Tag: life

Look Up

carissaricci

Instead of letting the difficult parts of life harden us, what if we let them soften us even further? To love more deeply. Live with more vitality. And embrace the fullness of the human experience—from the heartbreaking to the divinely joyous.

So much of my life, I’ve felt like I’ve been huddled in a ball, white knuckling it through life. Staying “heads down” and focused on the goals I’ve set for myself. Trying to protect myself. Surviving.

In more recent years, I’ve experimented with a different approach. Instead of trying to avoid the things that hurt, I allowed them to be.1 What if we did that more often? Sit with the joy and the pain. Make friends with all the pieces and parts. Instead of a “heads down” approach to life, what if we had a “look up” approach? Look up to connect with others. To engage with what makes life meaningful—the easy, the difficult, and everything in between. To look up in appreciation at the night sky for the beauty and perspective it offers.

The inspiration for this experimentation was Andrea Gibson—one of my favorite humans and an incredible poet who recently passed. The way they saw the world has been life changing for me and for so many. Their ideas about our relationship with ALL the things this human experience offers—not just the pleasant ones—shifted my view on what it means to be fully alive.

Some of my favorite quotes of theirs are:

“When nothing softens the grief, may grief soften me.”

“Just to be clear, I don’t want to get out without a broken heart. I intend to leave this life so shattered there better be a thousand separate heavens for all my flying parts.”

“In the end, I want my heart to be covered in stretch marks.”

All that to say…if you haven’t ever read their work, now is the time.2

Watching how they lived their life, I’m reminded that I can control nothing that happens outside of myself. But internally? I can make choices about how I react, respond, and how I show up in the world. How I treat myself. How I talk to myself. How I engage with others. How much I choose to open my heart. What I let in. What I shut out. How I view joy. How I view pain. How I heal.

Elizabeth Gilbert once talked about how “the most peaceful and wise people are the ones who have created enough internal space to be able to allow all the parts of themselves to coexist despite the contradictions. They have room for their creativity…they also have room for their fear. They have room for their dignity…they also have room for their shame. They have room for the parts of themselves that are glorious and divine and wonderful…and they have room for the parts of themselves that are petty and jealous and ridiculous. They create this huge auditorium of a landscape inside themselves. They don’t kick any parts out. Because guess what? You can’t.”

Contradictions can coexist.

Let’s be real. This world we’re living in right now? It’s completely bananas. As we navigate this rollercoaster of life with all its unknowns and so many things out of our control, these two humans have taught me so much. That contradictions can coexist and that there’s a form of peace that comes when we allow the complexities and layers to all be true at the same time. That doesn’t mean we don’t learn, grow, and continue to make adjustments in how we show up and approach life, but it can help us stay grounded in the turbulence.

The goal? To get to a place where we realize that to shut ourselves down and check out is the ultimate tragedy. To have a heart lined with stretch marks indicates a life truly lived where we get to experience the full spectrum of what it means to be human.

Whenever the day comes when I pass on to my next adventure, I want to know that I’m leaving with a heart that was soft and open. That I was willing to bear some scars and not just tolerate them but celebrate them as part of what it means to have been here. I want to know that I loved more deeply than I thought possible and refused to turn my shoulder or close my eyes to all the pain in the world just because it was uncomfortable. I want to have been a safe harbor for others. A friend who would sit with you in the dark as well as share your joy. An adventurer…willing to take risks for the sake of experiencing something real and true.

As we make our way through whatever is next in these coming years, let’s not forget to look up. Connect with each other deeply. Make room for all the parts of ourselves. Talk about the hard stuff. The real stuff. The stuff that doesn’t make sense. The stuff that makes your heart sink. Be there in the dark with others who are trying to make their way through, too.

And as we take care of each other, be sure to take care yourself as well. Look up at the night sky and take some deep breaths to get perspective. Hydrate. Nap. Recharge. Go for a hike. Read a book. Do a few rounds of box breathing. Call your bestie. Whatever lights you up…find those good moments.

And in the wise words of Andrea:

Never forget that it is possible to cry and sing at the top of your lungs at the same time.

As a tribute to this incredible human, let’s stretch our hearts and go cry and sing our way into whatever comes next. I’ll bring the tissues and the tunes for anyone who wants to join me.

1An important side note is to make sure we’re taking care of ourselves when we do this. Compassion fatigue is real and feeling numb is a sign to recharge.

2You can find their website here and their Substack page here.

