I was down on all fours crawling through the woods.
Literally.
In total and complete darkness. Utterly and thoroughly lost.
Let me back up…
Once upon a time when I was 22 (yes, I really was 22 once) I worked at the Washington Posts’ Send a Kid to Camp.
Every two weeks bright yellow school buses delivered batches of new kids. Fresh little faces, many of whom had never been out of the city in their lives.
There was discovery and swimming and macramé and camp food and songs and marshmallows and canoes…. and strange new bugs galore.
It was a blast.
It was exhausting.
At the end of each 2 week stint, we’d pack all the kids up.
Tears.
Hugs.
Last minute notes and friendship bracelets.
Then at last, the buses pulled out…
Silence.
Blissful, amazing, incredible silence. (In all honesty, birds kept singing, insects kept chirping—or whatever it is that insects do—but to us it felt like absolute and total silence).
Never in my life had silence been more welcome.
Most of the staff rode back to DC with the kids to spend their time off at home.
I stayed at camp in the woods.
I loved those old wood cabins and the cavernous rickety gym and the Roosevelt era mess hall.
5 of us were staying in camp that weekend. We holed ourselves up in the kitchen. We lay on the stainless steel countertops, laughing, telling stories, nibbling on little treasures we’d found in the walk in refrigerators.
Can I just say, there’s nothing more fun that a walk-in fridge!
Albert decided we needed a 7-eleven run (not exactly around the corner; we were after all out in the middle of nowhere). We agreed. He took our orders. We rounded up our spare change (there wasn’t much of it in those days) and off he went in what I remember to be a real battle axe of a car.
The rest of us continued on with our jokes and stories. Time passed.
Then, almost in unison we decided to go back to our cabins for one thing or another and out the door we filed.
While we’d been gabbing and solving all manner of world problem, the sun had set.
I mean it had really set. It was dark.
There was a pale circle of light around the mess hall but beyond that nothing. (Little footnote for anyone who hasn’t spent much time at a summer camp. There’s something about camp lighting. It’s not really light. It’s not a120 watt bulb or even a 60. I don’t know if they make 7 watt dim yellow bulbs but that’s basically what camps in the middle of the woods tend to have. It’s sort of like lighting a small candle for a football field).
I stepped onto the path to my cabin and started on my way.
It wasn’t long before I couldn’t see.
Darker and darker… until I couldn’t even see my hand when I waved it in front of my face.
We were all laughing; joking; each of us on our own path. And each of us “blindly” trying to find our way.
My friends’ voices were getting fainter as we branched off into different sections of the forest.
I inched forward. Tentatively shuffling one foot in front of the other.
Then I got down on all four and tried to find my way by patting the sides of the tiny dirt trail with my hands.
What the heck? I wasn’t even sure I was headed in the right direction. I should already be at my cabin by now, shouldn’t I?
And then Albert came back.
At first the beams from his headlights were just broken faint light in the distance and then, bam, full on glare.
Oh myyyyyy!
I was in a patch of ivy (not poison; thank all the 100 billion stars in the Milky Way galaxy) not remotely headed to my cabin, totally and completely off course.
If Albert hadn’t driven back into camp that night there’s not one iota of doubt that I would’ve spent a really really uncomfortable night out in pitch dark woods.
Not only would I have spent a really lousy night—most likely wide awake peering blindly in the direction of every cracking branch—but I would’ve been really, really lost in the morning.
Let’s face it, we don’t like to stop. Even when we know in our heart of hearts we’re heading in the wrong direction.
Our brains get ahold of a plan, they set a course and onward and forward they go. Never mind that we’re heading in the wrong direction.
Now I’m a huge believer in action because I think inaction toward something you want can be lethal and I know that courses can self correct if it turns out you’re heading in the wrong direction. Sometimes the best thing is just to get moving.
Here’s the thing though—you have to be willing to self correct.
That night, in the woods, I wasn’t.
I had a feeling. A niggling that got louder by the second and exploded into a full cacophony when my friends hit out of earshot range.
But still, doggedly and stubbornly I plunged forward.
Sometimes it takes a headlight to stop us dead in our tracks and get us to redirect.
There have been so many headlights in my life. And this from a woman who was dubbed Queen of the “I’ll do it myself” kingdom at the ripe age of 3. Arms crossed. Feet planted. I can do it myself!
I’ve had to counter that attitude over and over.
And thank those 100 billion stars in the Milky Way Galaxy again that I did because the team of people who have turned on the headlights when I was crawling off course, have been amazing—over and over and over again.
The journey never ends. Expansion and growth are always there. They’re yours for the taking.
You’ll never feel better than when you’re growing and becoming fully and truly the person you always hoped you’d be.
Nothing feels better than becoming that ever expanding, ever evolving being that is quintessentially, uniquely YOU!
I can summarily say that my life wouldn’t be close to what it is today if it wasn’t for my headlights–my team of incredible coaches and therapists.
I sometimes joke that we all should’ve been assigned a therapist or a coach at birth. I don’t know why I joke about this because it’s true.
Life is complicated and birthing the greatest versions of yourself takes midwifing and a light held high by someone who’s an unabashed champion for the greatest version of yourself.
I hope you have headlights—you deserve them.
