A few months ago, I fell into a hole.
Not a real hole, although sometimes it felt deep enough to qualify.
Something happened that frightened me. Fear opened the door to frustration and anger, and before long I was feeling powerless, desperate, and more than a little sorry for myself.
I wallowed.
For days, weeks, even a few months.
And then I did what we humans so often do when we’re uncomfortable.
I looked out there for something to change.
If only this would happen. If only someone would do that. If only there were more money. If only I knew what came next.
Around and around I went.
The circumstances weren’t imaginary. Neither were the fear, anger, or frustration. They were mine, and they deserved to be felt.
But without realizing it, I was also carrying each moment into the next one.
Fear was writing the next sentence.
I’ve known for a very long time that words matter.
Years ago, the work of Louise Hay introduced me to affirmations and encouraged me to pay attention to the words I spoke—to myself and about my life. Later, when I first read The Secret and watched the movie, that awareness deepened.
Watch your words.
Watch your thoughts.
Pay attention to the story you’re telling.
Over the years, I became increasingly sensitive to language—not because I believed I could control life by saying all the right things, but because I began to notice how words affected me.
More recently, I added something new to my morning journaling practice.
I’d been listening to one of the monks participating in the Walk for Peace. One suggestion he offered repeatedly was beautifully simple: write, and then say aloud:
I am peaceful.
I liked that.
So each morning, pen to paper, I began writing:
I am peaceful.
I am grateful.
I am blessed.
There is something about putting pen to paper that asks me to slow down enough to enter the words.
And gradually, I am peaceful became more than an affirmation.
It became a reminder.
Not a demand that I stop being afraid.
Not a denial of sadness, frustration, or anger.
A reminder that I could meet those feelings and still remain peaceful.
Fear can be here.
And peace can be here, too.
Then, quite unexpectedly, The Secret fell into my lap again.
I was sitting in the living room of a dear and supportive friend, scrolling through the television channels looking for something interesting to watch, and there it was.
Watching it took me back all those years to when I’d first read the book, watched the movie, and fallen in love with the idea that we participate in creating our lives.
And naturally, one question came to mind:
Why am I not a millionaire?
Ha!
But watching the movie this time, after all these years, I heard something I hadn’t heard before.
When I first encountered these ideas, I thought the important part was identifying what I wanted, writing it down, visualizing it, and watching my words.
And I did some of that.
But when life became frightening—when I really wanted more money, more security, love, direction—I often reached for those practices from a very different place.
Fear.
Lack.
Desperation.
Please let something change.
There is nothing wrong with wanting those things. The desire wasn’t the trap.
But I had begun to believe that what I wanted out there contained something I needed in here.
Peace.
Security.
Joy.
Watching The Secret again reminded me that perhaps the more interesting question wasn’t:
How do I get what I want?
Perhaps it was:
What am I bringing to this moment?
So the next morning, I tried something.
I took out my journal, put pen to paper, and began writing the story of the life I would love to create.
I wrote about continuing to live with my family, but in a new home where I have a spacious wing of my own.
I imagined my bedroom on one side and my office on the other—my desk, bookshelves, oils, and all the things I love around me.
I imagined big windows overlooking green grass and trees.
And French doors.
Oh yes, there are French doors.
I’ve always wanted French doors.
I wrote about my book becoming a bestseller. I imagined money flowing abundantly, enough to pay my expenses and enough to help the people I love. I imagined writing my next book, doing work I love, and having a wonderful assistant beside me who understands me and helps me keep it all moving.
I let myself dream.
And when I finally put my pen down, I was filled with joy.
So much joy.
But why?
Nothing I’d written had happened.
I hadn’t acquired a new home while sitting there with my journal.
There were no French doors.
My bank account hadn’t suddenly grown several additional zeroes.
My book hadn’t magically appeared on a bestseller list.
So none of those things could possibly have been the source of the joy I was experiencing.
Writing about them had simply helped me remember the joy that was already available.
Maybe that is why I will keep doing it.
Not to place an order with the universe.
Not because writing something often enough guarantees that it will happen.
But because imagination is creative and playful. Because putting pen to paper slows me down enough to enter the possibility. Because for those few minutes, I am not rehearsing everything that might go wrong.
I am creating something beautiful.
And something in me shifts.
Not long ago, someone I love was having a difficult day. He was frightened and sad—and with good reason.
Normally, I might have felt myself tighten. I would have begun listing solutions, offering suggestions, thinking of things he could do to help himself.
But this time, I noticed something different.
I didn’t need him to change.
His fear was real. His sadness was real. I didn’t need to talk him out of either one.
I could simply meet him there.
And my peace could be there, too.
In the end, all he wanted was to hear me on the other end of the phone.
So I stayed.
For more than an hour, I listened—to his words when they came, to his tears, and sometimes simply to his silence.
Eventually, he said goodbye and thanked me for being there.
That was all he had needed.
And perhaps that is the part I missed all those years ago.
Peace isn’t something I have to create by changing what is happening around me. It doesn’t require someone I love to stop hurting. It doesn’t even require me to stop hurting.
Fear can be here.
Sadness can be here.
And peace can be here, too.
We are always creating—not because every thought magically produces an event, but because the way we meet this moment becomes part of what we carry into the next one.
If something goes wrong and I tell myself, Of course. Nothing ever works for me, I carry that story forward.
Then something else happens.
See? I knew it.
Before long, I’m no longer simply experiencing a difficult moment. I’m living inside the story I’ve been telling about it.
The answer isn’t to paste a positive thought over an unhappy one.
It’s to notice.
I’m frightened.
I’m angry.
I’m frustrated.
I’m feeling sorry for myself.
And then to meet what is here.
Maybe I am peaceful can be here, too.
I still want the house.
I still want financial freedom.
I absolutely want the bestseller.
And those French doors are staying.
Desire isn’t the trap.
Believing that the thing I desire contains the joy I’m looking for—that’s the trap.
So I can want what I want.
I can dream outrageously.
I can put pen to paper and imagine the details until I’m grinning from ear to ear.
And then I can put down my pen and return to the life that is actually here.
If some of those dreams come true, how delightful.
And if life brings something I never thought to write down, can I meet that, too?
I hope so.
Because the world may indeed be my oyster.
But perhaps I’ve misunderstood which part I’m meant to control.
I don’t control the ocean.
I don’t control what washes in.
I don’t even control every grain of sand.
What I have is this moment.
And I am the pearl.