Making My Bed Saved My Life
The truth about how energy shifts your mind—and why small actions matter more than big epiphanies
Survival Series: Part Three
There’s a moment in any collapse where you realize something awful and liberating at the same time:
The old identity is gone. And the new one isn’t here yet.
That’s the raw middle.
Not poetic. Not inspiring. Not cinematic.
Just a woman in pajama pants standing in her own home, looking out the window at Ninth Street, watching people walk past with their coffees and their dogs and their grocery bags—all acting like the world was normal.
But my world wasn’t normal.
My roles weren’t intact. My sense of self wasn’t intact.
Was I still the brave one? The strong one? The woman who uprooted her entire life and moved to a new town at seventy, believing she could start again?
Or was I the woman who had just spent three months terrified on her couch, too weak to stand, crawling through the dark?
I didn’t know.
And that uncertainty—that standing in the terrifying middle with no map, no signposts, no sense of who I was supposed to be next—that’s the part nobody prepares you for.
People love to talk about reinvention like it’s glamorous.
Like you have some big epiphany, burn your old life down, and rise from the ashes with a new wardrobe and a five-year plan.
Let me tell you the truth:
Reinvention starts with something embarrassingly small.
Mine started with making my bed.
Not because I was virtuous. Not because I was motivated. Not because I was “turning my life around.”
I did it because everything else felt too big.
Write a new business plan? Too big.
Figure out my purpose? Too big.
Call someone and explain what I’d been through? Way too big.
But making my bed?
That I could do.
So I did it.
One small, crooked, not-even-close-to-HGTV bed.
The sheets were wrinkled. The blanket was uneven. It looked like a seven-year-old had done it.
But the moment I stepped back and looked at it, something shifted.
Not the room.
Me.
That tiny act created the smallest spark of order in my body—a spark that lifted my energy just enough to change how I was thinking.
I wasn’t the woman who had fallen apart on the couch anymore.
I was the woman who could take one clear step.
And here’s what nobody tells you about energy:
Once it shifts—even slightly—your mind follows.
That spark of physical energy created a spark in my thoughts. And that mental spark allowed me to feel something I hadn’t felt in months:
Possibility.
Not certainty. Not clarity. Not confidence.
Just the faintest whisper of maybe.
Maybe I could heat soup without collapsing.
Maybe I could open the blinds.
Maybe I could take a shower tomorrow.
Maybe—eventually—I could figure out who I was becoming.
The fear quieted. The next thought came in cleaner. The next step felt possible.
I couldn’t have told you that morning who I was or where I was going. I had no grand vision, no five-year plan, no sense of direction.
But I had made my bed.
And that crooked little bed—and the energy it sparked—was the first proof that the new identity, the one I hadn’t met yet, was already forming.
Tomorrow I’ll tell you what that next thing was.
Unfancy. Unspiritualized.
Exactly what actually worked when all I had left was myself.
P.S.
I just realized something while writing this.
I still make my bed first thing every morning.
Sure, I used to make it before—eventually. After the first cup of coffee. After scrolling Substack. After the bathroom trip.
But now?
I hop out and make the bed before I do anything else.
Not because I’m disciplined. Not because I read some productivity guru’s advice.
But because my body remembers.
It remembers that morning when I didn’t know who I was anymore and making that crooked bed was the first proof I was still here.
That tiny spark became a ritual. And that ritual became the foundation of who I am now.
Some survival skills don’t leave you once you learn them.
They just become part of how you show up for yourself—every single day.
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I am enjoying your Survival Series. I can’t find the 4th installment. Can you help me with that?
I am 5 days short of 4 months since the love of my life passed away. I haven’t read far enough back to know much of your crushing blows but I read it was significant loss. I am so sorry for your losses.
I am still lost. Every act of the holidays rings empty except for one and that is - I am honoring my beloved -one day at a time. I have a long way to go. My start was brushing my teeth. Thank you!