I’d like to get to know you—and help you get to know each other. Because I believe that uncertainty, life transitions, and new beginnings are best navigated together.
This evergreen thread is an opportunity to introduce yourself. You’re welcome to share as little, or as much, as you’d like! Tell us who you are, and what brought you here.
Your prompt, should you choose to accept it: Which of the following best describes you? Copy and paste one (or more!) of these emojis when you start a new comment below.
🔥 Some version of your five-year plan already went up in flames.
🪂 You’re considering a jump into new, uncertain territory of some kind.
🙈 You’re just starting to let go of your Type A, overplanner tendencies. Or, perhaps you’ll consider letting go of them…someday.
🎸 You’re an uncertainty rock star who’s embraced change for approximately as long as the Rolling Stones have been on stage. (Tell us your secrets!)
Or, choose your own emoji adventure! Pick something that best describes your relationship with uncertainty, life transitions, or new beginnings.
🔥 + 🙈. I'll kick things off! I'm your typical Type A overachiever, who loved planning so much that I made an entire career out of it (as a financial planner).
After experiencing a divorce, my mom's passing, and job loss in quick succession, it became clear that I needed to learn how to embrace uncertainty...whether I wanted to or not! This newsletter is my attempt at codifying everything I'm learning, and helping others along the way.
Hello. My five year plan included living my 50s with my husband. Surprise! He has a terminal illness. So there's that. . . I always figured he'd go first, I just figured we would be in our '80s. Looking forward to leaning in to uncertainty.
I've had many a five year plans blow up. Some I torched. Some imploded. Some were a slow burn that started imperceptibly with a tiny ember from someone else's nearby flame. Didn't see it coming.
That's what happened the last time.
My latest 5-year plan ended when I went home for a 6-week visit and ended up staying to be the caregiver for my aging parents (one with Alzheimer's, the other legally blind).
Since then much has changed and I'm building a new life in North Carolina. I'm writing all about it here on Substack (https://nnekatrini.substack.com).
Still, I continue to make my plans:-) Even though they blow up, they move me closer to my desires.
🪂 Stepping into uncertainty and unknown as God is calling me into deep waters of the soul, shifting me, softening me, opening me. He has called me to build a Christian coaching business, a calling that both excites and terrifies me. Thank you for your writing and encouragement. Loved the last post about not having an instruction manual for all of this.
Hi Maddie, I found my way from your article 'Holding onto Smoke'. Thank you for that beautiful piece.
I'm Victoria: I'm a Carer, a Mentor, an advocate-activist of other caregivers, and a business owner of 2 companies outside of Substack. Over a couple of decades, I climbed the corporate ladder from Market research manager to Global Commercial VP of brand portfolios - that was 16 relocations across 9 countries. Underneath all the achievements and responsibilities stuff, I loved building teams, cross-cultural collaborations, strategy and confounding people as one of the youngest-looking Asian women.
I've been hugely blessed and can thrive despite experiencing the full amplitude of what life can offer over the last 8 years. I know I've experienced more 'life' in these years than I have before, which is why I have deep gratitude for small moments.
My emoji is the one I have for my company - a fiery phoenix. Simply, it represents the many times I've grown, burned bright, outgrew myself and have, so far, risen new again.
My story has many dimensions - hence why there are so many sections on my website! ;-)
There's lots we could share! I'm looking forward to growing our connection.
I'm particularly interested in reading & discussing interdependence from a perspective of carer support and preparing communities to help each other when current infrastructure and systems are failing our growing needs.
Are you familiar with Bruce Feiler - if not, take a look at his TED Talk video on my site
Maddie, hello! I just chatted with Chris Anselmo yesterday and he recommended your newsletter — it is EXACTLY what I need in my life right now. I'm so honored you liked my post on my own newsletter as well — I know I'm fangirling right now, but I feel like a celebrity just liked it!!!
