Consider the Lilies: An Essay

& an announcement about the Hatch!

Me trying very hard to read, Lentil trying very hard to thwart any attempt at productivity

Hi friend,

This is the longest I’ve gone in more than four years without sending a newsletter, and while this break has been a balm, providing much needed rest and time to reconnect with family, I’ve missed being in touch with you very much. So I wanted to put together a little missive to say hello and also to share a couple of things. 

One is an essay I wrote recently called “Consider the Lilies,” which is available in full for paid subscribers below. In my last newsletter, I wrote about how, for as long as I can remember, my sense of self-worth has been tied to my output, and to take time off, I feel like I have to earn it. Many of you responded saying you struggled with the same. That lifelong challenge is the subject of the essay; in it, I reflect on the tyranny of striving and hustle culture and meditate on how I first learned—and am relearning—the importance of rest.

The second thing is an announcement about the Hatch—which is happening this Sunday, July 28 from 1-2pm ET (mark your google calendar here). For those of you who are new, the Hatch is our virtual creative hour for paid subscribers, where we gather for a dose of inspiration and connection. We start with a short reading and mini-lecture, then spend the rest of the hour journaling (or drawing, painting, or making music) together. Our managing editor, Carmen Radley, is hosting this time, sharing a poem about magic and several magical prompts. It’s the warmest, loveliest way to spend an hour, and I hope you’ll join us. We’ll send an email to paid subscribers with the Zoom link this Saturday.

Until then, I hope you’re able to reflect on your own relationship to rest, and if you have tips for unplugging—like how you carve out the time, what rest looks like for you, and what it makes space for—feel free to share them in the comments!

Sending love,
Suleika

Anne Francey, Battle of the Angels (1988), on view now at ArtYard

Consider the Lilies by Suleika Jaouad

I was always a striver, it seems, and in my younger years, I wore it as a badge of pride—something I now recall with more than a little embarrassment. At age 12, I announced to my mom it was my last year to be “precocious,” and it was time to get serious. I threw myself into things full force, whether it was ballet or the double bass or writing novellas on yellow legal pads. As the child of immigrants, I knew the sacrifices that had paved the way for me, especially those of my dad, whose parents could not read or write, who was the only one of their eight children to leave his homeland of Tunisia. It felt important to honor those sacrifices by making something of myself.

So I earned a full-ride to Princeton, where I proceeded to work myself to the bone. I was furiously motivated by a fear of failure and also what I now recognize as a serious case of imposter syndrome. It proved an effective strategy. I graduated with honors while holding down two jobs. For my next step, I imagined an impressive career as a foreign correspondent, reporting on international conflicts like the Arab Spring. 

I never got my foot in the door of a newsroom, though—at least, not as a war reporter. A year after graduation, I learned that I had acute myeloid leukemia, which came with a 35-percent chance of long-term survival. I was only 22, and I couldn’t wrap my head around what that meant. I couldn’t possibly have cancer—I had plans. But you know what they say about plans: humans make them and God laughs.