What I deem as Important is Important
On prioritizing my own life and my own needs and where to find me in the coming weeks
An entire life of masking has taught me that the things I deem as important are not important to other people. Not only are they not important to other people but they are also frowned upon or even mocked. The things I deem as important have been called insignificant or not worth pursuing when there are so many other respectable things akin to adulthood. While I’ve gone through the motions of my life believing this to be true and orienting to this assumption like fact, I’ve had the sudden (not so sudden) realization that this is very untrue.
The things I deem as important are actually so incredibly important — finding old furniture and fixing it up; tending to my plants; cultivating relationships with my neighbors; rummaging through estate sale fabric and making pillows for my dog; anything and everything mystic like LOTR or tarot or the uncanny ability I have to find a cemetery in every city I visit.
It hasn’t been until recently that my exhaustion for keeping things close broke down the charade of my normalcy. Perhaps I was burned at the stake in a past life so the fear of being seen feels like life-or-death. Perhaps it’s because every time I allow myself to check in with the events of the world, another queer or trans death streams across my feed so it is actually life-or-death. Perhaps it’s because every time I speak up about something that feels fucked up it puts me at odds with someone in my life.
I share all of this to say that I’m coming back around to the things I find to be important. It also means that the very things you deem as important are also very important. So I give you an intention to read to yourself, either internally or aloud, for the entirety of this newsletter:
What I Deem as Important Is Important.
I allowed the world to convince me that my silly little tasks were insignificant in comparison to what so many others are doing with their time. But my silly little tasks are my favorite tasks. They allow me to transmute my experience into the most magical work. My silly little tasks are god’s work, and I am beginning to treat them as such.
As I let myself continue to unravel like the thread being used for my cushion, I am given the chance for greater presence with my work. I look at myself with kinder eyes, knowing the deep significance of the work I do. I feel my power coming back into my body when I notice the strength it takes to show up for my practice every day.
What I Deem as Important Is Important.
In the reckoning of prioritizing the things I deem as important, I’m finding such a greater presence of peace. Peace that seems unshakable when I’m moving through the motions of my day doing just what I feel called to do in service of the work. I look at myself and mumble under my breath, “I just filled another day tending to the things I deem as important, and therefore they are important.”
What I Deem as Important Is Important.
I am free to move with discipline around my creative work. I am free to take up more space in my days and my weeks, meeting people on the other side of my practice. I am free to orient myself fully and joyfully back towards myself.
I am free.
I recognize the importance of prioritizing the work because I’m reminded by the messages, the emails, and the expressions of support from y’all when I’m showing up to create it. The work is to be done, and I am the one to facilitate that.
I must remember that when the celebrity of anything outside of this work glistens before my ego with promise, I must reorient towards what it is I feel called to make.
I want to continue to honor and cherish the little things. I want to have space to hold gratitude for the way my dog looks at me after a long walk or the way the sky puts on a show for us every night before dark.
I’m allowing myself to show up like this with less inhibition. I’d love for you to continue to show up in the ways that make you feel this way too.
We Get to Prioritize What’s Important To Us.
We Get to Prioritize What’s Important To Us.
We Get to Prioritize What’s Important To Us.
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This is really inspiring Meredith, thank you. I’m taking the invitation to “show up for things that I deem important” to heart!
Yes. I feel this deeply. Last week when I was talking with Morgan Harper Nichols for my latest podcast we talked about just this and circled around to LOTR and fantasy and how we’d come to feel that wasn’t “professional” or “on brand.” I also noticed how easeful the conversation felt because I wasn’t masking and we were coloring in the podcasting lines. Hoping we can notes continue to center the things we love and talk about them with people who “get it.”