Escapism, Illness, & Finding Presence
As a leadership presence coach, I help people experience the fullness of the moment and the vastness of their potential in it.
I didn't always see value in the present moment. In fact, I spent most of my life running from the past, to the imaginary future. In college I would read books on the elliptical.
And so, when in early 20s I decided to move across the country from New York to LA to fulfill my destiny as a famous actress, I did so like I did everything: I ran.
Working for the family business, I told my mother slash boss: I’m leaving and will be working virtually- with no regard for the emotional or logistical effects of my choice.
I arrived in LA and didn’t stop. Straight from the airport: The first car I looked at- I leased, the fist apartment I saw- I moved into.
Within a few days, I was in an acting showcase meeting a slew of the most influential industry folks in LA, because of course I was ready to make my best first impression.
I was also doing something I’d habitually done to avoid facing the moment: Over exercising. If I could be the fittest, I could be the best! At what though? A question I was avoiding.
In perpetual motion, I was avoiding all of the real questions:
Like... "What am I running from?" "Where do I think I'm running to?"
What we avoid, life has a tricky way of forcing us to confront.
Within 3 weeks, I’d torn my meniscus and was stuck on the couch recovering from surgery.
Here I was, asking my new roommate to get me groceries. I felt a deep loneliness. I saw now how I hadn’t cultivated community- only people who I made sure saw me as a winner. No friends or family in a new city, hour by hour with myself, I started to feel sick.
Despite this- limping and in intense pain- I flew out to New York for a job, only to find myself unable to work.
Fast forward, I’m back in my childhood home in New Jersey.
All this running, to end up exactly where I began, at a level of weakness I’d never experienced.
I can't walk. I can’t eat. I can’t speak. Eventually, I can’t even swallow water. After months of decline, I'm hospitalized and diagnosed with autoimmune disorder.
Upon release, the healing process began. Naturally. Over Time. Apparently you can’t run through this part.
I started going to therapy with a wise and loving sage named, appropriately, Mary. One day, feeling that familiar impatience taking hold, I asked her: “When will life get back to normal?”
Her answer surprised me: “I hope your life never goes back to normal. I hope this is a new normal.” She suggested I watch the spring unfold.
I’d take long slow walks around the block, inhaling “this moment” exhaling, “perfect moment.”
Something was changing in me. I was relearning to walk, talk, eat, and to experience the presence. In a real way, I was moving out of the dream of the future and into reality.
When, eventually, I was well enough to move back to LA and start again, I did so on every level.
In our one life we have the opportunity to live many. But in order to experience what’s here for us now, we have to let the previous life go. This can be harsh and painful and feel like death. But from this death is the rebirth. This rebirth was the “horrible gift”- as Mary called it- of my illness.
While today I’m blessed with good health, having an autoimmune is a continual reminder to slow down.
Of course, I am only human! Patterns I swore I’d outgrown pop up, as they do for all of us, but now, I have wisdom through experience to breath in, breath out, and- when I remember to: feel this moment as: perfect moment.
Our mess can become our mission. My mission is to help others experience the perfection of this now moment, and in doing so, live.