Thank you for speaking to my soul with your posts, especially since I am definitely a type A person who struggles with uncertainty.
🎸 as someone who has been influenced more but the great philosophical movie The Big Lebowski than anything else in life, I've taken a lot of chances based on gut reaction. If anything goes wrong, "eff it dude, let's go bowling." Move from Boston to Denver? 48 hours is enough time to make that decision. Leave a comfortable corporate gig to go join a start-up? I trust the lady in charge, let's do it. And in my younger and single days, it's also led to some great stories. I don't do 1 year, 5 year plans and just trust it'll all work out, for better or for worse lol
Maddie! I’m just getting to know your work. I’m interested in creative freedom and myself and my husband are working towards being free to work digitally all over the world with our kids... I love following finance stuff and healing old money stories. I’ve done so much work on it all! Looking forward to reading more of your stuff. ✨
Hi, I’m Wendi. My Substack is “Changing Lives,” wendigordon.substack.com. My plan for the rest of my life, not just five years, went up in flames 🔥. But I lived through it, learned a lot in the process, and my husband and I are recovering and building a new and much better life now. I keep trying to plan things at least a few months out, then getting reminded once more than life usually doesn’t go as planned! I’m learning to embrace the uncertainty and enjoy the journey without worrying too much about the future. Some days I am able to do that; other days I just want the illusions of certainty and total control over my life that I used to have!
I echo everyone else's comments. This is a wonderful idea Maddie, and hello everyone!
I'm Chris. I live in Connecticut where I've lived all my life except for 12 years I spent in Boston, which happened to be where my plans (one, five, ten-year, full-life) went up in flames. I was diagnosed with an adult onset muscle disease after graduating from college, which made life quite unpredictable, to put it kindly.
However, the experience is what fuels my writing, so it hasn't all been bad. I enjoy meeting other writers and people interested in learning about how to be the best version of themselves despite life's up and downs.
I think I'm somewhere between 🔥 and 🎸, depending on the day. Other days I'm the GIF of the dumpster fire being swept away in a flood. But I have my good planning days too. For example, today I sat down to write for 3 hours and managed not to get distracted. Small wins!
My 1, 3 and 5 year plans have been decaying in a hot dumpster ever since I graduated from college. Grief, trauma and it’s aftermath in my body have made me, finally, at 48, stick to 1, 3 and 5 hour plans!
I spent my whole working life as the guy that slept in the office and never applied anywhere else out of loyalty and this idea I was indispensable. Then one day my boss did a runner and I realised I'd been in a toxic relationship where nothing would ever change until my abuser left me... It made me rethink how I work and for the past ten years I've been working remotely, before it was a thing... I've fine this in Switzerland, France and now in Barcelona, living my best life x
Hi Maddie, this is a great way to break the ice and build a community! 👏
I'm from Devon, England. I grew up on a small farm where we couldn't see our neighbours. But I've lived much of my life in megacities (Mexico City, Shanghai, Tokyo, Cairo) or large ones (London, Hong Kong). I describe myself as a recovering cultural bureaucrat having retired from my public sector job last year. I now write - copywriting (for money) and here on Substack (to learn/practise).
I used to plan a lot, so know that plans are just - well, plans. What actually happens is usually (almost always) something else. But knowing that doesn't always make dealing with it easy, does it? So I am 🔥but also entry level 🎸. And maybe a bit of 🙈.
Sep 22, 2023·edited Sep 22, 2023Liked by Maddie Burton
🎸 I've been at this uncertainty rock star game for most of my life.
My brother and parents died within 6 months of each other when I was 10 years old. It was all the things you could imagine and worse. Growing up without parents is filled with uncertainty. There are a lot of choices that have to be made on unstable ground and when that ground breaks, you have to pivot and adjust. Whilst I was lucky enough to stay with my sister afterwards, she herself was 22 years old when it happened with a 2 year old. She literally had 4 kids overnight. (My other siblings.) She didn't parent me and she didn't sugarcoat what our lives were going to be like and for that I'm very grateful. She provided a safe environment, made sure I was fed, but the rest I had to figure out. Eventually I got my own apartment in high school and was legally emancipated to be on my own. I could excuse myself from school, I signed off on "parent slips", etc. I went through school utterly heartbroken and there were days I didn't think I was going to make it.
