The Body Sends the Invoice

My back went out recently, and it didn’t ease me into it.

One day I was fine, and the next I could barely move without paying for it.

I haven’t got this wrapped up neatly, and my back isn’t done teaching me yet, but three things are already clear.

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1. The warnings were never small.

I’d like to tell you it came out of nowhere, but it didn’t.

The small warnings had been there for a while, and I treated each one as something to deal with once the calendar calmed down.

The calendar never calmed down, so my body stopped asking and collected the whole bill at once.

The first thing it took was running, and running isn’t exercise for me, it’s where I sort my head out.

Without it my thinking got loud and messy in a way I didn’t like.

I couldn’t even sit for meditation, which is usually the one practice I can fall back on when everything else is off.

Every time I tried, the pain pulled my attention straight back to my body, and the stillness I normally go there for just wasn’t available.

The dogs would wait by the door for a walk I couldn’t give them, and I found that harder to sit with than I expected.

Then it took my energy, and that was the one that scared me.

Pain is tiring in a way people don’t talk about, because your body spends the whole day bracing, and by the afternoon there was nothing left for the work or the people I care about.

Some of what I felt was fear, if I’m honest.

When your body stops cooperating, a quiet voice asks whether this is the start of something, whether this is what getting older looks like, and I didn’t have a good answer for it.

I tell founders “energy before time” all the time, and I believe it, which made it more embarrassing to be the one who ignored it.

The calendar will always feel more urgent, which is exactly why the body has to win that argument before it turns into an invoice.

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2. Pain will do your subtraction for you if you won’t.

For a few days the pain made the decisions I’d been putting off, clearing things off my schedule without asking whether they mattered.

On Quarterly Planning days with leadership teams, I’m normally on my feet, moving around the room, reading people up close and using the space to keep the energy up.

This time I had to sit for most of it, and I felt like I was facilitating with one hand tied behind my back.

The day still worked.

Nothing fell over anywhere else either, the clients were fine, the work kept moving, and I was surprised by how little I missed some of what had disappeared.

At home, the kids carried on with their days, Jasmine carried on with hers, and the house kept running without me holding it all together.

If those commitments could vanish without anyone noticing, I have to ask why I’d been carrying them so carefully.

I think being the one who carries everything has been part of how I see myself, and putting things down felt like losing a piece of that.

The cuts the pain made were cuts I could have made myself on a good day, while it was still my choice.

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3. Letting people carry the weight is part of the work.

I’m much more comfortable being the person others lean on than the one doing the leaning.

Jasmine ended up doing the driving, and sitting beside her I noticed how rarely I let anyone else take the wheel, in the car or anywhere else.

My kids started carrying things around the house for me, small things I’d normally pick up without thinking, and every time they did it I felt a mix of gratitude and something close to helplessness.

They didn’t make a big deal of it, which somehow made it harder, because the only person keeping score was me.

I had to rest before I’d done anything to earn it, and I kept catching myself feeling guilty, as if lying still was a kind of failure.

I know where that comes from, and I’d call it out in a client within a minute, but it’s a lot harder to see when it’s yours.

Next time I’d like to listen to the notification, instead of waiting for the invoice.

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Here’s Some Inner Game Wisdom to Chew on This Week

1 punchy question to rattle your brain

Are you growing stronger, or simply growing tired?

2 quick Q&As from me

Q: What’s real resilience?

A: Not enduring more, but recovering faster.

Q: What’s the most underrated form of courage?

A: Admitting when you’re not okay, and still choosing to move forward.

3 truths

• Strength Isn’t Built in Comfort
  It’s built in those silent moments when quitting would be easier, but you don’t.
• Overwhelm Isn’t a Sign to Stop
  It’s a signal to simplify. Your system is asking for a redesign, not surrender.
• Your Future Self Is Built in Micro-Moments
  Not the big wins, but the tiny choices you make when nobody’s watching.

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Until next week:

Read the notification.

Make the cut.

Let them carry it.