Meet Suzy - busy mom, wife, and Executive Director for Opening Act - a non-profit organization that uses theater to help kids gain confidence and leadership skills - and longtime Provenance Meals client. In this spotlight edition, Suzy shares her honest approach to wellness, why she has given up on the impossible goal of being perfect, and how she invests in her self-care on a regular basis.
I have this image of myself embodying “wellness.”
It looks a lot like me after a yoga retreat: grounded, centered, in touch with my chakras, eating only organic food and no alcohol, breathing deeply, and being unmoved by the cacophony of distractions around me. It’s quite a beautiful image.
Spending time with my eldest, Gus.
And then... I go back to reality, where I’m the Executive Director of a busy nonprofit - Opening Act, where I have a husband and two young boys with their own busy lives, and where I live in New York City and am constantly bombarded with the hustle, stress, and impossibly crowded subway rides that make up my daily existence.
Unremarkably, that zen version of myself starts to slowly disappear, each healthy choice slipping away as I “reward” my daily survival of city-work-mom life with my kids’ leftover macaroni and cheese for dinner, late night binging of Netflix until I fall asleep with my laptop in bed with me, and too much rosé.
Wellness feels so all or nothing. So if I can’t be “all”, well...
But here’s what I have learned. Wellness is never going to be “all” in this life I have proudly built for myself, at least not in the ever-perfect “ALL” of yoga-retreat-Suzy. Because my life is not a yoga retreat. It’s busy and complicated and joyful and stressful. And I also know that because of that, I have to find ways to make wellness work for me, to center my health, and to put my own oxygen mask on first if I want to have anything left for my colleagues, my friends, and my family.
Playing a game with my youngest son, Charlie, while eating dinner.
Over the past two years, I’ve had a lot of big life moments: my youngest son started school, we moved, my sister survived breast cancer, I turned 40, we welcomed a beautiful new nephew to our family, and I had a prophylactic hysterectomy and oophorectomy to address my family’s history of cancer. Each of these moments gave me occasion to pause and to notice. To behold. And what I saw was a tremendous lack of attention to what I need for my own health, both physical and mental. And I am committed to changing that.
To start, I’m focusing on the things I already do, like eating.
I can’t make the excuse that I don’t have the time (like with exercise) or the quiet (like with meditation). Eating is something I do every day and I can make it something that moves me away from surviving and toward thriving.
Enter Provenance.
When I first tried their main cleanse program, the Provenance Detox, I was struck by their philosophy and instruction to focus not on what you were taking away (sugar, gluten, etc.) but rather on what you were adding (healthy fats, nutrients for energy, etc.). That philosophy continues to inspire me.
I now try to look at each meal as an opportunity to give my mind and body a gift.
I love how each Provenance meal shares a short wellness note with the benefits of the ingredients in that dish. So even if it’s only for 10 seconds, and even if my kids are squabbling mere inches away from me, I take the time to read it, think about the good I’m putting in my body, and be grateful for the extraordinary privilege I have to access such high quality food. Every time I invest in a week of Provenance, I think of it as an investment in myself and my health. And it pays off every time. Eating clean gives me more energy, better sleep, glowing skin (such a perk!), and maybe most importantly a feeling that I am doing right by myself. And you know what that inspires me to do? More of the things I know I need - like a deep breath midday, a moment of stretching before I get out of bed and begin the hurry-up-we’re-late-for-school routine, a story time that is less rushed and more present.
Wellness is a bit of a domino effect for me; and Provenance has been that critical first domino that gets it rolling.
I know that not every meal this year will be eaten in thoughtful reflection, because… life. But I hope, as 2020 begins, to take wellness one meal at a time.
Source: Opening Act
Suzy Myers Jackson
Executive Director for Opening Act
Suzy has served as a consultant for such organizations as HBO, the Harlem Educational Activities Fund, and the Resilience Advocacy Project, teaching the power of personal narrative, fundraising, and board development. She joined Opening Act in 2003 when it was still a passion project of its Founder. Five years later, Suzy accepted her current role as Executive Director and is proud to have helped grow the organization’s budget from $25,000 to $2 million and to increase its partnering schools from 3 to 56 high schools. She currently serves on the Board of SparkYouth NYC and is raising her two young boys in Brooklyn with her husband, a public school teacher.
