The Most Important Thing

As I recently shared on social media, I am amazed and humbled at how far and wide my poem The Most Important Thing has reached.

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Image by Karla-M Bardz

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I clearly remember writing this poem. It was a gorgeous summer day, I had just dropped my teenage daughter off at the farm where she had a job picking blueberries, and I was feeling especially exhausted. I decided I needed some deep self-care.

I could have gone home and folded the many loads of laundry that were waiting for me (along with the dozens of other things that were screaming for my attention), but instead I decided to stretch out in a patch of sunlight and just be. This poem came from the permission I gave myself that day.

That listening has created many, many ripples…

Taking care of ourselves, listening deeply to what is calling, truly is the most important thing. Everything ripples out from the love we give (or don’t give) to ourselves.

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One of the beautiful ripples:

This past Valentine’s day, I received an email from Maike, a beautiful woman from Germany, who shared that my poem came to her at a time when she was questioning herself. She wrote: “It inspired me to coax music out of my fingers from my piano.”

Below is the music Maike coaxed from her fingers, along with her beautiful reading (in German) of my poem The Most Important Thing.

Below Maike’s reading, is the English reading of my poem with Maike’s gorgeous piano music (read by me).

I hope you enjoy…

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Speaking of Germany & important things, I am super excited to share that my husband & I are heading out tomorrow morning (for a couple of weeks) for a family reunion in Germany, and then for some hut to hut hiking in the Swiss Alps.

I’m super excited and grateful that I get to take some time away from screens and everyday stuff to nurture what is calling.

I hope this poem inspires you to consider what is calling to you, to consider how you might go about making a beautiful (or even more beautiful) shelter of kindness inside yourself.

I would love to hear from you in the comments on my Substack page….

For those of you asking, my upcoming Write Yourself Free series is now sold out. If you would like me to add you to the waitlist, please let me know. (You can simply respond to this email.)

And now for the written version of my poem & Maike’s beautiful recordings…

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The Most Important Thing

I am making a home inside myself. A shelter 
of kindness where everything
is forgiven, everything allowed—a quiet patch 
of sunlight to stretch out without hurry, 
where all that has been banished and buried 
is welcomed, spoken, listened to—released.

A fiercely friendly place I can claim as my very own.

I am throwing arms open
to the whole of myself—especially the fearful, 
fault-finding, falling apart, unfinished parts, knowing 
every seed and weed, every drop
of rain, has made the soil richer.

I will light a candle, pour a hot cup of tea, gather 
around the warmth of my own blazing fire. I will howl 
if I want to, knowing this flame can burn through
any perceived problem, any prescribed perfectionism, 
any lying limitation, every heavy thing.

I am making a home inside myself
where grace blooms in grand and glorious 
abundance, a shelter of kindness that grows 
all the truest things.

I whisper hallelujah to the friendly
sky. Watch now as I burst into blossom.

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