I Built a Multi-Million Dollar Business to Avoid Feeling Anything [Summer Read-Aloud]

  Sam Vander Wielen: Hey there, and welcome back to On Your Terms®. So for the next couple of weeks, I’m gonna be doing something a little bit differently as part of a little summer series of sorts. For the next few weeks, I’ll be reading you a few of my essays that I’ve written on my Substack. My Substack is just called Sam Vander Wielen, because as you can probably tell by now, I’m really, really good with coming up with creative names for things.

But I have a Substack called Sam Vander Wielen, where I share personal essays and behind the scenes, a lot about grief and loss, coming back from that grief and loss, and learning to, I don’t know, uncouple myself from overconsumption and overworking, and really learning how to be more present in my life.

So all you have to do for the next couple of weeks is just kick back, put in your headphones, maybe even go for a walk, and listen to my reading of this week’s essay from Substack. If you’d like to subscribe to my Substack so that you can also read these on Substack or on the app, go ahead and just click the link down below. It’s completely free.

I got forced to slow down, the lesson I need to learn over and over and over again. It was only a few days ago that I was wiping the sand out of my eyes, emerging out of the Atlantic Ocean after getting pummeled by a wave. It was so fun, by the way. I raced home to shower and get changed into my tennis whites before heading off to my tennis lesson, my favorite hour of the week.

Afterwards, I grilled veggie and turkey burgers on my blue stone patio and spent time with my boys, my husband Ryan, and my Bernedoodle Hudson. After dinner, we took our family walk for over two hours. Our walk actually only takes 35 minutes. The extra hour and a half was spent stopping and chatting with all of our neighbors.

It’s only four days later, and I can’t do any of that now.

Over the weekend, I played in a tennis clinic at our club and lunged for a really tough down the line shot. The next thing I knew, I was on my back staring up at the clouds. My knee, I think it went in three different directions it wasn’t supposed to go in, but also my foot. Why is it throbbing so badly?

Why does it feel like there’s liquid running down my leg? I stood up and brushed the clay off my sweaty legs just as much as I tried to shoo away the bruise from my ego, I was so embarrassed. I don’t normally fall. I pride myself on being athletic and tough. I don’t want anybody to think I’m weak or out of shape, God forbid.

“Sam, don’t you wanna sit down?” The pro asked. “No, no, I’m fine. I just wanna keep playing. I’m so sorry for interrupting the game,” I said, even though I’m supposed to stop apologizing for everything. “But what about the blood?” they asked. “The blood? It’s fine. It’s fine,” I assured them without even looking at my knee. “Let, let’s just play.”

They hit the first ball away from me on purpose. They hit the second one gingerly and nearly right next to me, barely requiring me to move on purpose, too. I dropped my racket and started to laugh. “I can’t move, like, at all,” I said, finally giving in. “I think it’s my foot.” One of the players picked me up like a bride on her wedding night and carried me over to the benches.

We took off my shoe, waiting to see what was hiding underneath my sock. “Has your foot always been shaped like that?” my Bolivian-born tennis pro asked, which by the way, is going to be forever a core memory. Turns out my foot, along with my twisty little right knee, is busted. It doesn’t matter what’s wrong with it.

First of all, by the time you’re listening to this, I hope I’m doing a lot better. But I also learned well enough a long time ago that the fewer details I give out online, the better. Plus, this isn’t really about my injury or even what my rehab plan is This is about the journey I’m on to learn how to just be.

And what better way to learn how to be than to literally get taken out at the knee and foot?

I can’t walk unassisted. I can’t drive. I can’t go with my boys on our family walk. Just like my grief over the loss of both of my parents, there is nothing I can do with how disappointed, frustrated, hurt, a little different hurt in this case, but still other than to just process it, give it time, and sit with it. That goes against everything I want to do. I want to fix it, make it go away. I’ve already Googled the fastest way to heal this injury and thought about what supplements I can take to dull the pain.

I’ve thought about just ignoring the injury and tricking my body into thinking it’s fine, just like how I tried brushing how devastated I really felt after my parents died under the rug and pushed forward, writing my first book, making millions of dollars in my business a year, helping everybody else so I didn’t have to help myself.

I didn’t take a moment to breathe, and I’m paying for it now. You better believe it I don’t have any nice, neat bow to tie this up with. You’ll notice a theme of that in my essays here on Substack these days. The point of me writing here isn’t to teach or show anybody the way. I’m figuring it out myself.

It’s to share how I’m navigating my own way, for better or worse. I’m sharing how I’m climbing out of the very deep hole of grief, including the moments where I fall back in or those where I stumble on my way out. Thank you so much for reading and for being here. If you head over to Substack, I would love to hear how this resonated with you in the comments.

Go ahead and leave a comment on this post. I also left a little note on this post because this was the week where there was a devastating tornado in my husband’s hometown, home area of Wisconsin, the Fox Valley of Wisconsin, and I let everyone know I’m thinking of you if your loved ones, uh, were affected by this tornado that ravaged Neenah, Menasha, and Appleton, Wisconsin this week.

PS, I’m very happy to report that the people in my tennis clinic told me that I made the shot down the line back and that it was, in their words, incredible. Very not worth it, by the way

Thanks so much for listening to today’s essay. I hope that you liked it. I would love to hear from you over on Substack, so make sure you come and subscribe to my Substack below, and go and comment on the essay that you just heard me read. I’d love to see you there. With that, I’ll talk to you next week.

Thanks so much for listening to the On Your Terms® podcast. Make sure to follow on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you like to listen to podcasts. You can also check out all of our podcast episodes, show notes, links, and more at samvanderwielen.com/podcast.

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