I Fumbled Words. He Died. The Reality Is—Perfection Can’t Save Anyone, But Relationship and Grace Might.
I keep coming back to this—this tangle of grace and trying, fumbling and becoming—not because I haven’t moved on, but because it keeps showing me something new.
Each time I revisit it, I find another layer. Another bridge. Another place to connect what once felt scattered.
So if it feels familiar, that’s because it is. But repetition isn’t regression. Sometimes, it’s revelation.
The world doesn’t pause just because you’re stuck on a loop. Deadlines don’t shift. Conversations move on. The dishes still need washing. The dog still needs walking. It all keeps going—relentlessly.
But so does grace.
Grace doesn’t wait for you to be caught up. It doesn’t demand that you be over it. It meets you in the motion. In the mess. In the loop.
And when everything else keeps moving like you’re fine— Grace stays. Grace notices.
There’s a particular kind of pressure that comes when someone you look up to starts looking at you with belief in their eyes.
When someone you admire—maybe even revere—trusts you with something that matters. A role. A moment. A story. A space.
And suddenly you’re not just trying to do the thing—you’re trying not to let them down in the process.
And it’s not about ego. It’s not about perfectionism. It’s about honoring the trust they gave you before you felt worthy of it.
Because they saw something in you. And now, all you can think is: Please let me live up to it. Please don’t let me break what you handed me.
You start watching yourself more closely. You rehearse. You overthink. You spiral after the smallest stumbles.
And when the moment doesn’t go smoothly—when your voice shakes, or the idea slips, or you feel like you missed the mark—there’s this ache in your chest that has nothing to do with failure and everything to do with love.
Because you don’t want to just get it right. You want to honor the person who believed in you when you still felt small.
And maybe they don’t even realize what that trust meant to you. Maybe they don’t know how long you’ve watched them, learned from them, tried to carry what they modeled without dropping the weight.
So you carry this tension: Gratitude and fear. Admiration and inadequacy. Hope and the haunting thought: What if I disappoint them?
The Holy Part of Facing Them Afterward
And then comes the moment you’ve been dreading: Facing them.
The moment after the fumble. The moment you have to look them in the eye with your shame still smoldering. The moment you want to say, “I tried.” And also, “It needs work. Lots of work.”
That moment? That’s sacred too.
Because the holy part isn’t just in doing the thing well. It’s in owning the moment fully—even when it didn’t go how you hoped.
It’s in standing there, shoulders heavy, voice unsure, and still saying:
“I didn’t carry it like I meant to. But I cared. I really, really cared.”
And sometimes they’ll hug you. Sometimes they’ll just nod. Sometimes they’ll say, “I’ve been there too.”
But more often than not, the people worth admiring? They’ll still believe in you. Not because you got it perfect. But because you showed up. Because you tried.
The Weight Lives in All Kinds of Relationships
This isn’t just about formal mentorship. It’s the tension between parent and child. Teacher and student. Boss and new hire. Coach and player. Friend and friend.
Any time someone sees potential in you and hands you a little more than you feel ready to carry—this is what it feels like. Holy. Heavy. Hopeful. And sometimes? Hard.
You don’t want to drop it. Not because you’re afraid of punishment—but because you want to live up to what they saw in you.
And that feeling—the wanting, the trying, the trembling under the weight of someone else’s belief— That’s where the sacred lives.
And Holy Can Break You, Too
Let’s not pretend it’s all beautiful. Sometimes holy shows up and wrecks your composure. It rips open parts of you you weren’t ready to share. It asks you to rise before you’ve even caught your breath.
Holy can break you. And not gently.
Because sometimes the only way to become is to be undone first.
And when someone hands you something sacred—trust, responsibility, a space you weren’t sure you were ready to stand in—it’s not just about growth. It’s about risk. It’s about showing up, knowing full well it might shatter something in you. That it might fucking wreck you. And you show up anyway.
Especially When They’re in the Room
There’s something brutal about learning grace from someone whose presence makes you forget how to receive it.
The one who taught you to breathe… suddenly takes the air out of the room—without meaning to. Just by being there. Just by being who they are.
Their steadiness. Their silence. Their eyes.
They don’t even have to say a word. You hear it anyway. Not judgment. Just the sound of your own fear echoing off their faith in you.
And the weight of that? It’s fucking holy and horrifying all at once.
Because they handed you something fragile. Not with rules. Not with pressure. With trust.
And now you’re standing there with it cracking in your hands, trying to hold it together without bleeding all over the floor.
You want to live up to it. You want to prove them right. You want to be the version of yourself they must have seen when they first called you in.
But the truth is—you’re still learning how to carry it.