Next would come even more death, my best friend was murdered in high school, a father figure died suddenly when I was 19 from cancer and then another best friend was murdered when I was 30. So much loss makes you realize how fleeting it all is. There has been so much grief, so much depression, and so much stumbling to make my way out of it. I'm grateful to have given myself access to A LOT of amazing therapy and reflection. (Talk therapy and EMDR are my favorite.)
There has also been A LOT of wild joy, dream come trues, adventures all over the world. I've done almost everything I've ever wanted to in this life and for that I am extremely proud.
I chose to embrace uncertainty because I was determined to survive and live a life filled with joy and excitement no matter what.
Recently, I've jumped into a new uncertainty. Instead of the stability of corporate life, I've chosen to focus on writing. I used to have a blog and it did fairly well, I also worked as a copy writer, but I never gave my writing the attention it deserved. I was dealing with earth shattering circumstances, I didn't always have the bandwidth to sit down and map out a direction that I wanted to go. And to be perfectly honest, for a while I had quite the contempt for life. It had been very cruel to me and being here felt like a jail sentence. I fought my way out of that dark forest and now I feel more like myself than I ever have.
I took a job where I can work from home, make my own schedule, and I love it. (I didn't want to work in an office, it is soul crushing for me.)
It allows me to work around my writing schedule and gives me the bandwidth to start building my writing career path.
Whilst some of my friends are 15-20 years into their careers, I am just a fledgling starting out in the writing world. It feels new and exciting, it also feels wonky and weird. That's life in any capacity, so I'll take it.
I love your Substack because it showcases that anything can happen at anytime. When people have rough childhoods, they tend to fantasize if things were different their adult lives would be different...and that isn't necessarily true. There are zero guarantees in life. Wild things happen all the time because that is life on planet earth. That is the contract we sign when we come here. The best shot we can give ourselves is to make friends with acceptance and mind the bends with as much love and care as we can.
Your story is beautiful and I'm so glad you are sharing it here. Thank you, Maddie.
Hi, Maddie! I’m a native New Yorker (Born in Brooklyn, grew up on Long Island) who after 40 years living and working in Manhattan decided 7 years ago to try out Chicago when my brother and sister in law opened a restaurant here. I loved it and stayed. When people ask what I did for a living, I ask “What decade?” I’ve been a professional chef and baker, degreed counselor(NYU) and non-profit exec. But I went to undergrad at St. Michael’s college for English and writing - I wanted to be a writer and somehow making a living and being distracted took me off course of that, but led me down extremely interesting paths and I met lots of fabulous people. It’s only taken me my whole life to come back to writing 😂 and I’m so glad I did because now I have decades of living to write about. The great bonus and joy of being on Substack is meeting wonderful people like you who, in a million years, I never would have met. Cheers, Maddie!
Oooh. Love this Maddie. Here is my quick response: Definitely this one...🔥🔥. Couldn't find the parachute emoji, so this hanging off a cliff one will have to do! It's appropriate. 🧗♀️. I think I've graduated from 🙈, or at the very least further along the way of letting those Type A tendencies go to find a new home in someone else. Great exercise. :)
🎸 Love the idea of this thread and happy that it's here. I'm Kathryn, a full-time writer in San Francisco working at the intersection of art and mental health.
As a freelance writer for the past twentyish years, I've had to navigate uncertainty in terms of income ebbs and flows, job changes, technology changes, etc. I live with double depression which means that there's often also uncertainty in my health/energy. I'm not sure that I've always embraced it, per se, but I have accepted that it's part of life and most of the time bob along on those waves without too much desperate paddling to shore.
