When You Stop Shaking the Snow Globe

By C Alexa | October 6, 2026
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By Kim Levin
ETJ Retreat Leader, Founder of Kim Levin Coaching, LLC, Reiki & Energy Healer *

Sometimes clarity doesn’t come from doing more. Sometimes it comes from getting still.

Kate Lemay created a painting about clarity that has stayed with me. It was inspired by a Buddhist story. A group of children asks their uncle for something to drink. He pours each a glass of juice. The first glasses are clear and beautiful. But the last glass is filled with pulp.

The child looks at it and says, essentially, That’s dirty. She doesn’t want to drink it.

Later, she comes back to the glass. The pulp has settled. The juice is clear. Nothing had to be fixed. Nothing had to be forced. The glass simply needed time to become still.

I learned this lesson first through the SAT Prep program.

Dr. Deborah Scott and I were preparing to lead it. We had a clear intention: help students feel more confident as they approach the SAT and the college admissions process. But people weren’t enrolling.

So, I did what many of us do when we’re uncertain. I started shaking the snow globe. I posted more. I shared the program in Facebook groups. Some posts were declined. Some weren’t posted. And honestly, it didn’t feel very good. I pushed. I promoted. I kept thinking, What else can I DO?

For a while, it looked like we might have only three students. One dropped out and we only had two.

And then something interesting happened. We decided two or three students were enough to move forward. I got clear. The goal wasn’t to fill a room. The goal was to help students. And almost as if the universe had been waiting for me to stop shaking the glass, another parent reached out. Then the day prior to launching, another. Our first class began with four students – and they all happened to be friends.

Then they invited a fifth. A student herself reached out to me yesterday to join our cohort.

Kate’s painting reminds us that knowing when to get clarity and when to take action is a skill. When in doubt, get present in your body. Feel your breath and allow time to get clarity.

I couldn’t have manufactured that outcome by pushing harder. It happened when I stopped making enrollment the measure of success and returned to the intention behind the work. That was the clarity.

My husband and I are approaching our 25th wedding anniversary. There is something about that number that makes you stop and look at your life. We are almost empty nesters. College, careers, independence, money, retirement, aging parents – all the complicated things of middle life are suddenly very real.

And sometimes, if I’m being honest, it feels like we’re both standing inside that snow globe, waiting for someone to stop shaking it.

My husband is a mensch – a Yiddish word for a good, decent, honorable person. He’s funny and can make an entire room laugh. He loves deeply. He works hard. He wants to provide for our family. And sometimes that caring comes out as worry. Sometimes it comes out as anger.

I have my own version of shaking things up. I try to solve. I try to explain. I try to fix things. I try to change others. Knowing full well, on some level, that I have no power over anyone’s choices.

But what I learned with the SAT program – that clarity comes from getting still, not from doing more – I’m learning all over again in my marriage.

I have to remember something important: I can love someone without being responsible for fixing them. Are there even things to fix? We are not broken. We are human beings, just doing the best we can with what we know at the time.

Maybe one of the most important lessons of twenty-five years together is this: we don’t have to agree on everything to love each other. We don’t need to see the world in exactly the same way.

There are subjects where our perspectives are very different. And sometimes the healthiest thing we can do is recognize that continuing the conversation isn’t creating understanding – it’s simply creating more noise. So we pause. We give each other space. We come back later.

Because I know: I don’t want to win an argument with my husband. I want to grow old with him.

I want our marriage to feel loving, respectful, honest and safe. I want us to be able to say what is true without fearing that honesty will threaten the relationship. I want us to be able to disagree without becoming enemies.

I have my retreats. I have my sound bowls. I have my coaching, my teaching, the things that make me feel alive. He deserves to discover the things that make him feel alive, too.

Maybe this next chapter isn’t about doing more together. Maybe it’s about creating enough space for each of us to hear ourselves – and then choosing each other again from that clearer place.

We both wish we had unlimited resources. We would give our children everything if we could. But we can’t. And maybe that’s another lesson in clarity: love doesn’t mean eliminating every difficulty for someone. Sometimes love means standing beside them while they learn how to navigate difficulty themselves.

We are learning to let our children grow. We’re learning to let each other grow. And we’re learning that our marriage doesn’t need to look exactly like it did twenty-five years ago to still be extraordinary.

Our 25th anniversary falls on October 27th. Our getaway will be a weekend together – maybe St. Michaels or Cape May. And somehow, I think that is fitting. Because the celebration isn’t about recreating our wedding day or planning the perfect weekend. It’s about recognizing everything that came after it. The children. The challenges. The successes. The arguments. The laughter. The sacrifices. The dreams.

Twenty-five years isn’t proof that we’ve figured out marriage. It’s proof that we’ve continued to choose it.

And maybe that’s what clarity looks like at this stage of life. Not having every answer. Not agreeing on everything. Not controlling what happens next. But getting quiet enough to remember what is true. Getting still enough to let the pulp settle and see what was already there.

We love each other. We want good things for our children. We want to enjoy the years ahead. We want to feel safe with one another. We want to grow old together – not simply grow old.

So perhaps the next chapter isn’t about shaking the snow globe until everything finally looks right. Perhaps it’s about putting it down. Taking a breath. And seeing what is already there.

* * *

Make it a magnificent day!

Kim Levin
KimLevinCoaching.com

 
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