Recently, New York Times bestselling author Mari Andrew spoke with me about My Inner Sky: On Embracing Day, Night, and All the Times in Between, her latest book of essays and illustrations. It is a powerful and deep meditation on waiting, longing, suffering, grief, and ultimately, healing.
Before Mari launched @bymariandrew and started writing books, she was a contributing writer to the OG The Wheelhouse Review. It was a huge pleasure to reconnect with one of our favorite writers and humans. This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Juliet Vedral: So, where to start? Tell me about your book and where this came from? I mean, obviously, it came from deep pain and healing. Where did the sky metaphor come from?
Mari Andrew: When I started writing it I was in the middle of recovery from this really traumatic, strange illness, that now I have a lot more perspective on, but at the time it was just like, “what on Earth is happening?” It was so life-changing, and the recovery part was really, really hard because I didn't know how to speak about it, and I didn't know how to move through it, and no one knew what to do with it, and it was just a really confusing in-between time. And at that time, 2017, the zeitgeist was all about positive thinking. . . I think this has changed, but at the time it was like everywhere I looked it was “think positive, we're all striving for happiness,” and I thought there's just something intuitively so wrong about that.
And I remember thinking it's sort of like wanting to only live during the afternoon. ... We love our mornings, we love the evening. There are different energies that happen throughout the day, and saying “think positive” is like saying the hours between 2:00 and 3:00 are the only times that matter, and the rest of it, don't even think about it. That's how I started thinking about the sky, and different weather, and different light, and seasons, and would we really want a blue sky afternoon all the time? Because I wasn't living that at the time.
Going through this recovery I was like, well, I'm not going to think positive because that's not available to me and also so disembodied from how I'm feeling right now, so what can I find here? I'm in the middle of the tunnel, there is no light at the end that I can see, so what can I see in the tunnel? And it made me think about embracing. How do you embrace the rain? How do you embrace storms? How do you embrace times of day that you want to move through?
And it just felt so obvious to me that it's like, oh, well, we all have this inner landscape, inner sky that's rich in color and mood and weather and all of that. Isn't that what we want? Don't we want a whole life and not just the sunny one? That doesn't seem right to me. So that's how I started thinking about that.
JV: I felt like it was a thread you pulled nicely through the book, which is: we want to focus on the big events and the milestone, or like you said, the afternoon. We don't want to focus on the path that we need to take to get to that place or the waiting, or the ambiguity and I found that really resonated. Especially, I remember when I was getting married and I was like, you know this isn't the most important thing I'm ever going to do in my life. It's important, I'm not saying it's not, but it was like I've done other things that were bigger deals, in my opinion, and required a lot more celebration. Like picking up my life and moving to DC at 30 when I never lived outside of New York City.
MA: Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
JV: And no one was like, "Here's a blender."
MA: Right, right, right.
JV: Or let me just give you some silver.
MA: Yeah, yeah.
JV: Here's some silver and crystal because that's a totally normal thing to ask people for, but it really bugged me because it was like women don't get celebrated for things other than marriage and family. On the other hand, though, now that I've been married now for four years, and I'm a mom, sometimes I'm like maybe those parties are people's ways of being like, “The shit is about to hit the fan, so here's some silver.”
MA: Right. Totally. That's so funny. I always think it's so funny how we treat, I mean this is a whole other thing, but I touched about it in my book, the way that single women that I'm sure that you can remember this, the way single women are kind of like taught that, if we do enough work on ourselves then we get a relationship. That's sort of the prize, that's the lollipop, and it's funny because relationships are so hard, and it's like why is the prize this thing that's just another challenge? Not saying that it's not beautiful and all of that, but it's sort of like, yeah, it doesn't mean you're going to be set for life as far as self-worth and ease and all of that. In fact, you're introducing so many more challenges to your life, and still that's what we say. “Oh you've made it now, now you have worth as a human,” and there's no sense of “yeah, you might invite this relationship into your life, but guess what? It's going to be really challenging and have it's own life that's really different from the one that you're living.”
JV: Right. Right. I love that part about grief and good things. Because you're right, we want to live from two to three o'clock, we don't want to talk about how it is traumatic, especially since I didn't get married until three days before I turned 36. So the absence of the question of “am I going to get married and to who?” was actually really hard to deal with, because I was like-
MA: Oh my gosh that's so interesting.
