Storms Are Life

By: Elaine Fraser

For a long time it seemed to me that life was about to begin – real life. But there was always some obstacle in the way, something to be gotten through first, some unfinished business, time to still be served, a debt to be paid. Then life would begin. At last it dawned on me that these obstacles were my life. Alfred Souza

There’s no such thing as the perfect time.

When should I have children?
Should I change jobs right now?
Is it a good time to travel to New York?
Is it a good time to release my book?
Should I begin writing my book?

There’s no such thing as perfect at all.

There’s good timing, there’s amazing timing and there’s lucky timing, but there’s no perfect timing.

Sometimes we want all the ducks lined up in a row, all the papers laid out in neat piles on our desk, all the family members occupied doing something else, the sun shining and feeling like you can conquer the world before we begin. But, days like that rarely happen.

This week our washing machine died on our return from a holiday. It was also the day I began teaching a two-day writing retreat in my home and the week I was speaking at a women’s event. It’s nice to have clean clothes on weeks like that. Now, it’s not the end of the world. We took some of our dirty laundry over to my mother-in-law’s and she kindly ran it through her machine and even hung it out and folded it. We can access a laundrette if we need to. But sometimes it’s the straw that breaks the camel’s back.

Broken washing machines aside, there are storms in our lives right now. There are sources of anxiety, pain and disappointment that turn our lives into storms that prevent us from creating.

The best thing we can do is create through the storm.

When my mother died, I not only had grief to deal with, but I was executor of a flimsy will, my sister and I had to sort out mum’s possessions, I was working on a book release, a close friend was suffering from a permanent injury and the fallout of that, my husband was also releasing a book and we had to work on the launch. There was so much going on that I just wanted to hide under the covers. I didn’t even have time to grieve because so much was happening.

However, that’s life isn’t it? Life happens and we have to deal with it. I’ve found that pushing through the grief, the pain, the storms, and continuing to create has helped me immensely. Storms don’t stop your life, they are part and parcel of your life.

I’ve learned that no matter what happens, or how bad it seems today, life does go on, and it will be better tomorrow. I’ve learned that you can tell a lot about a person by the way he/she handles these three things: a rainy day, lost luggage, and tangled Christmas tree lights. – Maya Angelou

Article supplied with thanks to Elaine Fraser, a teacher, mentor and author from Perth WA.