Mid-Life Musings

carissaricci

I’m at the stage in my life where I’ve been expecting the dreaded “mid-life crisis” to rear its ugly head. For the record, I haven’t yet dyed my hair, purchased an expensive vehicle, or run away to Vermont in search of a Hallmark-movie-worthy lumberjack decked out in some sort of plaid flannel.1 (If I do, you’ll be the first to know.)

I’ve decided to take a different approach to this season of my life. Am I doing things some people might think are out of the ordinary? Absolutely. This is the time for big change. But I’m not doing it to distract myself from the reality of my own mortality or to run from the inevitable. I’m making some bold decisions in service of running toward what feels most right for me—something I’ve neglected to do for a large portion of my life and which I’m no longer willing to do.

I was recently in a conversation with someone and started a sentence with, “I’ve never really been much of a risk taker…” to which she interrupted me with a laugh. And then said, “You’ve taken more risks in the last few years than I’ve taken in my entire life, so I think you need to stop saying that.” It was a stark reminder for me about how we see ourselves and how we often hold on to old ideas about who we are. I’ve never seen myself as a risk taker, and to be honest, I wasn’t in my younger years. This friend has only known me in what I’m calling “Phase 2” of my life and it got me thinking…it might be time for a rewrite of the story I’ve been telling myself about who I am—to adjust the narrative and step into who I am today.

As I’ve been talking to various people in my life, it seems that many of us are in a time of major transition. Exploring difficult questions. Making hard choices. Closing the doors on previous chapters so we can flip the page on new ones. All of those things can feel overwhelming and BIG. My hope for us is that we start thinking about this phase of our lives a bit differently. Rather than diving headfirst into crisis-mode, what if we took this as an opportunity to reevaluate? To take an unapologetically honest look at our lives and identify what still fits and what needs to change.

The truth is, once you have that realization, you can’t unsee it—and it requires you to make the call between staying stationary or making your way down a new path.

Pre-Phase 2, I was keeping myself in situations that were unhealthy and where I couldn’t bring my fullest and truest self. I had tricked myself into thinking I was “stuck”, but the reality was that I was the one keeping myself stuck. Sometimes, I didn’t want to admit to myself that I was in the driver’s seat of my life. That I had choices…even if they felt impossible to consider and insurmountable to make.

Once I acknowledged this, though, it meant that I was responsible for either keeping myself in those situations or choosing another option (which usually felt like the scarier of the roads). But the truth is, once you have that realization, you can’t unsee it—and it requires you to make the call between staying stationary or making your way down a new path.

Staring down the barrel of another cold, dark, and wet winter in the Pacific Northwest, I decided to follow the sun2 and booked an Airbnb somewhere warm for a few months. I hesitated right before I confirmed it—I wasn’t sure how my dog was going to do being away from home for that long. In chatting with a friend and sharing that concern, she said, “What if she thrives being on the road with you and being somewhere warmer?” Once again, I was being challenged to question my default assumptions and confront myself with a familiar inquiry: “Am I looking for reasons to keep myself stuck in what feels comfortable even if it’s not honoring what I feel called to do?”

So, I decided to take the plunge. And guess what? My dog is doing better here. She’s acting like she did when she was two or three years younger—more energy, better sleep, less pain. And I’m feeling similarly.

Feeling the warmth on a sunset walk

Some of the biggest leaps I’ve taken have resulted in some of the best experiences I’ve had, reminding me to keep going—urging me on. To try new things. To persist. To run after what feels right.

To honor these major transitions that many of us are navigating, I’d like to propose a change in terminology for the “mid-life crisis”. I want us to think of it more as a mid-life awakening. A time for us to take stock of all the things that got us here. All the things that make us who we are. What lights us up. What propels us forward. What dreams are still unfulfilled. And then I want us to relentlessly run after all of it—full out. Yes, our time here is limited. But instead of that scaring us into distractions and denial, let’s allow it to strip away the things that have been holding us back so we can step into this next phase as fully alive as we can possibly be.

When I look back on my life, I want to know that I honored that call…even if I had to let fear come along for the ride. If you’re in a similar spot, take some deep breaths. Remember everything you’ve survived to get here and stand firm in the knowledge that we can do scary things.

Let’s embrace the awakening—it’s here to help us find our way to what is most resonant for each of us. I know it might be easier to just dye our hair purple and jet off to a quaint town in search of someone who can teach us how to tap a tree…but will that really satisfy what our soul craves? I want to challenge us to run toward what lights us up instead of away from what feels daunting.

Am I scared? You bet. But I’m going to keep going anyway. If you want to join me, consider this an open invitation. We ride at dawn.