Something that helps as a creative is seeing my work as a body of work, one that perhaps I don't even know the entire thread of at this close-up view. I imagine that after my death someone does a retrospective of all of my art and writing and makes sense of the themes of it all. Sometimes I see those themes and sometimes I don't but this lens helps me to realize that every single thing I'm creating matters to the big picture but also no one individual item is all that big of a deal. That helps a lot with the uncertainty of the creative path.
🔥 + 🙈. I'll kick things off! I'm your typical Type A overachiever, who loved planning so much that I made an entire career out of it (as a financial planner).
After experiencing a divorce, my mom's passing, and job loss in quick succession, it became clear that I needed to learn how to embrace uncertainty...whether I wanted to or not! This newsletter is my attempt at codifying everything I'm learning, and helping others along the way.
Hello. My five year plan included living my 50s with my husband. Surprise! He has a terminal illness. So there's that. . . I always figured he'd go first, I just figured we would be in our '80s. Looking forward to leaning in to uncertainty.
I've had many a five year plans blow up. Some I torched. Some imploded. Some were a slow burn that started imperceptibly with a tiny ember from someone else's nearby flame. Didn't see it coming.
That's what happened the last time.
My latest 5-year plan ended when I went home for a 6-week visit and ended up staying to be the caregiver for my aging parents (one with Alzheimer's, the other legally blind).
Since then much has changed and I'm building a new life in North Carolina. I'm writing all about it here on Substack (https://nnekatrini.substack.com).
Still, I continue to make my plans:-) Even though they blow up, they move me closer to my desires.
🪂 Stepping into uncertainty and unknown as God is calling me into deep waters of the soul, shifting me, softening me, opening me. He has called me to build a Christian coaching business, a calling that both excites and terrifies me. Thank you for your writing and encouragement. Loved the last post about not having an instruction manual for all of this.
Hi Maddie, I found my way from your article 'Holding onto Smoke'. Thank you for that beautiful piece.
I'm Victoria: I'm a Carer, a Mentor, an advocate-activist of other caregivers, and a business owner of 2 companies outside of Substack. Over a couple of decades, I climbed the corporate ladder from Market research manager to Global Commercial VP of brand portfolios - that was 16 relocations across 9 countries. Underneath all the achievements and responsibilities stuff, I loved building teams, cross-cultural collaborations, strategy and confounding people as one of the youngest-looking Asian women.
I've been hugely blessed and can thrive despite experiencing the full amplitude of what life can offer over the last 8 years. I know I've experienced more 'life' in these years than I have before, which is why I have deep gratitude for small moments.
My emoji is the one I have for my company - a fiery phoenix. Simply, it represents the many times I've grown, burned bright, outgrew myself and have, so far, risen new again.
My story has many dimensions - hence why there are so many sections on my website! ;-)
There's lots we could share! I'm looking forward to growing our connection.
I'm particularly interested in reading & discussing interdependence from a perspective of carer support and preparing communities to help each other when current infrastructure and systems are failing our growing needs.
Are you familiar with Bruce Feiler - if not, take a look at his TED Talk video on my site
Maddie, hello! I just chatted with Chris Anselmo yesterday and he recommended your newsletter — it is EXACTLY what I need in my life right now. I'm so honored you liked my post on my own newsletter as well — I know I'm fangirling right now, but I feel like a celebrity just liked it!!!
Thank you for speaking to my soul with your posts, especially since I am definitely a type A person who struggles with uncertainty.
