Notes To My Younger Self:

As a pilot, you will become familiar with the term “sucker hole.” Many days, you’ll be flying along through mouthwash blue skies and as you gaze out on the horizon you’ll notice the bright sky you’re enjoying being shrouded by dark, ominous clouds. The closer you get, the more expansive the billowing masses grow. So much so, that you’ll scan the growing storm clouds strategizing about whether you should go around or through the weather, when seemingly out of nowhere, an oasis appears in the cloud wall. A hole brimming with light. A hole chock-full of white fluffy clouds. An opening just big enough for you to fly through. Over here, come on in, here’s a shortcut. The clouds will beckon. What luck. You’ll think. Just once, though. Because although this hole looks like safe passage through the threatening thunderheads, by the time you arrive at what you think is your shortcut through the storm, the clouds will collapse around you and your hole will transform into a pit of darkness. And instead of flying around the mighty wall of weather you’ll find yourself tossed about, riding at the whims of wicked turbulence.

You can’t know what you’ve never experienced. Once you’ve had the experience though, it will be up to you to be paying attention. Circumstances do repeat themselves. Odds are good many thunderstorms—and life’s maelstroms— you come across will have a sucker hole. The trick is to not fly—step—into it.

E.L. Chappel author of Spirit Dance/Storm Makers/Coming very soon: The Surge

Don’t take the bait.

aka The Glamorous Wife