JV: Yeah, I was like I'm so happy to be married, I love my husband, he's wonderful. Of all the guys I dated, I can definitely say he was worth making a huge life change for.
MA: Mm-hmm.
JV: And basically strapping myself to for the rest of our lives.
MA: Yeah.
JV: But it was still a weird feeling to be like oh, this question that I've thought about since I was a little girl is gone.
Juliet Vedral: I liked, I can't remember what chapter it was, the idea of desire being like wanting to look at the stars. And we want to look at them.
MA: Yeah, like reaching for things. Kind of wanting what we don't have is actually a really satisfying thing to do. It sounds like it's not grateful or there's issues with it, but the act of desiring is sort of wanting something that's a little bit out of reach, and that's so human and for me it's a really creative place to be. It's hard to really want something that you can't immediately make happen. But … that's where we get so much of our joy and inspiration and intrigue and spiritual growth and all of that, so I think there's a lot of lushness to longing for things.
JV: I agree. I think in a way longing is grace because we are reminded here that this place is like IKEA. You get the furniture and it's nice and it looks well-ordered and together but it's going to break, it's not going to last forever, and you just hopefully make it through the shop without abandoning your family. I think that's helpful because every time I have those moments where I think, “I should be happier,” I'm like should I be? Or maybe that's just not what this world is for and it's pointing me towards something more eternal or gracious and divine than my bucket list.
MA: Right. Right. It is kind of interesting that we've started talking about happiness as this thing … that's very normal to want, but also kind of that we're entitled to. I mean obviously the pursuit of happiness, I'm all for that, but it's like is that the point? Is that the point of life? I feel like I've been so formed and so nourished by these really, really difficult times, and I wouldn't want them. It's not fun to go through them, but it feels like whoa, that is life. When you're going through that stuff, that's like the most, the “lifeiest” life you can live.
It's like oh my gosh, this is it. I think especially as a creative person, that's kind of what I'm here for is to experience as much as possible about life, and I know intuitively that's going to come with some really, really hard things. … It's just so part of the package, and it's interesting that we have all sorts of ways to deny that in ourselves which kind of pathologizes the hard things we go through. It's like things we should be over or that we shouldn't give that much attention to or we should not focus on, when really it's like what else should we be focusing on but the things that make us really human?
JV: Right. I love that thread also, especially when you were writing about Persephone. What you went through is horrific and I am so sorry that you had to experience that, especially in Grenada which is such an amazing place. It's almost like that is the most “lifeiest” life, it's like of course, it doesn't happen in Washington where you can go to GW and get great healthcare in English. It happens in a magical paradise full of history and legend and magic and isn't that life?
Because you're like the whole point of life is that human connection of walking through it together. … I love that metaphor of the underworld, of seeing the underworld, the pieces of darkness and other people, and that's really what we need, is someone to see us.
And you can't actually see other people if you haven't had some kind of suffering or struggle. I don't want to romanticize it as much to say that we really diminish it's power. It’s not the power to go through joy with other people, it's the power to sit in the sadness and not flinch.
MA: Yeah. Yeah. For sure, for sure. And I think that perspective really shifts the way that we go through suffering because it's like it can feel so isolating of course when you're going through something really hard, it is isolating.
But you're also entering into the fullest human experience and you're entering into a community that is as old as humans are of people who have gone through pain. This is with a lot of hindsight and processing and a lot of resentment toward anyone who romanticizes pain, but I will say there's almost a strange privilege hidden in the darkness because it's like “oh I get to know what life is like for other people and I get to enter into this community more deeply and I get to understand things I wouldn't have understood otherwise.” I don't know if that's a writer way to look at it, or if that's how other people look at it who are not writers, but even when I was really young, there were really hard things I wanted to experience because I thought I needed the full plate here. I came to earth for the full meal, I don't want just part of it. I'm looking for the full experience and of course, that is so fueling for my creativity.
It can be really easy to just leave it there and be like “well pain makes you more creative,” and that's not what I believe at all. But …once you have some distance from it, I think there is sort of an honor in being a part of that community and being able to really show up for other people who have experienced it.
