The Unforgiving Mile: Living with Intention

We close on the sale of our home today. It’s been a flurry of activity trying to move a home into two apartments, but it’s also the purging of a life that once was.

I was ok, until I went into my daughter’s bedroom. The bare walls, the outlines of where her art used to be. Stains from art activities on the carpet, leftover stickers. Flashes of what was supposed to have been. Family trips, watching her have sleep overs. Christmases and Hannukahs, dinner parties, birthday parties. We knew that this house wasn’t going to be our forever, but we thought we were forever.

Walking through the house, I saw the scars, too. The warning signs. The separate lives we lived, and the rooms we occupied. Ghosts of fights and bickering at each other while we tried to put her to bed. Projects started and never completed. Fits and starts of trying to find happiness in a situation that was never going to provide that for us.

The sale of this house is the end of what I thought my story was going to be. The future is wide open and it’s scary. It seems ironic that the sale of the house, my first “post separation break up” so to speak, and further discussions of divorce are all happening just as I turn 39. It feels a little like the universe is recognizing that I am entering a new decade and it’s time to adjust course. A purging, if you will.

I’ve always been a bit more aware of mortality and time than the average person because my dad was diagnosed with COPD when I was 5. He died when I was 29, but he spent my whole life essentially dying – not living. I’ve always felt the need to live big because time is finite.

That living was chaotic, though. Let me do whatever comes my way! What if I don’t have time to do everything? The fear of missing out haunted me. I lived in chaos and most of the time, things worked out.

Until they didn't.

I’m realizing that my energy is now more finite. My options are different. I wouldn’t say that I have fewer options, but they’re different and they carry greater weight than they did when I was in my 20s. Decisions carry greater weight, and it’s not just me that my decisions impact. The chaos approach is no longer serving me.

I did this with work for a long time. I took every opportunity that came my way. I have burned out many times and am starting over yet again. Now, I’m working on being more selective with my time. I don’t have to choose to kill myself for survival anymore. I can choose projects that bring me satisfaction and joy.

I choose to be more present for my daughter. I’ve spent the majority of her life depressed, resentful, angry. I will do and be better for her, and that means I have to have energy left to give her.

When I was in my 20s, casual experiences with men were fine. Fun! Exciting. No stress. Now, it feels different. The vast majority of people are looking for someone to experience life with. I need to have experiences, but do I need to try everything that comes my way anymore?

I went on a date a few months ago with someone who was obviously not a good fit, but when we had that talk I just saw him deflate. He shared with me his exhaustion of trying to find someone to love and be with, and how sad he was that it was another failed date.

I started to realize a few weeks ago that the situation I was in was starting to run its course on my end because I realized that despite the feelings I had for the man I was seeing, I wasn’t ready. I would say to myself out loud (and to my friends,) “I’m not ready for this. I’m not ready for this.” I had said to myself, “if the perfect man for me walked through the door tomorrow, I still wouldn’t want to be in a relationship.” I, yet again, hadn't prepared.

I wasn’t enjoying any aspect of texting, messaging, matching, and I had no desire to meet anyone new. I didn’t have the energy. I also reflected on how by being in the dating pool when I wasn’t ready to commit to someone, I was causing harm. I didn’t belong there. I pulled myself off the apps and recommitted to my other goals, which were some of the reasons I had left my marriage – like focusing on work, my daughter, my own health. I let the “roster” dwindle. I wasn’t ready to say goodbye to the man I had spent the most time and energy on because I really did feel strongly for him, but I think a part of me knew it was coming. The next step would have required investment and a commitment, and I knew I didn’t have it to give. I shut down.

This was confirmed when I asked my therapist about when you know it’s time to commit to someone. I expected her to say something about them, but she said to me, “When that person is 20% of your pie. You aren’t at the point where your own life is 80% of the pie.”

My ex and I had a long conversation yesterday about when we should have broken up, and we ultimately arrived at the conclusion that it probably should have been about a year and a half in. We were together 16 years. We didn’t have the same goals, the same work ethic, and while we shared many of the same values, our fundamental differences were always a push against each other. I realize now that caused friction in our ability to be intimate in many ways, and that ultimately caused him harm. It took so much unpacking to finally get to the core that we, at 23 and 21, rushed into our relationship before we knew who we were or what we wanted.

I know now that when it comes to love, I am clearly ultimately seeking a soft place to land, where I can open up and be my true self realized that I want a slow, connected, committed, intentional, intimate kind of love where someone finally knows how to love me and we can invest that love into each other. Where I can let down my walls, feel safe and protected. Be with someone who knows that despite my desperate independence and self-reliance, that sometimes I just want to be held and know that I am safe. I want more intention in the way I conduct my relationships.

I reached out to a man I had been out with a few times and told him that while I appreciated the time we had spent together, I wasn’t in a place to have anything more with anyone than a friendship. He said he appreciated the honesty, and he was looking for dating relationships and didn’t have the time to invest in new friendships. It was a very kind and respectful conversation but again, reinforcement that we need to choose what we want to invest our finite energy into.

All of these stories are funneling into an obvious need to be more intentional about the way that I spend my time. To milk every minute that I have on this earth doing the things that provide me with the most contentedness, joy, and satisfaction. It will make it that much easier to do the things that I don’t necessarily want to do, but need to do, to achieve the dreams and goals I now have the opportunity and means to pursue.

I need to take this as an opportunity so that rather than hide and protect myself from the possibility of pain, I am ready for when the opportunity arises for love, or a new work opportunity, or a new friendship. I need to be available for my sweet girl and give her everything I didn’t have.

I am appreciating the need and my desire for intentionality at this point in my life. Chaos no longer serves me. Perhaps this is what the sound bites about “love yourself first” and “do all things with love” really mean.

I ask you, is there something you can do with more intention? Allow things in your life to be more satisfying? I don’t know if I’d call it simplifying so much as being intentional with your time, energy, and love.

I'm not saying that I'm going to plan every second of my life (I mean, I am still me, a bit of chaos and spontaneous fun). I'm not saying that at all for you, either. But perhaps a little bit of a plan here and there wouldn't hurt, so that I am ready and open, and have the bandwith, for opportunities I want when they come my way.

Goodbye, old house, and goodbye, old life. Thank you for the lessons you’ve taught me. To quote Kipling, “If you can fill the unforgiving minute with sixty seconds' worth of distance run, yours is the earth and everything in it.” Fill your seconds with what matters, because that is truly all we get. I am ready to begin my next decade on this floating ball of water with intention. Well, tomorrow. Today, I'm grabbing a drink with my ex to celebrate our new chapter(s).