We’re Not on the Menu
I never imagined I’d stand so close to a cheetah that I could reach out and touch it.
These were the kinds of moments that made headlines for all the wrong reasons—"Clueless American Stalks Cheetah, Learns the Hard Way." And since I’d spent most of my life avoiding both wild animal attacks and looking like an idiot, I never thought I’d end up here.
Yet here I was. Heart pounding, adrenaline surging—not just from fear, but from something else. A raw, electric aliveness. I had no idea this moment—standing just feet from one of the fastest predators on earth—would teach me about fear, power, and the unexpected peace that comes when you stop running.
Minutes earlier, I’d been comfortably seated in the Land Rover, basking in the vast, untamed beauty of the South African bush. Our guide had been tracking something—I wasn’t sure what. Then, without warning, he parked, hopped out of the vehicle, and vanished into the brush.
"Stay here," he’d said. No problem.
I thought I heard him mention cheetahs.
Our guide’s name was Obvious. Yes, Obvious. He was from a local village and carried an encyclopedic knowledge of animal behavior—their movements, their tracks, the subtle shifts in their sounds. When he got excited, he stuttered slightly, his words tumbling out faster than his mouth could keep up.
And right now, he sounded excited.
This wasn’t the first time we’d tracked cheetahs. Earlier in the week, we’d followed three males on foot while they roamed—something I didn’t think was advisable. I had assumed my ass would remain firmly planted in the Land Rover unless we were at a designated stop for morning coffee or evening cocktails. And yet, there we were, trailing the world’s fastest land predator on foot.
I had accepted this with a mix of cautious optimism and thrill, mostly because Obvious was an expert and assured us there were protocols: stay together, don’t get too close. "We’ll look big to them," he’d said. And the rush of tracking cheetahs was intoxicating.
But this time, Obvious went out alone. And he was gone a long time.
We sat in the truck, waiting. I found myself staring at the ground, where flecks of rose quartz glinted among the dirt, scattered like tiny jewels mixed with pebbles and grass. After several minutes, curious energy settled over our group.
“Should we be concerned that he’s been gone this long?” someone finally asked, half-joking.
“He probably needed to take a bush wee and told us that he’s tracking cheetahs,” I offered. It seemed like a perfect excuse to jump out of the truck if nature called.
Then, his voice crackled over the radio.
“Indlovu guests.”
We exchanged glances.
“Uh… is he talking to us?”
“No, I think that’s Indlovu Lodge trying to reach him.”
None of us knew how to respond on his multi-channel radio, so we sat in silence. Then, from a distance, we heard Obvious yell.
“Come, come!”
That seemed pretty clear.
We climbed out of the truck and followed his voice.
Obvious had spotted two male cheetahs—massive and sprawled out in the shade, their bellies round and bulging from a recent meal. Their stomachs looked the way mine did after demolishing an entire burrito or being eight months pregnant. Clearly, they’d just eaten—likely an impala.
“Is it cool for us to be here, Obvious?” someone asked.
“Yeah, yeah,” he assured us. “They’ve just eaten. We’re not on the menu.”
Well, that was comforting.
Then, one of my friends pointed. “Obvious! There’s another one right there.”
Tucked into the bushes lay a third male cheetah.
The full-bellied cheetah rose, stretched, and started walking in the direction of his brothers. Finding an opening in the bush, he stopped and chirped—a high-pitched call meant for his siblings.
We followed him.
Then, behind us, someone whispered.
“Uh… Obvious. Behind you.”
We turned.
The other two cheetahs were walking straight toward us, mouths slightly open, their movements slow and fluid.
My breath caught in my throat. Heat surged through my body before my mind could fully register the scene. The fear felt instant. Primal. My heart pounded in my ears.
Obvious and I were standing between them and their brother.
We were supposed to keep our distance. We were supposed to stay in a group. We were supposed to look big. And yet, here we were—more isolated, standing between two powerful predators and their sibling.
These creatures could bolt in an instant, pounce, rip flesh, and crush bone like they were snapping a carrot in half. There was no fighting back. No outrunning them.
Then, something happened.
A voice within me said to relax and breathe. This voice has always been there, whispering to me in moments of fear.
(Before I stepped onto a theater stage. Before I gave birth to my girls. Before I called an ambulance for my mom after she fell.)
(It’s not always easy to access, but I believe it resides in all of us.)
I slowed my breath, dropped my shoulders, felt my feet planted on the earth and tried to match the ease of the cheetahs approaching us.
Beside me, Obvious stood still. Relaxed. Unbothered. If he, the native expert, were relaxed—why couldn’t I?
It was as if I could feel the relaxed energy of the cheetahs and my guide—and I mirrored it.
Quantum physics tells us that we all have an energetic field extending at least five feet around us. I don’t know if that’s what I was sensing, but I felt it. These cheetahs weren’t hunting. They weren’t threatened. They were simply moving with the casual confidence of kings in their domain. And in that moment, I wanted them to sense ease within me, too.
We’re not on the menu, I told myself. They don’t want anything to do with us.
The cheetahs strolled past—so close I could have reached out and traced my fingers along their sleek, spotted backs. I stayed still, my breath steady.
And just like that, fear transformed into awe.
There was something almost mystical in the cheetahs’ presence—majestic, untamed, and beautiful. As they glided past, their spotted coats shimmering in the sunlight, I felt a deep connection—not just with them, but with the raw aliveness of the moment. The beauty of their movement, the power in their grace, the vast landscape around us, and the steady calm of my guide and friends—all of it merged into something greater than the sum of its parts.
I wasn’t just witnessing something extraordinary—I was inside it.
In that instant, I realized how wildly alive I felt. It wasn’t just the cheetahs that were magnificent—it was the whole experience: the landscape, the company, the moment. I was fully in life, in its unfiltered beauty. A wave of gratitude washed over me, and I couldn’t help but think, Am I really living this? Fear melted away, leaving only awe.
The brothers rejoined, rubbing their heads together before turning to spray a tree, marking their territory.
And I stood there, marked by something else entirely.
Fear has a way of convincing us that we’re always under threat. That the hard conversation, the career leap, the big move, the vulnerability—whatever stands in front of us—will devour us whole. That we’ll experience failure, humiliation, loss, regret.
But what if… we’re actually not on the menu?
I’ve spent countless nights wondering if my work is good enough, if I’ve upset people, or if I’m even capable of accomplishing my dreams. The fear of failing, of disappointing others, or of not measuring up has led me away from myself and my dreams.
It’s been in moments of fear—like the cheetah, whether or not my family and I will escape a wildfire (that’s another story) or how long I’ll have with my mom before dementia takes her—that have been the fucking wake-up calls. The kind that forces me to face the truth: I don’t want to spend my life playing it safe or worrying about pleasing others only to look back and realize that what I feared was never going to kill me. By avoiding fear, I'd also be avoiding life.
Of course, I still fall off course. We all do. The fear of not being worthy, of failing, of not being liked, is so damn strong that it can pull us back into the shadows without even realizing it. But we can guide ourselves back to the light. We can choose to show up again.
What if we could pause, breathe, and trust that we’re safer than we think? That not everything we fear is here to consume us? That sometimes, what we think will destroy us might actually walk right past—leaving us not in pieces, but in awe?
What if awe shows up in the areas of life that scare us the most, like aging, loss, career change, endings, and new beginnings?
What if the moment we fear most is the one that, when faced, will make us feel most alive?
Maybe the things we fear most aren’t here to consume us. Maybe they’re here to wake us up, to push us into the kind of life we’ve been too afraid to live.
I write regularly about fear, aliveness, and the inner choices that shape our lives. More of that writing lives on Substack.