JV: Yeah. I know we felt that way when we were trying to get pregnant and we were told we had unexplained infertility, and it sucked. It was a really shitty time, I was very angry and very much like why me? As it is, I waited forever to get married, and I'm in this boat partly because I'm an “old,” and just the anger, like why is it so easy for other people and for me it's so difficult?
We discovered we knew so many people who were in the same boat and it is like being in this weird club. No one wants to be a member of this club, but while we're here we might as well make the most of it.
JV: Yeah. I just found that really powerful and I'm glad you articulated it because I think when you're suffering you feel like “I'm missing out on something.” Like I'm missing out on health, I'm missing out on a baby, I'm missing out on a partner. … I'm missing out on this life I think I should have, and it's a lie though because you're actually--to your point again--living the most “lifeist” life.
MA: It kind of feels like exile, and it is … but there's also kind of an invitation. It's like you're both exiled from sort of old life and understanding of yourself. And then you're kind of beckoned into new life and this new community, which again, you would never choose necessarily but there's a lot of richness there.
JV: One thing that came across to me reading this book was how contemplative it is. And I think that is a huge gift, being able to walk through life looking for grace or the divine or the bigger picture and that comes across a lot. I don't know if you have cultivated that. But even when you were writing about creativity, I was like that sounds a lot like contemplation and being open to God showing up somewhere when God wants to and not when you demand it.
MA: That is so interesting because I have ... I remember reading, gosh what's that book? Streams of Living Water, does that sound familiar? By what's his name?
You can look it up. Gosh, it's sitting on my bookshelf. It's about like seven… approaches to a kind of Christian manifestation or expression. So contemplation, mysticism, evangelicalism, a few others. And I remember reading the contemplation chapter and I have so much respect for it, like I was so enchanted by it. I was like wow these people are so evolved, but that is so not what I'm able to do because I can't sit still and I'm so antsy about everything. And I much more related to mysticism which, for me, is kind of more like that's a lot more active and I can kind of summon what I want to hear and I can reach out to people and it's very external, whereas this contemplation part felt very internal on this level that I kind of felt like I wasn't patient enough for. Also I'm just seeing the book now, it's Streams of Living Water by Richard Foster. It's a great book.
But that's interesting because I think that kind of was my maturity. I think my growth was toward a more contemplative, probably more contemplative expression and “oh wow, this is what happens when you kind of enter into your own evolution.” … You do let things show up on their own time, and you kind of develop this humility for inspiration and for visits from the divine, whereas I think I used to really try to make those things happen. Then at some point it's like, I think just personal growth is knowing that you have so little control over everything, even including your own inspiration.
JV: Yeah. I just want to encourage you in that, because as long as I've known you I've felt that about you and I see it so richly in this book. … I am really sorry that you have had to suffer the things that you have. I definitely related to the Dave chapter so much. … But I appreciate you allowing those things to be like seeds rather than like hardening yourself. If that makes any sense.
MA: Thank you so much for saying that. A lot of the process of writing this was like does anyone care about this story? Will anyone relate on any level to this? And whenever I wrote really unselfconsciously that's when I felt like oh like someone's got to know what I'm talking about here. I think those were the kind of ... that felt like co-creating a bit with the divine. And it's funny, what does God have to say about dating? Well, God would probably agree that humans are wired for attachment and wired to really find the depth and beauty in each other and that you can be so profoundly moved by a two-week relationship as much as you can a four-year one. So it always means a lot when those kinds of things resonate with people even though they felt a little silly to write about at the time.
JV: I loved the paper houses concept because I think that was always the grief for me. Not just the end of a relationship as much as it was like the death of potential. And I love how you wrote about it as ruins because it doesn't go away, those dreams or potential, they just kind of exist as a monument to this what if.I guess the key is honoring those ruins while also … remembering that you can always build something new.
MA: Yeah. Right. Right. And not trying to live in the ruins, and not pointing to them as evidence why you shouldn't keep going, which for someone who's dated a lot in New York, you can get jaded really quickly.
JV: Well, I don't want to take up more of your time, but what is next for you? What other things are you thinking about and contemplating?
MA: I am getting really comfortable or I'm trying to get really comfortable with answering I don't know.
JV: That's cool.
MA: And just letting it be that.
JV: Yeah.
MA: Because that's the truth.
JV: Well whatever it is, when creativity or the divine come to you, I'm sure it will be as lovely and powerful as you are.
MA: Thank you.