Day 8: No one is falling behind

Last night, I lay in bed frustrated that I hadn’t written anything yesterday and was falling behind on my self-imposed deadline. Falling behind on a project I started with the goal of writing freely, without the pressure of distributing everything to a mailing list.

Falling behind. The phrase carries the image of a race for me. I imagine a jockey on a horse, leaning forward, straining, whipping and urging the horse forward, only to watch another racer pass by.

Exactly who is passing me? How am I falling behind? It makes absolutely no sense in this project.

Maybe some days I will write three posts. I hope most days I will write one. Maybe another day I will catch up.

There is no falling. There is no behind.

Such is the gift of aging. We begin to realize that the race we have been running was a cultural story designed to keep us straining forward, always trying to win.

But at almost 68, I am pushing back against that metaphor.

I am not falling behind.

I’m resting.

I am not in a race.

I’m doing things in harmony with my whole system.