Writing with Juliet Iwelunmor

How one day of storms and starlike moments taught me the art of living — and finding meaning in this one life we’re all becoming.

A year ago, on this very day, lightning struck our home. It came in the middle of a thunderstorm — sudden, loud, and sure of itself. The sky cracked open. Thunder rolled through the rooms like something looking for a way out. And when it was over, parts of our home were damaged, and the silence it left behind felt heavier than the storm that made it. But the storm was not the only thing that happened that day.

That same afternoon, we closed out our STAR program — the program where we train undergraduate and graduate students to become the next generation of researchers. Young people, bright with promise, ready to carry the work further than we ever could alone. We were, in the truest sense, sending stars out into the world.

So on one ordinary day, I held two things at once. A storm that broke part of my home. And a star-filled moment that asked me to believe in the future anyway.

That is why I write.

That is why I keep something — no matter how small — about every single day I am privileged to witness. Because days like that one have a way of teaching you something about life. And what they teach is too quiet, and too important, to let slip away.

Life teaches life
That is the simplest way I know to say it. Life is the art of living, and it teaches us the way a patient hand teaches a child — not with lectures, but with days. Some days will be full of storms. Other days will be bright like stars. And then, ever so often, a single day will bring you both. A storm in one hand. A star in the other. And it is in that strange, holy pairing that life teaches you the art of living. I used to believe the storms were the lesson and the stars were the reward. I don’t believe that anymore. The storm is not the end of the story. The star is not the end either. Neither one is a destination. They are teaching moments. They are the texture of being human — the honest, unedited experience of being alive. They are all the ways we slowly, gently become who we already are.

What we are becoming
We become our truer selves. Our wiser selves. Our more experienced, more grounded, more fully arrived selves. The selves we were always growing toward, even on the days we couldn’t feel it.
Whether the storms and the stars come separately or arrive together on the same afternoon, they are the anchor of our becoming. They steady us. They remind us that nothing we live through is wasted — not the loss, not the joy, not the long ordinary middle. And they hold us inside a quiet, stubborn hope: that this one life — this single, unrepeatable life — is a task worthy of being lived fully. Not perfectly. Not without storms. But fully. That is the whole invitation. To live this one life all the way to its edges. To let the hard days shape you and the bright days lift you. To find meaning in both, and to keep becoming through all of it.

Keep something of your days
So here is what I’m asking of you, friend. Keep something of your days. Keep the storms and keep the stars. Write down the small thing, the hard thing, the bright thing — the lightning and the light. Because one day you will look back and see clearly what you could not see in the moment: that every storm and every star was part of your becoming.

If these words found you today, stay close. Subscribe to the blog and read along each day, and let us learn the art of living together — one storm, one star, one beautifully ordinary day at a time. This one life is worth living fully. Keep this.