What If the Work Now Isn’t Catching Up—But Letting Myself Arrive?

A reflection on ambition, urgency, and learning how to be "on time" for my own life

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I’ve never missed a deadline, but I live with a constant sense that I’m behind.

I’m part of a group called the Wise Women’s Council, and recently the woman who runs it, Sarah K. Peck, shared a quote that stopped me in my tracks:

You are not behind.

There is no behind.

You are exactly where you are and we are so happy that you are here.

Sometimes quotes like this wash over me. They’re nice. Reassuring. Easy to nod along to before moving on with my day.

This one didn’t do that.

It lodged somewhere deeper—not in my head, but in my body. And I realized, with surprising clarity, that I live with a persistent, visceral sense that I am behind. Not intellectually. Nervously. Somatically. Like my system is always bracing, always catching up to an invisible clock.

I feel it first thing in the morning, when I snap to attention before I’ve even fully woken up—my mind already racing through everything I want to do, everything I should do, everything that might slip if I don’t stay on top of it.

I feel it during school drop-offs, checking the time, worried about being late, already thinking about emails and deadlines and obligations piling up like an avalanche in the background of my psyche.

It’s not exactly panic. And it’s not constant anxiety in the way I once knew it—I’ve done a lot of work to steady my mind over the years. But it’s there, humming underneath everything. A low-grade urgency. A sense that I’m always slightly behind where I should be.

And that’s what shook me about the quote. Not that I disagreed with it—but that my nervous system didn’t believe it.

So I started wondering: what would it actually feel like—not as a thought experiment, but in my body—to believe that I’m not behind? That I’m exactly where I’m meant to be. That I’m right on time for my own life.

How would that change how I move through the world? How I show up to my days? How I breathe?

I got to thinking about what “on time” means, what “late” means. For what, for whom? I remembered a moment from years ago, at one of my first book parties. I was standing around with a group of writers and editors, and the editors were laughing about how most writers are perpetually late with deadlines. They said it affectionately, like a known truth of the trade.

Then one of them turned to me and said, almost with surprise, “You’re the exception. You never miss deadlines.”

I took it as a compliment at the time—and in many ways, it is. But looking back now, I see it more clearly. Never missing a deadline isn’t just professionalism for me. It’s a coping mechanism. It’s how my anxiety learned to be useful.

Staying ahead became a way of staying safe.

I don’t think this is unique to me. I think a lot of us—especially women, especially mothers, especially people who learned early how to be capable—confuse urgency with virtue. We get praised for being on top of things, for holding it all together, for never dropping the ball. And slowly, quietly, our bodies learn that rest is risky and arrival is suspicious. That there’s always something else we should be doing, fixing, proving.

And here’s the thing that keeps circling back for me: if I’m never missing deadlines—if I’ve done the big things I set out to do—what, exactly, am I behind for?

I’ve written two bestselling memoirs. I’ve built a meaningful career doing work I care deeply about. I have a full, beautiful life: a loving, brilliant partner; two funny, infuriating, wonderful, healthy kids; a cuddly dog; a home that holds us; friendships and creative projects and days that feel rich in ways I once dreamed about.

So why does that feeling persist?

I think part of the answer lives in ambition—one of my greatest strengths and also, sometimes, my quietest tormentor. Ambition can be a powerful engine. But it can also create a moving finish line, where nothing ever quite counts as enough.

My brain is very good at this game. Yes, the book did well—but not that well. Yes, that goal was met—but not in every possible way. There’s always another benchmark, another comparison, another imagined version of success that I didn’t quite reach.

And somewhere along the way, I started measuring my worth not by how present I was in my life, but by how efficiently I was chasing the next thing.

The question that keeps rising now is gentler, but harder: when do I get to arrive?

When do I let myself feel that this is enough—that I am enough—not because the external boxes have all been checked, but because I’m showing up to my life with integrity, presence, and imperfect authenticity?

I don’t want to opt out of ambition. I still care about growth and making things and wanting more. But I don’t want urgency to be the price of entry. I don’t want to live as if I’m always late to my own life.

What if the work now isn’t catching up—but letting myself arrive?

Letting my nervous system believe what my mind already knows. Letting myself experience this season, this life, this moment, without bracing for what’s next.

Maybe being “on time” isn’t about when things happen.

Maybe it’s about whether we’re here when they do.

I’m curious what it would feel like—for me, and maybe for you—to practice being on time not by doing more, but by finally letting ourselves be here.