Could you tell me a time where you took a leap of faith?

They say the best way to build your wings is on the way down.Two years ago, I would have questioned that statement.

You place the parachute on before the jump. You slide the floaties on before you swim. You assemble a belay before you climb. It’s not the other way around.

However, two years ago, I found myself at a harrowing crossroad. I’d been navigating a tenuous battle with my health, over seven years of failed treatments and regimens to mitigate the burden of my condition.

Known as Topical Steroid Withdrawal, it’s debilitating and relentless in its hunt to control every piece of your life. I’d lost my performing career, my marriage, my hair, and the complete foundation of my life’s trajectory. The type A, top-of-her-class, “Most Likely to Be Famous” superlative winner was now a scrambling, inconsistent mess of a human being – and I just had to go along for the ride.

I hated it. The loss of control swallowed me whole. Yet, no one was the wiser of this civil war raging beneath the surface. I exuded positivity like a badge of honor, asserting that the glass wasn’t empty nor full, but refillable. I continued to make vision boards, to castigate any self-doubt that I wouldn’t get better, and fell into a routine that became uncomfortably comfortable.

I landed a full-time job as a secondary school dance teacher (known as middle/high school in the states – originally from Florida), I entered into a relationship, and I seemingly started to rebuild from the rubble that Topical Steroid Withdrawal gifted in my mid-twenties.  

How I wish that was the start of a happily ever after.

The bulldozer, the one I’d hoped had disappeared into the distance, came charging back for more. It decimated my ability to be a functioning partner, a consistent teacher, and it sunk its proverbial teeth into my already aching body, sucking every bit of resilience I had left.

I wanted to die, and I wanted the universe to do it for me. But she had other plans.

As silly as it sounds, I listen to what the world has to say. Not people – the actual world. And I was being pulled towards creating my own bulldozer. If I couldn’t hold on to pieces of a life that I wasn’t even sure I wanted, then I would just start from scratch. I didn’t want to be with my partner anymore. I didn’t want to be a teacher. I especially didn’t want to be living back in my hometown, a space that never felt like my own.

There were no wings in sight, but I was desperate to jump. I didn’t see it as running away from something, but towards it. The it could be negotiated on the journey, but the journey had to start despite my utter lack of plans or blueprints.

So, I listened. I observed. I allowed the world to point me towards places that I prayed would bring me back to myself.

It pointed me towards Europe, to the UK, and particularly to Scotland. I wasn’t sure why, but I let the gravity take hold, and I leapt. I leapt into an 8-week summer holiday that would change my life.

I ended my relationship before leaving; I turned in my resignation my first week away, and I didn’t look back. I lived each day with eyes wide open, writing and journaling, eating fresh food, soaking in nature, allowing my nervous system to breath. I didn’t know where I was going, but I was committed to getting there.

Coddiwompling, That’s what it’s called – to move towards an unknown destination with purpose. It became my new favorite word. It taught me so much. It gave me the grace to open myself up to someone who resuscitated me, and it planted a seed that is now flowering into a dissertation here in Edinburgh, Scotland.

Life went from suffocating to liberating; from a foggy black and white to intense technicolor.

Now, I’m not saying it isn’t scary at times, nor do the answers come all at once. I think the point of jumping before knowing the outcome is that you learn so much more about yourself than you could have in planning every detail or, worse, staying on the ledge because you just haven’t figured out exactly where it is you’re going. The contract is releasing control and accepting the possibilities.

I think too many of us stay within the confines of societal norms, what we should and shouldn’t be doing in the eyes of others who, in the end, do not matter. Life is so short, and precious, and worth every ounce of your tenacious will. So, go do the thing. Take that leap of faith. Do not shy from the courage it takes to assemble your feathers.