More Than Fine

Have you felt under the gun lately?

Like you are taking hits from all directions? Like the smoke is thick, the noise is loud, and you are trying to keep moving even though you are not entirely sure you are still pointed in the right direction?

I have been there.

A few years ago, I had one of those years that came with lovely highs and tush-kicking lows. If I judged that year only by what went wrong, I would still be in a permanent state of whine-one-one.

And yes, at the time, I skated a little too close to the cliff.

Not the “I need one quiet afternoon” cliff.

The “I have been telling everyone I am fine, but I am actually fine while hurtling toward trouble” cliff.

That realization made me mad at myself because there was so much good in that year. The wonderful really was wonderful. The blessings were real. The happy moments mattered.

But here is the thing I learned the hard way: counting blessings is good, but it is not always a one-size-fits-all fix for hard times.

Sometimes you can be grateful and tired.

Grateful and overwhelmed.

Grateful and stretched too thin.

Grateful and still in need of rest, quiet, help, or a serious rethink.

That was the part I missed.

I kept telling myself I was fine.

And I was fine.

Fine, while heading toward a cliff at a brisk pace.

Not ideal.

So I stopped.

That sounds simple, but it was not. Stopping felt irresponsible. There were things to do. People to care about. Work to finish. Goals to chase. Books to write. Plans to keep moving forward.

But stopping was the first wise thing I had done in a while.

I had to ask myself where I was, where I was going, and whether I actually wanted to end up there.

That question matters.

It matters in life.

It matters in business.

It really matters when you run your own creative business and every opportunity shows up wearing a tiny hat that says, “This is urgent!”

Spoiler alert: not everything is urgent.

Some things are important.

Some things would be nice.

Some things are someone else’s panic trying to climb into your inbox and eat your day.

And some things really are urgent. If the Hubs is having chest pains, that is a priority. No committee meeting is needed. No spreadsheet. No inspirational quote. That is a get-moving-now situation.

But a lot of what feels urgent is not.

A lot of it is noise.

A lot of it is comparison.

A lot of it is the pressure to do more, publish faster, post better, market smarter, learn every new tool, understand every new platform, answer every email, update every sales page, and somehow also remain a functional human who remembers where she left her soft drink.

As an author, I love my readers. I love writing stories for them. I love that my books get to go out into the world and become part of someone else’s reading life.

But I cannot write and publish as fast as everyone might like.

That way lies the cliff.

Taking care of business, I keep learning, also means taking care of Real World Pauline and Author Pauline.

They are not always the same person, but they do share one body, one brain, one calendar, and one limited supply of chocolate.

The balance is tricky.

There are readers, family, work, health, home, marketing, books, business decisions, and all those fictional people wandering around inside my head asking when it is their turn.

Some days it feels less like balance and more like tap dancing on a tightrope.

Did I mention I do not like heights?

But when I look back on that hard year, I see the lesson more clearly now.

I needed time to reflect.

I needed time to think.

I needed time to plan.

I needed time to refill the inner well so I could be there for the people who needed me, and so I could be more than “fine.”

Somewhere in all the sound and fury, I forgot to value silence.

I forgot that thinking counts as work.

I forgot that rest is not quitting.

I forgot that every day is fresh and new.

The past shapes us, but our choices going forward still matter.

That is the hopeful part.

We are not required to keep hurtling toward the cliff just because we picked up speed.

We can stop.

We can reassess.

We can decide what matters now.

We can choose the next right step, even if it is smaller than the big dramatic leap we planned in January.

Maybe especially then.

I keep this Robert Louis Stevenson quote where I can see it:

“Everyday courage has few witnesses. But yours is no less noble because no drum beats for you and no crowds shout your name.”

I love that.

Because most of life is made of everyday courage.

The quiet kind.

The unphotographed kind.

The kind where no one sees you decide not to give up.

So here we are, with May behind us and summer tapping at the door like it forgot to call first.

How has 2026 been treating you so far?

Are you going the distance, or do you need a pause, a rethink, or a little more quiet?

Any hopes for the rest of the year?

Grand hopes are welcome.

Modest hopes count, too.

Some days, modest hopes are the bravest ones.

I write essays here, and I write novels everywhere else. Both are fueled by curiosity, humor, adventure, and a stubborn belief that everyday courage matters.

If you would like to explore the fiction side of my work, you can find my books here.

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