Living Through War: From Missiles To Mimosas

When on the fence, choose yes.

That’s what my mentor always says, and it’s why I found myself on a plane to Israel in June 2025 with barely four days’ notice. A cosmic series of coincidences had led me there—a Tuesday call, a shared Hoffman experience, perfectly aligned timing. Despite the quick turnaround, I did my homework to prep. I talked to people, talked to friends close to the situation, and everyone assured me: it’s safe, couldn’t be safer, especially in the south where we’d be volunteering.

The first few days unfolded exactly as promised. We heard from incredible speakers, got an extraordinary behind-the-scenes look at an Air Force base, and spent meaningful days volunteering at kibbutzim in the south, very close to the Gaza border—painting, cleaning out preschools, connecting with locals who’d lived through October 7th. I spent an entire day painting a beloved tractor in a kindergarten playground, the kind of project that isn’t a top-tier priority but, as we learned, exactly the kind of thing that brings smiles to people’s faces when they return.

We planted trees, bore witness to stories, and had what I’ll never forget as one of the most powerful experiences of my life: dinner with soldiers who had just returned from Gaza. I spent ninety minutes talking to a 21-year-old named Yuval, struck by his maturity and perspective on life, relationships, family, and country. They kept thanking us for showing up, for letting them know the diaspora was on their side. They felt so alone, so isolated, like the world was against them—which, in many ways, it was.

Then, on our fifth day, everything changed.

We’d just had a lovely spa night—face masks, eye patches, the whole thing. Around 1:30 AM, the hotel fire alarm went off, which was jarring but seemed manageable. We went back to sleep. No more than an hour later, our phones started going off like Amber alerts. But this time, the message was different: Israel had launched attacks on Iran and the retaliation was imminent.

That first trip to the bunker was surreal. Every floor of our hotel had one, and we found ourselves split between two rooms with our group, not really knowing what was happening; tired and scared. Naivety was actually helpful in those early hours. The trip leaders gathered us together, answered questions, and I managed to go back to sleep for a while before we were called to the bunker again.

The next morning, I came downstairs for breakfast and the thing that brought me to tears wasn’t the missiles or the sirens—it was when a friend casually mentioned, “Yeah, I think we’re gonna be here for two weeks.” I broke down right there. I can’t be here for two weeks. I just can’t.

But there I was. And I had to figure out how to get myself through this insane experience that was going to challenge me to the extreme.

What anchored me was everything I’d learned at my recent Hoffman retreat, combined with a deep confidence in my ability to navigate difficult situations. I went into strategic mode: How am I going to make sure I don’t spiral? The answer was radical presence and relentless positivity. Not rainbows-and-butterflies positivity—the fact stood that I was indeed in the middle of a war zone, but genuine appreciation for our circumstances within that reality. We had the best bunker in Tel Aviv. We were together with new friends. We were in a beautiful hotel. We were going to make the most of it, and we’d get out when we could.

The physical reality was intense. Every time a siren went off, your whole body would jolt with adrenaline and cortisol. I remember being on a work call, thinking I’d be cool if something happened, and then—the transcript literally captures me going “Shit. Fuck. I gotta go.” Your entire nervous system fires at once, whether it’s day or night, expected or not.

The worst was an afternoon siren at 3:30 PM when I was alone on the terrace near the pool while my friends were in the sauna. That one was completely unexpected, and being alone made it terrifying. From that moment on, I didn’t spend time alone until we left the country.

We settled into this bizarre Groundhog Day existence: pack a go bag every night, wake up to sirens, spend days at the hotel pool with mimosas, get jarred awake by alerts, head to bunkers where we could have our entire bedding with us or someone might be doing magic tricks or sharing falafel. The context switching was relentless—one moment you’re on a work call, the next you’re running to a bunker, then you’re back at the pool trying to live normally. Someone offers you a glass of prosecco. Then some schnitzel…and definitely a piece of watermelon.

