When I first sat down to sum up what The May Daily was all about, the words I kept circling back to were “I have no idea what I’m doing.”
It was literally true in an immediate sense, but it can be applied pretty broadly in my life, for one. I don’t claim to speak for anyone else, but when it comes to grown-up life and all of its trappings – from nourishing and taking care of myself, to marriage, to assembling a home, to building the life that exists inside and outside its frame – I have no. idea.
What I do know is that it’s far too easy and comfortable in this life to be passive. To let things happen to you, put off taking action and take your own agency for granted. A few years ago, I started to get this nagging sense that told me I should start trying to live my life on purpose. I could start with little things – bird by bird, as they say – like making sure that what I was putting in my body was what I wanted to be putting in my body, and not just what was available. That hobbies and interests I’d long shelved would come off and take up space in my life in place of mindless TV and hours of listicles and Internet mining. I’d start putting more thought into the people and the objects that I surrounded myself with, instead of just … accumulating.
I looked to the experts – people who lived really incredible, full and beautiful lives – and tried to figure out how they did it. (Goop was mesmerizing and crushing, in this regard.) But try as I might, I couldn’t find an honest portrayal of HOW these beautiful lives were constructed. Instead, the point seemed THAT they were constructed. These women had arrived. And I was, and we all should be, envious. Well, I offer my sincerest awe-struck congratulations. But I also came away feeling that us normal folk needed a space where failures, not-quites and well-that-didn’t-turn-out-like-I-planned would be treated with the same high-gloss, artful presentation and respect as perfectly laid tablescapes, gourmet meals and the world’s most amicable divorce.
So that’s what The May Daily is: an acknowledgement that yes, we have no idea what we’re doing, but we’re figuring it out. One day at a time. And in the event that you might not quite always know what you’re doing, either (we won’t tell), this is a space to share how we go about living each day a little more deliberately, what we’ve learned the hard way and what’s revealed itself in the meantime. Thanks for reading and learning with us!
