Neil Young’s question: Why do I keep f___ing up?

I find myself asking this poignant — if crude — question these days.

Or maybe the question is: “why can’t things run like a fire engine on all cylinders all — or at least most — of the time?”

I’m in an awesome new job. I love it. Great people, heady stuff every day and it’s in communications, my wheel house. On top of that, I’ve got a great opportunity to get my book in front of a publisher thanks to an amazing supporter that I was connected to through a Toronto friend. I had a fantastic road trip from Alberta to Toronto with my oldest just a few weeks ago, followed by an incredible week in Toronto at her new digs, joined by my lovely bride.

Amazing. Colossal. Fantastic.

But now back in Edmonton, my bride is going through intense, brutal medical treatment and there’s little that I can really do. The edits I’m making on my book before shipping it off  have  stalled for some reasons that I understand and others that I’m battling with my brain over. And I’m constantly feeling like I’m letting down one of my ladies as they cope with the myriad challenges they’re facing.

Angering. Crappy. Frustrating.

It would be nice to be able to stop time for just a few hours to put together a game plan to figure out how to get everything right all at once. Clearly that can’t be done, and I keep having vivid reminders of this. To that point, I’ve posted a pair of pictures taken from my office of the construction of the new arena – Rogers Place – being built in Edmonton.

The first pic is the day before I left for Toronto on my road trip. The second is from my first day back to work, two weeks later.

Look at all of the change in such a short time! When I saw this, it made one thing crystal clear — there ain’t no slowing down the clock. Tick, tick, tick.

So then, with all of the moving parts in life, how does a fella keep excelling at what they’re excelling at and try to bring other bits up to speed without dropping the ball on it all — like a beginner juggler? And how do you control the things you can’t control?

On the second question, I guess you just can’t. A guy just has to learn not to try to control these things and spend the time in hand as well as possible. And to be open to the opportunities and needs of whatever comes.

On the first part though, I may have found the answer in a quote hanging in my home office for so long that – until today – I stopped paying attention to it. It’s from Marianne Williamson. She said: “Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world.”

Maybe she has something there? I’m going to think about it for a spell.

Meanwhile, I better get back to those damn book edits and then think of some ways I can support my wife and girls without trying to fix everything.

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