Goals

My impossible bucket list

Foster a child Write a book Complete another spin class

These three things may seem easy to some, but to me, they each seem impossible in their own way.

I’ve kept this list in my notes on my phone for about a year now. I’ve kept the first two items on a mental list for at least fifteen years.

When I look at each one of these, my mind tells me I can’t accomplish them. I lie to myself about the complexity of these because I am terrified that maybe I will be able to do them, to achieve the impossible.

1. Foster a child:

If I can’t even handle my two (mostly well-behaved) children, how could I handle someone else’s child temporarily? My husband told me when we got a guest bedroom we could discuss it. We have a guest bedroom now, I put my son’s rocking horse in there from his toddler days just in case.

But there are too many excuses. How can you foster a child if only one parent is on board with the idea? I go to delete it off of my list, it’s ridiculous really. Then I remember what made me entertain the idea in the first place.

I go back and listen to “Runaway Love” by Mary J. Blige and Ludacris and I remember hearing it for the first time. I remember being those little girls. I want to save them all. I watch from 600 miles away as my best friend raises her four children, including two adopted children, who began as her foster children. She saved their lives.

2. Write a book:

My mind laughs at me. You aren't smart enough to write a book and have it published. You can’t even hold down a full-time job. Who would take you seriously? You’re just too sensitive, a snowflake. You aren’t extraordinary; you are just sad. It would be too much rejection. Don't even try, you couldn't figure it out. Then I see the countless notebooks that I’ve kept since childhood and realize there’s something valuable within them.

Plus my father taught me to always believe in myself.

3. Complete another spin class:

For a long time, my looks were how I got what I wanted in life. I was told this was how life worked for women. I was thin so I was accepted. I had “pretty privilege” and white privilege.

However, unfortunately for me, I have always had a *tricky* relationship with food and weight. This was not a problem when I could work out consistently. In May of 2020, my left elbow was fractured and consequently, I can put almost no weight on it now. It is a constant source of pain. My children refer to it as my “bad arm”.

I never liked exercising, but if there was any type of workout that I could tolerate-it was spin class. There were usually no men around and the perfect early-mid 2000’s pop playlist screamed at me to work harder, which I did. When I stopped being able to do it, I stopped caring about my weight. I gave up. I did have PT sessions but regardless my arm feels like a limp appendage that weighs me down and most days I wish I could cut it off.

Are my goals impossible? I ask myself this question every day.

Before everyone was obsessed with Channing Tatum, I, at age 14, was already in love with him as Jason Lyle, in my favorite movie, Coach Carter. in the movie, Marianne Williamson’s famous poem, “Our Deepest Fear” is quoted.

This poem had a profound effect on me then at age 14 and still does to this day at age 31.

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate, Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us…”

Thank you for reading. You can read more of my work here.

Shoutout to Yana Bostongirl, Iris B. Stehn, KiKi Walter, Kira Dawn, Victoria Ponte, Lola Rosario, David Rudder, and Poetic Therapy for their articles & stories that inspire me to share more every day.