like it sounded legit enough to cover up the fact that I still just wanted to be a writer.
This is the part where I tell you I met the man of my dreams, got married, had kids, and wrote a New York Times bestseller. And that if I could do it, so can you.
I mean, I did actually get married and have kids. But it also involved a global pandemic, raging postpartum depression, and a cross country move in the middle of both. And while I did do some social media writing (yes, that’s a thing) for a fancy yoga company, there’s still no bestseller with my name on it.
But lucky for you, there’s Substack! And I’m still here trying to put words on the page as often as I can because as much of a struggle as it is for me to get here, it’s still all I really ever want to do.
So maybe if I’m still here trying … so can you? Let’s keep showing up, okay? Because I think, in this life, sometimes that’s all you can do. And sometimes, that’s the greatest thing of all.
Footnotes:
I was really struggling with why it’s been so hard lately to show up for the one thing I really want to do and then I read these two bad ass writers and felt like 39% better about myself. You should read it, too.