I often imagine myself standing in the wings of an active stage for my turn to enter the story. This improv stage is my life, and I have only a glimmer of an idea about what's next. Standing there, waiting to enter, is like a new beginning. The moment defines one of my knife's sharpest edges.

I cannot tell you how many hours I’ve stood in the wings watching life pass. Frozen. Filled with an aching longing to play, make my voice heard, and feel like I have some say in my life. Afraid that I have nothing to offer, that I'll make the mess bigger, and that I'm not even wanted. Even as I cannot see myself in it, my own life passes me by.

And then, something happens on that stage that compels me into action. Occasionally, anger unfreezes my feet, and I barrel onto the stage. My partners for this portion of the play see the energy and the offense. They push back, hard. They echo the frustration and shame over how my inaction created the conditions that compelled the anger roiling within me in their pushing. Overflowing with a sense of unworthiness, I instinctively disappear again into the wings. 

The watching begins again. The longing rises even as so very little changes.

After years of watching my life pass by without much of my input, I had enough. For me, enough wasn't a distinct moment; I just got tired of doing this thing that wasn’t working.

I started examining my life and found this cycle of engaging and retreating and the two places where I could make small shifts that just might increase my presence in my own life.

These days, I spend less time in the wings. When I’m ready to leave them, to begin again, I shift my focus from action out there to the person I am here. Taking the lessons of Jim Karwish, I set my approach. I pull the unwanted thoughts out of my head, sometimes miming the extraction of worries, doubts, and distractions. I grind my toes into the floor to ground me into the present. And lastly, I decide the attitudes I step onto the stage with and imagine putting those into my body. Then, wanting to be out there, I let go and step into the light. Sometimes things go gloriously; others, it’s a nightmare. And, I'm present for it all.

A second beginning point camouflages itself within the action. It’s the point where I need to extract myself to rest in the wings. More harrowing to grab, I reach through the stage's activity, past my internal daemons and the judgment of our hustle and grind culture, to satisfy my need to rest. It's frightening, and I do it anyway as a practice of self-compassion. Over the years, practicing this retreat has made beginning with another return to the stage easier. Even better, I enjoy my time out there more.