Finding Your Footing When Life Feels Unstable

My Life Planned & Organized

This week, a lot shifted at once, and the sense of stability I usually rely on felt harder to find. Planning, which normally helps me orient myself, went out the window—not because I didn’t care, but because everything underneath it was moving.

I realized I wasn’t trying to make a plan — I was simply trying to find my footing.

It felt like February shook my snow globe without my permission, and the pieces of my family’s stability were suddenly unsettled and rearranged.

My nervous system, already on the sensitive side, went into protection mode. My daughter experienced humiliation at school and stopped attending. My dog stumbled on the steps into the kitchen and began seizing. Not long after, my own body followed with a panic attack.

Alongside all of this, my husband was carrying the familiar weight of grief on the anniversary of his father’s death.

Our emotional regulation echoed back and forth between us, as if the week itself had paused in time. Structure, routine, stability, and support became harder to locate—not gone entirely, but momentarily out of reach.

What was I made for?

The largest external shift in my life was the end of my previous employment, and I find myself feeding that emotional elephant both relief and grief at the same time.

What Was I Made For? has been looping in my head, and I can’t remember Billie’s answer—nor do I seem to have my own right now.

An elephant standing in a dry grassland landscape, using its trunk to feed from low shrubs, with soft, muted vegetation in the background.

What comes next

The snow in my head has been falling steadily and has finally settled at my feet—cold, bare, and quiet.

What comes next is still unknown, and for me—and for those of us who live inside carefully contained snow-globe worlds—this kind of change can feel unsettling.

For now, I’m not trying to solve what comes next. I’m focusing on finding my footing—paying attention to what grounds me, what I can see, hear, and hold, and what needs gentleness. In this season, grounding looks less like answers and more like staying present with what’s here.

I’m tending to the basics: rest, nourishing food, and simply being there for myself and my family. I spent at least an hour meditating this morning while simultaneously petting my poodle; I’m not sure who benefited more.

A clear glass snow globe resting on a neutral surface, containing a miniature winter landscape with snow-covered ground, bare trees, and softly falling snow.

Your Life Planned & Organized

If any of this feels familiar, you’re not alone. Truly. When life feels unsettled, planning doesn’t always look like answers or decisions. Sometimes it just looks like finding your footing wherever you happen to be standing.

I don’t know what your season looks like right now. You might be in the middle of something hard, or just quietly off-balance in a way that’s hard to explain. Either way, it’s okay if clarity feels out of reach. It often does when something is shifting.

Start by noticing

If it helps, you might simply notice a few things—not to solve anything, just to get oriented:

What feels uncertain or wobbly right now?
What still feels steady, even in small or quiet ways?
What does your body seem to be asking for more of—or less of?
What feels too heavy to decide today?
What feels safe enough to pay attention to?

There’s no right way to sit with these. You don’t have to answer them all. You don’t even have to answer any of them. Sometimes just noticing which one catches your attention is enough.

When things feel unsettled, coming back to the present moment can help a little. That might be as simple as naming one thing you can see, one thing you can hear, or one thing you can physically hold. Or it might mean choosing one small anchor—rest, food, a familiar routine, or a conversation with someone who feels safe.

In seasons like this, planning doesn’t have to be big or forward-looking. It can be quiet and observational. It can sound like, this is where I am today, and this is what feels manageable right now. Shorter timeframes and softer intentions still count.