This morning, I started to write a radically different article. After a painful U.S. election, I wanted to issue a call to action and a plea for hope in the face of what seemed like utter hopelessness. The first paragraph quoted Emma Lazarus and the second lamented Arizona’s passage of Proposition 314. Frustration poured onto the page. Then I got an email. My friend died this afternoon.

It was mid-November and I was at the end of my rope. Cards on the table: I’d had a bad six months. I ended the spring with MonoStrep (a simultaneous bout of mononucleosis and strep throat) and started...

“We have this sense that no matter how hard we work, we can never be enough, and to me, that is a byproduct of being told you have to be amazing at everything you do," said Rachel Simmons, a bestselling author, educator, and motivational speaker.