What to do when the other shoe drops.

"The other shoe dropped — now what?"

A little over two weeks ago, I got yelled at.

By a fellow adult.

The TLDR version is that my landlord was upset about a mishap with my rent check — I offered her a variety of options to make the situation right, yet none of them were acceptable to her.

(You can read the full story here.)

The next two weeks were spent doing everything I could to fix it.

Then, on my birthday, at the top of a mountain, I turned on my phone for just a moment to pull up my Apple Pay to buy something at Glacier's Granite Chalet and the first message that popped up?

"What is the status of my late rent check."

I took a deep breath. Texted my landlord back that I'd already worked everything out with her property management company and she could contact them directly. I also let her know it was my birthday. Then, I saw a bunch of other bday texts from through before I turned off my phone...

And walked.

And thought.

And walked.

And thought.

By the time I got to the bottom of the hike, 12 miles later, I found myself in a weird state: resignation + peace.

My entire life has been spent in a state of fear — I've perpetually waited for the other shoe to drop.

It first started at home, watching my parents rage at each other, fighting until something broke (either materially or spiritually). When they couldn't find enough release with their emotional eruptions, they turned to us.

We were easy targets.

Four young children raised by broken adults.

My young mind developed a warped emotional intelligence: if I could be perfect, then I could reduce the chances of anyone losing their sh*t at me.

Spoiler alert: they still lost their sh*t on me.

The hardship in growing up in environments like that is that early coping mechanisms are hard to stop. For decades, I kept trying to organize my outside environment, relationships, and appearance so that my insides could feel safe, steady, and orderly.

But this recent incident with my landlord? It broke the lie.

I finally "got it" that it doesn't matter if I try to be "perfect." I will never ever be able to control external circumstances. Or people.

There will always be unknowns.

There will always be people living out their own stories that have nothing to do with me, yet I may still be caught in the fray.

There will never be an "A + B = C Guarantee" in life.

Instead, it's more like alphabet soup.

I finally "got it" that there's no reason for me to put all this extraneous pressure on myself to always do right, to never make a mistake, to keep it all together. I can do everything "right" and life will continue to happen.

The difference now is that I'm not a little girl of 10.

I'm a grown woman of 46.

I have different resources, people in my corner, and healthy outlets to not only feel protected but also to serve as a check-and-balance, so I know what's "true" for me to own — and what I can leave out for someone else to pick up by the curb when they're ready.

Towards the end of my hike, I realized something else.

If crappy moments like this can unexpectedly happen, the converse is also true.

Wildly magnificent amazing moments can happen, too.

Unexpected gifts.

Unexpected blessings.

Unexpected moments of kindness and generosity.

I choose those unexpected moments.

I'm about to present a workshop on creating Visionary Visibility for women entrepreneurs of color — the thing I most underscore is that your mindset is the bedrock of everything.

Believe in the good, you will have good.

Believe you're at the whim of the world, you'll have a difficult time finding your footing.

I often repeat the mantra, "Everything is working out for me — even if I can't see it in the moment."

What about you? What do you believe?

Sending lots of love,

Judy

P.S. We're looking for new case study clients! My team and I are focusing more on metrics. If you'd like to be one of our new clients who we help build into our next success story, book a free brand assessment call here.