EP 63: You Can Do Everything Right and Still Get Knocked Down
You did everything right. Life still hit.
I'm back, y'all. I finished the first draft of my upcoming book, How to Be a Good Human, and celebrated by going out for a friend's birthday. Then I came home, tripped on a box I forgot I left in the hallway, and ripped my toenail clean off. No, for real.
Here's the thing though. I have been doing everything I tell y'all to do: take care of your body, rest, show up for the people who matter. And life still went sideways. But I had the capacity to manage it (after a small fit about not having a toenail this summer, you saw it if you follow me on IG). That capacity is exactly what human(ing) well is about. It is not about avoiding the hard stuff. It is about building enough in you that when life comes out of nowhere, you have something to draw from.
In this episode, I unpack what the injury taught me about recovery, and why doing everything right is not insurance against things going wrong. Because it is not. “Just because you’re doing the right things, it is not insurance against bad things… Life is going to happen no matter how diligent you are.”
Consider this: when life interrupts you in the middle of doing everything right, do you let yourself feel the frustration, or do you skip straight to the lesson? Whichever is true, why?
If you have been carrying something you did not sign up for while trying to hold it together, this episode is for you. And if it resonates, share it with someone who can relate.
With Care,
Amber
KEY POINTS
00:00 – Injury and podcast/book setup
04:25 – Lesson #1: Doing the “right things” doesn’t protect you from life
05:22 – Lesson #2: Recovery time (physical and emotional)
08:00 – Choosing practice even when you don’t choose the pain
09:25 – Lesson #3: What writing “How to Be a Good Human” has taught me
11:05 – Phone-free home idea, returning to the podcast, and invitation to listeners
QUOTES:
“I still have to put the practice in on something that is uncomfortable that I didn’t even choose.”
“It’s not about being perfect, checking every box, or pushing through at the expense of our well-being. It’s about discovering how to show up for our lives fully, intentionally, and without losing ourselves in the process.”
“The resilience to lose a toenail... and not let it take me out.”
“I am not interested in suppressing how I feel about things; I am interested in feeling my feelings, but I’m also not interested in living there.”
“You just can’t really fake your way through a manuscript the way you can fake your way through most things… your work shows what you’ve actually integrated.”