How to Launch the Next (Scary) Chapter of Life

APRIL'S BEAUTY PROMPT for when the future feels unthinkable. Be a tulip!

The Departure of the Boats, Étretat by Claude Monet

Dear Beautiful Friends,

This week’s Beauty Prompt is inspired by my neighbor and friend Noreen, who retired yesterday after years of putting it off because she was “scared shitless.”

It’s the terror of the Void, beautiful people—going from a full, satisfying, and structured life, into a wild frontier of … um, what exactly? Plus, living in a culture that asks of us—even demands—that we have a plan. Instead of opening ourselves up with glee to the untrod terrain ahead, we constrict and tremble, wondering:

Daybreak by Maxfield Parish

How will I live going forward, what will I do?

Here’s how:

This bold & beautiful quote was part of the writer, teacher, and ubermensch

George Saunders

’s 2013 Syracuse commencement address. I wish someone had said this to me when I graduated. But I’ll take it 40 years later.

Don’t be afraid to be confused. Try to remain permanently confused. Anything is possible. Stay open, forever, so open it hurts, and then open up some more, until the day you die, world without end, amen. — George Saunders

We’re all graduates, always graduating 🎉

We might not be in gown, cap, and tassel but aren’t we forever graduating from one chapter of life and moving on to the next one over and over?

We’re graduating, retiring, transforming, moving on—from working, from a relationship, from being single, from the hustle, an addiction, a displaced identity, a career shift, caretaking, parenting, a way of being, [yours here]… it’s what we do.

This month, let’s be willing to always explore, question, and get curious about the world around us. And, if you need a reprieve, an intermission, a rest day to catch your breath, by all means. Sometimes we need a little constricting before opening again, even wider this time.

If You Need an Intermission, This Way Please

Here’s this week’s Beauty Prompt Assignment—

Ready? Let’s go! It might run long for email but you can read it in your browser.