Raise your hand if you're playing around with AI trying to figure out how it can make your life easier. ✋

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Raise your hand if you're finding some genuinely helpful uses for AI. ✋

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Raise your hand if you maybe started asking AI to weigh in on some of the more complicated aspects of your life and it was helpful right up to the point when you remembered that it's not a real person with a real point of view and it's biased toward encouraging feedback and, at times, gives contradictory feedback and cannot be trusted to solve all of your problems.  Reality check, crying, a little break down… Just me?  I thought so.

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I wish I could say this breakdown moment happened to a friend of mine, but, no, it was totally me and as comical as it is to write about it now, it didn't actually feel funny at the time.  It felt awful.  Embarrassing.  Hopeless.

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I'd taken Claude to a whole new level treating it like a source of wisdom, an answer, an aquifer.  And it isn't.

 

The woman everyone leans on

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So many women, especially those of you who are highly functional, doers, planners, problem solvers, find themselves in the role of being the one who others look to for the answers, who will get s*** done, the women we lean on, unload on, show up to in pieces knowing they'll kinda put us back together.  It's a skill women often inhabit without even really trying.  We're just ready for it, good at it, feminine, maternal, nurturing.  This ability can become a source of great pride, even an income, a gift to provide to a relationship.

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But it's also taxing and other-focused and draining, even when we enjoy doing it.

 

You might be a well 🪣

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Women are like a well: A water source.  Life-giving.  Needed.  Sustaining.  Consistent.  Reliable.  Full.  Whether by choice or default, we can easily become the person, the thing, so many others depend on; they take, sometimes, but rarely, acknowledge the taking, take and forget to say thank you, and take, take, take.  So we provide, provide, provide hoping and attempting to keep our own reservoir full.  We settle into a system of filling ourselves up, we get pretty good at it, others take and then we fill back up again.  We are so deep and good at self-sustaining, we may not even know exactly how we accomplish this, let alone how to communicate the system to anyone else.  Once upon a time, wells were protected and tended to because their connection to survival was apparent.  Today we often tuck our wells behind drywall or a pretty exterior, but the dependence remains.

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Do you ever feel like a well?  The sustaining, essential, providing, and giving source of so many things to so many different people and systems in your life?  Many people depend on you, or maybe just a few really needy people.  That's the setup, which works so well until the well starts to…run…dry…

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A dry well feels awful. It feels flat, irritating, limp, and scary.

 

When the well runs dry

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Now what?  A well isn't a machine.  You are not a machine, you can run dry, too.  And this can evoke FEELINGS.  All shapes and sizes of feelings, some of which are very intense: guilt, shame, hopelessness, burnout, failure, confusion.  And doubt about your ability to be the well, your ability to be depended on, and whether or not you'll ever fill back up again.  I've been an empty well.  Maybe you have, too.  Maybe you even feel that way right now.  Scared of hearing the footsteps of the people who need you inching closer with their buckets in hand.

 

How a well actually stays full

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(I'm a city girl, I had to Google this one).  The system of a full well is a beautiful thing precisely because it's not magic or luck, it's intentional and maintained.

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A well stays full because:

1. It was positioned correctly. It's in a spot to receive.

2. It has a casing to keep the mud and rocks out.

3. It doesn't make water - it's connected to surrounding sources of cool, clean water that moves in to replace what is taken.

 

Let's linger on each of these for a bit:

 

1. You are already positioned correctly

And you can't convince me otherwise.  However long ago you surveyed the land, assessed where the water is naturally plentiful and made decisions about where to put yourself.  You thought about what you want, what you're good at, what would help you achieve your goals, and from there you dug.  Your education, your relationships, your work, your family, all of these are evidence of the intentional and consistent digging you've been doing for years. ⛏️

 

2. The casing keeps the muddy water out

Groundwater is dirty, possibly toxic stuff.  It runs along picking up gunk - comparison to others, offhanded comments that are hard to let go of, outer expectations you don't know what to do with.  It looks and feels like water, but it isn't coming from the deep places the well was designed to pull from.  The casing differentiates the gunk from what's real: deep knowing, your intuition, your self acceptance, your true love for those in your inner orbit and your grand ability to connect.