Would love to stay connected :)
🎸 as someone who has been influenced more but the great philosophical movie The Big Lebowski than anything else in life, I've taken a lot of chances based on gut reaction. If anything goes wrong, "eff it dude, let's go bowling." Move from Boston to Denver? 48 hours is enough time to make that decision. Leave a comfortable corporate gig to go join a start-up? I trust the lady in charge, let's do it. And in my younger and single days, it's also led to some great stories. I don't do 1 year, 5 year plans and just trust it'll all work out, for better or for worse lol
Maddie! I’m just getting to know your work. I’m interested in creative freedom and myself and my husband are working towards being free to work digitally all over the world with our kids... I love following finance stuff and healing old money stories. I’ve done so much work on it all! Looking forward to reading more of your stuff. ✨
Hi, I’m Wendi. My Substack is “Changing Lives,” wendigordon.substack.com. My plan for the rest of my life, not just five years, went up in flames 🔥. But I lived through it, learned a lot in the process, and my husband and I are recovering and building a new and much better life now. I keep trying to plan things at least a few months out, then getting reminded once more than life usually doesn’t go as planned! I’m learning to embrace the uncertainty and enjoy the journey without worrying too much about the future. Some days I am able to do that; other days I just want the illusions of certainty and total control over my life that I used to have!
I echo everyone else's comments. This is a wonderful idea Maddie, and hello everyone!
I'm Chris. I live in Connecticut where I've lived all my life except for 12 years I spent in Boston, which happened to be where my plans (one, five, ten-year, full-life) went up in flames. I was diagnosed with an adult onset muscle disease after graduating from college, which made life quite unpredictable, to put it kindly.
However, the experience is what fuels my writing, so it hasn't all been bad. I enjoy meeting other writers and people interested in learning about how to be the best version of themselves despite life's up and downs.
I think I'm somewhere between 🔥 and 🎸, depending on the day. Other days I'm the GIF of the dumpster fire being swept away in a flood. But I have my good planning days too. For example, today I sat down to write for 3 hours and managed not to get distracted. Small wins!
My 1, 3 and 5 year plans have been decaying in a hot dumpster ever since I graduated from college. Grief, trauma and it’s aftermath in my body have made me, finally, at 48, stick to 1, 3 and 5 hour plans!
I spent my whole working life as the guy that slept in the office and never applied anywhere else out of loyalty and this idea I was indispensable. Then one day my boss did a runner and I realised I'd been in a toxic relationship where nothing would ever change until my abuser left me... It made me rethink how I work and for the past ten years I've been working remotely, before it was a thing... I've fine this in Switzerland, France and now in Barcelona, living my best life x
Hi Maddie, this is a great way to break the ice and build a community! 👏
I'm from Devon, England. I grew up on a small farm where we couldn't see our neighbours. But I've lived much of my life in megacities (Mexico City, Shanghai, Tokyo, Cairo) or large ones (London, Hong Kong). I describe myself as a recovering cultural bureaucrat having retired from my public sector job last year. I now write - copywriting (for money) and here on Substack (to learn/practise).
I used to plan a lot, so know that plans are just - well, plans. What actually happens is usually (almost always) something else. But knowing that doesn't always make dealing with it easy, does it? So I am 🔥but also entry level 🎸. And maybe a bit of 🙈.
🎸 I've been at this uncertainty rock star game for most of my life.
My brother and parents died within 6 months of each other when I was 10 years old. It was all the things you could imagine and worse. Growing up without parents is filled with uncertainty. There are a lot of choices that have to be made on unstable ground and when that ground breaks, you have to pivot and adjust. Whilst I was lucky enough to stay with my sister afterwards, she herself was 22 years old when it happened with a 2 year old. She literally had 4 kids overnight. (My other siblings.) She didn't parent me and she didn't sugarcoat what our lives were going to be like and for that I'm very grateful. She provided a safe environment, made sure I was fed, but the rest I had to figure out. Eventually I got my own apartment in high school and was legally emancipated to be on my own. I could excuse myself from school, I signed off on "parent slips", etc. I went through school utterly heartbroken and there were days I didn't think I was going to make it.
