Your Suffering Is Not a Self-Improvement Exercise
Let go of the pressure to come out of this ‘a better person’
Ten years ago, I was a deeply insecure 27-year-old walking home from a very good job that I hated with every inch of my being. I was sobbing into the phone to my best friend Dave, who was at Home Depot with his wife Megan.
“I’m lost,” I wept. “I’m exhausted. I don’t want this kind of life and I don’t know how to change it.”
In the background, I could hear Megan asking how I was doing, and Dave stuttering to find a way to say “deeply unwell” without offending me.
But now look at me! I’m a deeply insecure 37-year-old with a life I love and a career that doesn’t make me envious of city workers tamping down asphalt into potholes. (This isn’t hyperbole — I used to stare out the window of my office, watching the people filling potholes and thinking about how satisfying it must be to see a smooth road at the end of their workday.)
Reflecting on the past decade, it’s clear that every part of my current life can be traced back to the death of my husband Aaron. We wrote his obituary together, before he died, and it went viral. That’s how I got a literary agent and a book deal, and how I got a job in public media. I met my current husband through my fellow widow friend…