 

3. A well does not make its own water

I'll say it again, a well does NOT make its own water.  Yes, people depend on you, but it is not your job to create water when water is nowhere in sight.  If you're feeling pressure my guess it comes from the misconception that you need to create fullness.  No, your sense of dryness and depletion is an invitation to reconnect to fullness.

 

The aquifer 💧

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All wells are connected to an aquifer, an enormous, ancient, and shared water-source.  It's deep, plentiful, and best of all, it will meet you where you're at.

 

If you're bone dry and barely functioning

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(I've been there).  It's ok to start small.  Starting small might even feel better for you so nothing floods and nothing is wasted.

Stretch.  Smell something delicious.  Bury your face in the soft fur of an animal.  Drink a glass of water.  Watch tree leaves wiggle around for a minute.  Wear a piece of clothing that's less functional and more appetizing.  Pray.

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Is any of this revolutionary advice you've never heard before?  No!  Is it a reminder to remember the process you're going through: tapping into play, nourishment, nature, spirituality, sensuality and to do it with the INTENT TO FILL YOUR WELL?  That's my hope.  Sometimes the reframe alone can help because you have a plan for that drink of water, that stretch, that smell you're actually taking the time to enjoy.  These little acts transform from passive experiences to intentional and sustaining pulls from the aquifer that is there for you when you're ready.

 

If "go smell a candle" sounds too fluffy

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(And I totally get why it might sound a little light.)

Take a look into yourself.  You have survived.  What have you survived?  You have built.  What have you built?  You have educated yourself.  What do you know about?  I bet if I were sitting in front of you I could easily name 5 things about you that we can both admire.  The evidence of your self.

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Humans can be almost too forward thinking, especially those of you who are ambitious and nurturing.  The list of things we want to accomplish and the ways we want to support the people we love is ever-growing and can get really long.  So long, in fact, that we get lost in it and forget about the equally long trail of successes behind us.  I bet you've had big successes.  I bet you've graduated high school.  Learned to drive.  Tended to your family through tough times.  Properly set up a new iPhone (why is this so hard?!?).  And these are things you may have forgotten about as you focus on everything you're not doing and all the distracting feelings like doubt, guilt, and failure.

You're just a great, hard working, super functional well stuck in a dry season.  I see you over there! 👋

 

If you have more capacity

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Then we're off to the races tapping into the big stuff.  The following list includes some of the deepest, most tried and true sources of life-giving water I've come to know and learn about from all the amazing women I get to sit with.  These can be soaked up in little dabs or big, sustaining gulps depending on what you have time and need for.

 

🤝 Let other women replenish you - Some women are already full and very ready to mother and nourish you with whatever you need: wisdom, care-taking, perspective, humor, doing things for you, buying you things.  One of my favorites is to listen to a podcast where women talk business with each other - I don't even have to respond :)

 

✨ Pleasure - What do you want?  Not what's practical, what's joy filled and seems to stem from nothing other than desire.  Things that make you smile both inside and out when you think of them.  Following nudges toward pleasure is deeply and divinely feminine.  Let the sun warm you up, use a fancy glass for your beverage, sink into a hug.

 

🌿 Dig deeper - Into the things in your life that are bigger, older, wider, stronger, and more evergreen than you.  This is a nebulous list but can take the form of spirituality, nature, poetry, exercise, sensuality, and self-trust.  You have already placed your well in the exact spot it needs to be; digging deeper into this spot can bring even more water.

 

This is not an exhaustive list.  It's not a suggestion or a requirement for a full well.  It's based on what I've observed in women over time to have worked to aid them when in a season of drought all the way to wanting more of the good water they already have.

 

None of this is coming from Claude…ah, that's still so embarrassing. 🫠

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Some of you will give away each new drop you acquire to the thirsty surrounding you.  Some of you will stockpile a reservoir for safe keeping and lay down in the middle of your vast and consistent water source until you are soaked through and through.  Many of you will find something in between.  From fullness, you choose what to do.