Thoughts on Drowning in Private

I don't want to win in public but drown in private.

Last week, another one of my favorite authors shared the devastating news that she and her husband are divorcing. Let me be clear: there is no judgment for this. 2020 has been so hard on relationships, pouring gasoline on the fire of any relational strife. And I've counseled too many married couples to know the decision to divorce doesn't come easy. To sever a marriage is to say you have no alternative. Things have become too toxic to continue. My heart breaks to think of what it must be like to have to process such a terrible private loss in front of an audience.

But it's also got me thinking about where I'm focusing my own energy these days. Am I tending to the garden of my private life or am I focused on public significance? Am I constructing a life on a foundation of health or am I accruing surface level success that splinters when life gets hard?

What about you? Where is your attention being drawn in the face of 2020’s shakeups?

I’m finding among my clients that the shifts and setbacks of this year are driving them to find meaning for their lives in new spaces. Jobs that once organized their ambition have been lost. Relationships that once filled their time have grown distant. All the stuff they were striving to get or acquire now seems pointless.

We’ve been talking about finding a new source of purpose for their lives and I would argue that in the disillusionment and loss they are finding themselves for the first time. It’s incredible to watch as women are growing into themselves, becoming stronger and more resilient than they ever imagined they could be.

True strength comes from abandoning the pursuit of significance for something that lasts.

This fall I’m starting a new membership community called Women of Consequence. If I’m honest about why, it's because I want a place where women are catalyzed to live real lives of meaning. And I wanted us to be able to do it together because it’s so hard to not be seduced by the immediate gratification of public praise. My hope is we will encourage one another and focus on our calling so our lives don’t shatter so easily against the stress of the times. Because what does it matter if we're bestsellers and girl bosses sitting in the midst of broken personal lives? If that’s the price of significance I’ll pass. Let’s choose to be women of consequence over significance any day of the week. You with me?