Time is such an illusion.  Moments that test us feel like an eternity while moments spent in joy pass in a blink.  We pass the days doing the same things over and over again, repeating the same routines, begging and searching for things to change only to wake up one day and find years have passed, wishing we could have done something different, wondering how everything stayed the same yet is so different.  How we begin and when things happen often isn’t up to us.  Following my Yellowstone kick, Luke Grimes is 41 and didn’t get married until he was 34 and had his first kid at 40—and he has been acting for over 20 years and is now enjoying the spoils of it. He didn’t stay in Hollywood, he moved to Montana.  Taylor Sheridan is 55-ish and he says he got kicked out of multiple schools until he saw Lonesome Dove and didn’t hit success with Yellowstone and spinoffs until just a few years ago.  Demi Moore is 60 and has been acting for 40 yeas and just won her first award.  Vera Wang didn’t start designing dresses until 40.  Tabitha Brown found her groove with food, children’s shows, and writing at 43.  JK Rowling was on welfare and didn’t hit success with Harry Poter until her 30s.  Harrison Ford was a carpenter, Ken Jeong was a doctor, Samuel L. Jackson didn’t start acting until his 40s.  There are infinite more examples of this in the world.  So as I’m starting over again at 41, tackling my health, sanity, career, goals, priorities, and confidence, I find myself in good company.    

None of the people listed above were an overnight success at 20something.  There was a significant portion of life spent trying to figure it out, waiting for things to happen, waiting for them to unfold.  I’m sure there were many nights begging for things to happen, hoping against hope that things would turn out.  From my side, this journey has been a little bit more convoluted to get here than I thought it would, but it has been amazing and knowing that some of the most brilliant minds in the world took the long way as well, that there is amazing work done by people who have started the greatest part of their journey at what some would consider a later part of their lives.  It means there is hope for all of us.  We aren’t all meant to peak at 20 and life isn’t over at 25.  There is a whole lot of life and love to have well beyond those years.  For the portion of our lives that we spend after those early years, we sure do put a lot of emphasis and pressure on finding ourselves young and making a name young.  Sure, it’s nice to secure our identities early and know exactly who we are and what we want to do.  But there is real value in discovering and starting again with intent no matter when it is or how many attempts it takes.  There is value in learning and exploring.  We don’t need to be a certain thing by any point in our lives.  We just need to be who we are and allow.  We need to allow the life we want to unfold as it is meant to happen. Say yes and the right things will find us. 

So this is a reminder, perhaps just as much for myself, that Just because it isn’t happening right this second doesn’t mean it won’t happen. I tried to go for a new 9-5 dozens of times, tried with a particular department upwards of a dozen times itself.  I made it far a few times thinking those were the moments of change, only to not have it pan out.  And now that I am on the precipice of something bigger in my life, the timing has proven right to allow for that change to happen.  It looks entirely different than I thought it would and I feel different than I thought I would, but I’m ready.  Sure, I could be upset about things not happening sooner or not in the way I wanted them to.  Or I can accept where I’m at and be grateful that these dreams are finally revealing themselves and coming into fruition.  Having that dream realized now is no less sweet than it would have been if I had gotten it 10 years ago. 10 years ago I wasn’t entirely sure what I wanted and I certainly didn’t believe in what I was capable of.  I had a vague idea of it, but I never did anything about it.  I think the most important lesson in all that is learning to get out of our own way.  Had I not been so stubborn and demanding of the timing and place and the how of things happening, I may have learned these things sooner—but the truth is it doesn’t matter.  It’s here now and the fruit is still as delicious as it would have been.  It always bothered me when things didn’t happen sooner because I wanted to relish in the joy of something longer.  I wanted the good to last longer.  But no matter how much time we have doing specifically what we want, it doesn’t take away from the joy we can have doing other things while we are on the journey.