This post originally appeared in my May 2026 newsletter.
Earlier this year the weather here in Austin was all over the place. Hot, then cold again, rainy, muggy, foggy. It couldn’t quite make up its mind.
There was a cool weekend where my husband was trimming tree branches and had to climb up onto the roof. I made him take the photo above for the post.
He asked why I was writing about our roof in the blog post…
A few years ago we had a leak in our living room ceiling. My husband climbed onto the roof to see if he could spot anything obvious but came back down empty handed. Naturally, I decided that if I got up there, I’d somehow be able to figure it out.
This made absolutely no sense considering I’m pretty afraid of heights.
Still, I had this very determined “I’m a homeowner, I can do hard things” energy and climbed the ladder anyway. I managed to get myself up onto the roof- which required pushing myself off the ladder and up onto the roof, an important detail for later.
I walked around looking for obvious damage. No giant hole. No missing shingles. Nothing.
So I turned around to climb back down.
And I couldn’t do it.
I walked toward the edge where the ladder was and instantly felt sick. I sat down and scooted closer. Tried dangling one foot over the edge. Nope. Backed away immediately.
Meanwhile Scott was already back on the ground holding the ladder, calmly giving instructions and encouragement while I spiraled completely out of my human body.
At one point I started trying to calculate whether I could safely jump into a nearby tree.
(Dearest Reader, I could not.)
I imagined scraping myself up on branches, breaking bones, an ambulance showing up in the neighborhood, thousands of dollars in medical bills. You know. A very normal progression of thoughts…
Every time I got close enough to touch the ladder with my foot, panic would hit and I’d scoot backward again.
I cried. I shook. I announced that perhaps I simply lived on the roof now. Could someone please bring me a blanket?
Hours passed. Or maybe not hours, but long enough that it certainly felt eternal.
Eventually I got close enough to the edge for Scott to climb partway up the ladder and guide my foot onto the top rung. “Just a little closer, keep going” he said.
And that was the thing I keep thinking about.
The distance between where I felt safe and where I actually needed to be was tiny. Inches. But my body experienced it as enormous. The Grand Canyon between my foot and that ladder.
I had to move past the point where I felt certain I would fall.
And I couldn’t do it alone, even though I was the one who ultimately had to take the step.
I think a lot about how often we wait to feel fully ready before we move. How sometimes support looks less like someone rescuing us and more like someone steadying the ladder while we do the hard part ourselves.
A few things to ponder:
Where in your life are you waiting to be fully ready before you make a move?
What would one small step towards that look like?
What support do you need?