Next would come even more death, my best friend was murdered in high school, a father figure died suddenly when I was 19 from cancer and then another best friend was murdered when I was 30. So much loss makes you realize how fleeting it all is. There has been so much grief, so much depression, and so much stumbling to make my way out of it. I'm grateful to have given myself access to A LOT of amazing therapy and reflection. (Talk therapy and EMDR are my favorite.)
There has also been A LOT of wild joy, dream come trues, adventures all over the world. I've done almost everything I've ever wanted to in this life and for that I am extremely proud.
I chose to embrace uncertainty because I was determined to survive and live a life filled with joy and excitement no matter what.
Recently, I've jumped into a new uncertainty. Instead of the stability of corporate life, I've chosen to focus on writing. I used to have a blog and it did fairly well, I also worked as a copy writer, but I never gave my writing the attention it deserved. I was dealing with earth shattering circumstances, I didn't always have the bandwidth to sit down and map out a direction that I wanted to go. And to be perfectly honest, for a while I had quite the contempt for life. It had been very cruel to me and being here felt like a jail sentence. I fought my way out of that dark forest and now I feel more like myself than I ever have.
I took a job where I can work from home, make my own schedule, and I love it. (I didn't want to work in an office, it is soul crushing for me.)
It allows me to work around my writing schedule and gives me the bandwidth to start building my writing career path.
Whilst some of my friends are 15-20 years into their careers, I am just a fledgling starting out in the writing world. It feels new and exciting, it also feels wonky and weird. That's life in any capacity, so I'll take it.
I love your Substack because it showcases that anything can happen at anytime. When people have rough childhoods, they tend to fantasize if things were different their adult lives would be different...and that isn't necessarily true. There are zero guarantees in life. Wild things happen all the time because that is life on planet earth. That is the contract we sign when we come here. The best shot we can give ourselves is to make friends with acceptance and mind the bends with as much love and care as we can.
Your story is beautiful and I'm so glad you are sharing it here. Thank you, Maddie.
Hi, Maddie! I’m a native New Yorker (Born in Brooklyn, grew up on Long Island) who after 40 years living and working in Manhattan decided 7 years ago to try out Chicago when my brother and sister in law opened a restaurant here. I loved it and stayed. When people ask what I did for a living, I ask “What decade?” I’ve been a professional chef and baker, degreed counselor(NYU) and non-profit exec. But I went to undergrad at St. Michael’s college for English and writing - I wanted to be a writer and somehow making a living and being distracted took me off course of that, but led me down extremely interesting paths and I met lots of fabulous people. It’s only taken me my whole life to come back to writing 😂 and I’m so glad I did because now I have decades of living to write about. The great bonus and joy of being on Substack is meeting wonderful people like you who, in a million years, I never would have met. Cheers, Maddie!
Oooh. Love this Maddie. Here is my quick response: Definitely this one...🔥🔥. Couldn't find the parachute emoji, so this hanging off a cliff one will have to do! It's appropriate. 🧗♀️. I think I've graduated from 🙈, or at the very least further along the way of letting those Type A tendencies go to find a new home in someone else. Great exercise. :)
🎸 Love the idea of this thread and happy that it's here. I'm Kathryn, a full-time writer in San Francisco working at the intersection of art and mental health.
As a freelance writer for the past twentyish years, I've had to navigate uncertainty in terms of income ebbs and flows, job changes, technology changes, etc. I live with double depression which means that there's often also uncertainty in my health/energy. I'm not sure that I've always embraced it, per se, but I have accepted that it's part of life and most of the time bob along on those waves without too much desperate paddling to shore.
Something that helps as a creative is seeing my work as a body of work, one that perhaps I don't even know the entire thread of at this close-up view. I imagine that after my death someone does a retrospective of all of my art and writing and makes sense of the themes of it all. Sometimes I see those themes and sometimes I don't but this lens helps me to realize that every single thing I'm creating matters to the big picture but also no one individual item is all that big of a deal. That helps a lot with the uncertainty of the creative path.