I've been thinking about Dante.
I've always loved stories about family elders who will stand up at an occasion to recite a poem they've long had lodged in their memory. If I want to be that matriarch someday, I'd better start expanding my mental roster, but I do have a few (short) pieces that I can ramble off at a moment's notice.
In eighth grade French, I memorized "Déjeuner du matin" by Jacques Prévert for a mandatory accent competition. (I made it to states!)
That same year, we studied William Carlos Williams in English class. In fact, "The Red Wheelbarrow" played a role in my knowing I was going to marry Michael. My wedding ring has "White chickens" inscribed inside, and his has "Red wheelbarrow."
And then there's Dante.
In senior year Italian, my teacher, Sra Svec, did something that feels wild to me now. She walked our small class through Dante's Inferno, in the original Italian with an accompanying translation by Robert Pinsky. It immediately became one of my top three favorite books. We recited the opening lines at an all-school assembly:
Nel mezzo del cammin di nostra vita, mi ritrovai per una selva oscura, ché la diritta via era smarrita.
Midway through the journey of our life, I found myself in a dark wood, for the straight path had been lost.
I had no idea at age 17 that those lines were planting a seed for my life's work.
A painting of Dante holding The Divine Comedy
I snapped this photo in the Duomo in Florence 18 years ago!
You are someone who gets things done. You've gotten all the things done, in fact — the career, the credentials, the relationships, the life that was supposed to feel like arrival. You did it all right.
And somewhere along the way, perhaps you looked around and thought: Wait. This isn't what this was supposed to feel like. I thought I was going to be up there. Why am I here?
Lo and behold, we find ourselves right at the opening of Dante's Inferno. Midway through the journey of your life, you find yourself in a dark wood. The straight path — the one you were so certain you were on — is suddenly, bewilderingly lost.
Just like our buddy Dante.
And how did he navigate his way through the depths so he could ultimately arrive at Paradiso? He needed a guide.
He needed Virgil.
I have spent five years trying to explain what I do, and for the last few months I keep coming back to this:
I am your Virgil.
OK, bold claim, but here's what I mean:
My work is walking brilliant, unapologetically ambitious women into and through the underworld, the depths where the real excavation happens, and helping them make sense of everything they encounter there.
Because it is only by descending — by really going there — that you get to Paradiso. The most blissful, beautiful, outrageously rich life you can possibly imagine. Not the life you were told to want. The one that's burgling up from your soul, the one that is asking things of you that don't totally make sense yet, the one that feels like a holy wow.
This is what happens inside coaching.
I have three July sessions left at a friends and family rate of $150 — a lower-stakes way to experience this work before you commit to an ongoing engagement. One session can move something that's been stuck for months. I've watched it happen more times than I can count.
If you've been in the dark wood — if you've been doing all the right things and wondering why it doesn't feel the way it was supposed to — click the button below. Let's take a few steps together.
