Sarah Ferguson - What I Know Now: Simple Lessons Learned the Hard Way

Also by Sarah Ferguson

The Duchess of York

Energy Breakthrough

Reinventing Yourself with the Duchess

Win the Weight Game

Dieting with the Duchess

Dining with the Duchess

My Story

Travels with Queen Victoria

Victoria and Albert: Life at Osborne House

The Palace of Westminster

FOR CHILDREN

Bright Lights

Royal Switch

Budgie and the Blizzard

Budgie Goes to Sea

Budgie at Bendicks Point

Budgie the Little Helicopter

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Copyright 2003 by Sarah Ferguson The Duchess of York

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available.

ISBN 0-7432-4612-8
ISBN 13: 978-0-743-24612-5
eISBN: 978-1-439-14176-2

For My Darling Angels, Beatrice and EugenieYou are the blood in my veins, the breath in my lungs, the freckles on my face, the joy in my heart.

You make my world complete and have taught me how to live and how to love.

I love you both with all of my being.

Until recently, my changing age held no more significance to me than the barometric pressure or the gross national product of Brazil. It was just a new number, an excuse for a nice dinner, and then I flipped the page to another year.

But as I turn forty-three, it seems to me an apt time for reflection, a time to share what I have learned, however slowly. For too long, my life was awash with inconsistency. I was like a river running in curves so broad that it never built any useful speed. I meandered through the unconsciousness of my youth and early twenties; the Sturm und Drang of my Buckingham Palace years; the perpetual crises of my thirties, when I first struck out on my own.

Now, at last, I have reached some perspective on those twists and turns. Ive begun to pare away the false and inessentialmy penchant for overdoing, my need to be accepted, my impulse for the rash and brash. I am getting to the nub of me, and I like what Im finding there. The small tales in this book are meant to illustrate my progress and perhaps to help others on a similar path.

This is not a book of grand pronouncements or high-flown philosophy. Whatever wisdom I have today is the fruit of my experience and especially my mistakes. They have made me at once stronger and more humble; they are the simple lessons of my life.

Sarah Ferguson
The Duchess of York
October 15, 2002

Readers of My Story may recall my old foes the Grey Men, the Palace bureaucrats who found me insufficiently royal in every way: my dress, my bearing, the friends I kept. They did what they could to make my life a misery, with a strong assist from myself, of course. After leaving their milieu, Id had no contact with any of these gentlemen for an ageuntil last year, when I strolled down a street in Mayfair and passed an art shop. There in the window sat an original portrait, by a well-known painter, of one of the top courtiers.

I didnt think twice. I bought the portrait and sent it to the courtier (now retired) with a simple note that I thought he might like it for his children, and I hoped he was well, and I sent my love. I didnt buy the gift to be kinder-than-thou. I simply knew that it would please him, as it would have pleased me. I would have done the same for anyone I knew.

A few days later, the mail brought the mans response. Out of respect I will paraphrase, but here is the gist of it: I cannot believe that after all that has happened between us, you can be kind enough to do this.

In that exchange, our history was forever altered.

For years I had stewed in my anger at all who had hurt me. Bitterness can be seductive. As long as you hold to it, you are forever wrongedand thus forever right. Over time, however, I came to realize that animosity was no good for me. It spoiled my natural optimism, made me tedious to be around. Worse yet, it kept me from learning from my errors.

When it came to the Grey Man in question, I thought about why Id been so furious with him. Then I solved the puzzle: I was angry with myself, for the blunders that had prompted his rebukes. I tried to look at life from the courtiers point of view. By his own lights, he was an honest man doing his job. And if, with hindsight, he might have done it less gruffly, what did that matter now?

My first step, in sum, was to acknowledge my own trespasses. Once done, it was not so hard to forgive the Grey Man, too.

Now I see that I have no right to bear a grudge, nor any interest in it. To lash back can only feed the old injury and any lingering self-doubt. To snub a person is to forfeit our future together. In the end, we both lose.

I do not merely rise above old wrongs; I deny them their reality. I sever my connections to darker times and circumstance. I take people with a fresh eye and an open heart, as they come to me today. Their old dossiers have expired. Our new story has yet to be written. By refusing to hurt another, I heal my wounds as well.

Through all the storms that have tossed us, Andrew and I have kept safe what we hold most dear: our abiding friendship and the two young girls weve raised together. Weve dealt with friction like everyone else, but weve always tried to put Beatrice and Eugenie first. It is a matter of common sense. Regardless of what else changes in our lives, Andrew will always be my daughters father. In parenting we will always be partners.