And nothing hurts more than fumbling it in front of the person who gave it to you.
The first time it cracks, it feels like failure. Like you weren’t strong enough to hold what mattered.
But the truth is— It was meant to crack. Not because you did it wrong, but because the weight was real, and your hands were honest.
And every time it cracks after that? It cracks differently. It reveals something new.
A weakness to strengthen. A story to reshape. A deeper layer of grace you didn’t know you needed until it broke there.
The cracks don’t disqualify you. They trace your becoming.
The grace they gave you? You need it most when you least know how to ask for it.
When your stomach’s in knots. When your voice is too small. When your whole body wants to disappear.
That’s when you need it most. That’s when it matters most. And that’s when it’s hardest to believe it’s still yours.
But it is. It is.
They don’t have to say it. You just have to stay. Stand there in the wreckage of your trying, and believe that it’s still holy.
Because the truth is?
You didn’t drop it because you didn’t care. You dropped it because you cared so damn much.
And that trying? That cracked, imperfect, trembling trying?
That’s what makes it sacred.
Tired of Not Getting It Right
I’m tired of not getting it “right.” Tired of measuring everything by clean lines and flawless delivery. Tired of feeling like every moment is a test.
Because maybe the goal was never “right” to begin with. Maybe it was true. Present. Authentic.
Maybe what we really need is permission to stop performing and start showing up.
To get messy. To speak clumsily. To stand in spaces we care about without pretending we’ve already arrived.
I’m done chasing perfection. Not because I’ve given up— but because I’ve finally realized that real costs more… and matters more.
And I’d rather be real than impressive. I’d rather be present than perfect. I’d rather fumble something sacred than perform something empty.
Because if I’m going to be trusted with anything holy— let it be while I’m still becoming.
Maybe the Exhaustion Belongs Somewhere Else
Why It Loops So Hard
Sometimes it takes three days. No sleep. No peace. Just the same moment on repeat, clawing its way back to the front of your brain every time you try to move on.
That isn’t weakness. It’s wiring.
Your brain isn’t punishing you—it’s trying to protect you. It thinks if it loops the mistake long enough, you’ll never make it again. Your nervous system stays on high alert, even when no one else remembers what happened.
And under all of that? Usually an old story.
One where mistakes meant shame. Or being misunderstood. Or losing something you loved.
So it isn’t just this moment you’re replaying. It’s every echo of a time you got it wrong and felt like you didn’t come back from it.
It takes days, sometimes, because you’re not grieving the fumble. You’re grieving what it represents.
That’s why you feel stuck. Why your stomach knots. Why rest won’t come.
But the truth is— You are not broken. You’re someone who feels things deeply, and your body hasn’t forgotten the cost of caring.
You don’t owe the mistake more of your life. You just need to reach for grace, however shaky the throw.
Because here’s the thing: Reliving the moment you dropped it won’t pick it back up.
You can loop it. Replay it. Analyze every word, every gesture, every gap. You can carry it like a bruise, flinch every time someone even looks in your direction.
But maybe… that exhaustion could be spent on something softer.
Like staying. Like trying again. Like putting your hands back on the thing you care about—even if they’re still shaking.
The fumble already happened. You don’t owe it your whole future. You just need to give a damn enough to fucking pick it back up.
Throw a Hail Mary to grace and keep going. Because sometimes that’s all you’ve got. And somehow, grace catches it anyway.
What you owe yourself— is a chance to touch the sacred again.
Not because you’re ready. Not because you’ve perfected the technique. But because it’s still yours to carry.
And you’re still the right person to carry it.
Even now. Especially now.
Because Becoming Isn’t Just Yours
When you realize you were never meant to be finished— never meant to arrive polished, never meant to hold it all together—
You become a place where others can unfold, too.
Because the more you accept that you are meant to live becoming, the more you’re able to help others become.
Not by having all the answers. Not by performing certainty. But by being real. By staying. By showing up with your edges still showing.
You don’t have to be finished to be faithful. You just have to keep carrying the sacred—trembling hands and all.
Where It Ends—For Now
I fumbled something sacred. I carried it like it might undo me.
But my neighbor died of an overdose this week. And it split the story open.
Because mine was a moment. And I still get to speak.
Not to save anyone. Not to preach some perfect hope.
But to say the thing—however cracked— in case it gives someone else one more breath.
I don’t know if those words could’ve helped him. Not like magic. But maybe like recognition.
Maybe the fumbled words were the ones he needed most.
And maybe what I need now— to make peace, to keep going—
is to speak anyway.
Because grace doesn’t wait for perfection. It breathes for the imperfect.