1 I’m not a fan of Hallmark Christmas movies (no judgment if you are), but if you’re in the same boat and are ever in a situation where you are subjected to a Hallmark movie watch party against your will, Google “Hallmark Movie Bingo” and play along to entertain yourself for that hour and a half of your life that you’re never getting back.

2 Give Follow the Sun by Xavier Rudd a listen for some inspiration and good vibes.

Soul Friends

carissaricci

“Is it going to be awkward?”

“What will I say?”

“What if she doesn’t like me once we hang out in person?”

These thoughts were flying through my head—as quickly as the plane I was on—as I made my way across the country to see my best friend for the first time. She and I had met through a pen-pal program when we were 8 years old. After countless letters and phone calls, the day had finally arrived…now at 16, I was headed out to her family home.

After the first few minutes of “I can’t believe it’s really YOU!”, we settled into our comfortable rhythm. We did what most teenagers do—ate junk food, stayed up way too late talking and giggling into the wee hours of the morning, and tooling around her quaint country hometown. After a couple of weeks, an irrevocable bond had been strengthened. Her family had become my family…and the rest is history.

Soul friends have a way of helping you from one side of the river to the other.

For those of you who know me well, you know of whom I speak. For those that don’t, here’s all you need to know: she is the most important human in my life. My person. My ride or die. We joke that when we get older, we’re going to move in together and live out our final years in each other’s company. I have no doubt that we’re going to have a rip-roaring good time until the very end. 

Our connection started early—almost instantly. We both loved reading books. And when I say we both loved reading books, I mean A LOT. Our letters were chock full of reading recommendations. We talked about our families. Our friends. As we got older, we started sharing more of the real things. Dreams. Love. Heartbreak. Big changes. Loss. Triumphs. Fears. Joys. Life. 

Every so often, we talk about how rare connections like ours are. When you feel as if a string is connected from your soul to theirs. When you don’t have to ask how they’re feeling because you just know. 

On my last visit, she was getting a couple of her kids situated in the car. It wasn’t quite going to plan. I was sitting in the passenger seat, and she looked over at me with a knowing glance. I looked back with an equally knowing glance, and she said “See? This is why we’re friends. You know exactly what I’m thinking right now and I don’t have to say a word.” And then we laughed as we pulled out of the parking lot. 

That moment when it hits you—the feeling like you’ve known them in another life or something.

There is such comfort in our friendship. Whenever I’m around her, I feel like I can finally exhale. I feel safe, seen, held, and loved—simply because of her existence in the world. I can be fully myself. No judgment. What a lucky woman I am…and what a gift to have been given.

There have only been a couple of other times when I have felt that type of deep soul connection with someone. That moment when it hits you—the feeling like you’ve known them in another life or something. You’re seeing directly into their heart as they’re looking into yours. No filter. No pretense. Just depth. And realness. And a connection so strong, you almost can’t believe it exists.

Friendship isn’t a big thing.
It’s a million little things.

Becca Anderson

If you find those soul friends, cherish every moment with them. They don’t come around very often and you never know how long you’ll have with them when they do. From the 5-minute conversations as one (or both) of you are running errands, to the week-long visits—every moment counts. 

Often, we think that friendship needs to be this big, grand thing, but the truth is that “Friendship isn’t a big thing. It’s a million little things.” (Becca Anderson)1 

The soul friendships I’ve been lucky enough to find have not only helped me feel deeply connected to something bigger, but have also helped me find my way. 

While Stephen Cope2 talks about many different types of soul friends—this definition is the most resonant for me:

“They have been irreplaceable companions as you’ve worked your way up the path toward an understanding of the meaning of your life. They’ve shared your struggles to understand, to make meaning, to express and fulfill your true self, and to see into the depths of your soul. They have become conscious partners and allies in your search for an authentic and fulfilled life.”

I couldn’t have said it better. 

A huge thank you to all of my soul friends—without you, I wouldn’t be me. You have shaped my experience. Held space for me. Seen me. Loved me. Celebrated with me in the high moments—and sat with me in my darkest days. What an honor it is to be in true connection with you.3

Cheers to the million little things we’ve shared so far…and the million little things to come. I wouldn’t want to do life any other way.

1 Need a good cry? Watch A Million Little Things.

2 If the topic of Soul Friends interests you, check out this book. It provides a fascinating look at all of the different types of soul friendships you might encounter.

3 If you have a soul friend (or two), this is your sign to call them. Or text them. Or just send them a little love.