Something that made the surreal even more so was experiencing how Israeli’s were navigating the situation: throughout all of this, I had second and third cousins who showed up to say hi, and a local friend who drove over on a different day. Israelis have a very different perspective on situations like this—not that it was normal for them, but Israel is the only country that has contingency plans for everything and actually has to use them regularly. They’re confident in their systems.

Perhaps nothing captures the bizarre reality better than this: I went for a massage in the hotel spa, and the massage therapist casually mentioned that if the sirens went off, we wouldn’t have to move—we could continue the massage right through the alerts because the spa was also the bunker.

Meanwhile, my phone was exploding with messages from home. I’d wake up to seventy texts from people at different levels of understanding about what was happening. Some friends were getting real-time missile alerts and completely plugged in; others would casually ask when I was flying out, not realizing the airspace was closed. Everyone cared deeply, but it was exhausting trying to meet people where they were while managing the time difference and preserving my own sanity.

As I reflect weeks later, I definitely downplayed everything to keep people calm. I wasn’t in a position to educate everyone about what was happening—that would have been more work than I could handle. So I sent pool selfies alongside bunker selfies, tried to project that I was okay, and saved my honest conversations for the few friends who were fully informed and getting the same alerts I was. I’d be able to share more once I was out of the stressful situation.

The group dynamics were fascinating. About ten of us were living at the hotel together, while others stayed in apartments around the city. We had multiple WhatsApp groups for different exit strategies, different levels of urgency. Some people needed to know every bit of news, watch every video, get every single alert, and be in every WhatsApp group. When we were in the bunker, they’d be telling us everything that was happening, listening to the news, while I was just trying to keep my nervous system calm because I knew there wasn’t anything I could do about the situation anyway.

It was great to understand what people’s different needs were—both to figure out how you could support your friends and also let them support you. Some people booked flights every fifteen minutes to make sure they had options—that freneticism was too much for me. Others felt a stronger urge to get home faster and make a decision versus wait, and ended up taking boats to Cyprus or drove and took flights out of Jordan. For me, the urgency wasn’t there, I felt safe in our hotel held by our community and I was not interested in going to a neighboring country just yet.

Our crew was strong and everyone made sincere and beautiful efforts to support each other. I was really grateful to be with a bunch of fellow executors. When we had an opportunity to get out, we’d rally together to move quickly. Someone created a shared Google Doc with everyone’s passport information (let’s hope this has since been deleted…), and I wasn’t the one frantically entering it all in—somebody else handled that. It felt really good to be able to lean on people and trust them to do an amazing job.

The uncertainty was the hardest part. I had no idea when we’d leave. My summer plans were dissolving into a distant memory. The disappointment of watching carefully made plans become completely unviable was crushing. On the day I was supposed to be home, here I was with no flight, no clear path out, trying to manage work obligations and family panic while living with daily missiles being shot at us.

But I also had unprecidented tremendous faith that it would work out. I just knew that the second we could get out in a way that made sense and aligned with what I needed, it would happen. That confidence sustained me through the worst moments—except when I was really tired, or when I let myself think too much about my ruined summer, or when a missile hit close enough that we felt the ground shake. That was terrifying, especially when one of our leaders came into the bunker saying he thought our building had been hit. (It hadn’t—it was two kilometers away, but still.)

The breakthrough came when my friend Sophie heard about a way to get us out through the closed airspace. Israel was sending planes to bring stranded Israelis home and agreed to take us wherever that plane was going next. We had less than twenty-four hours’ notice, could only bring carry-on luggage, and had no idea where we’d end up. I wore seven shirts on the plane and didn’t believe it was really happening until we were thirty minutes in the air.

We landed in Athens. Seven of us stood there looking at each other like, “Holy shit. How do we even begin to recover from that?”

A small group of us ended up staying, island hopping, trying to make the most of a completely insane situation.

Sometimes the best way to process trauma is to lean into life, to find joy and beauty and connection in the aftermath of something incomprehensible.

I learned that resilience isn’t about being fearless—it’s about being strategic with your emotional resources when you can’t control the external circumstances. It’s about finding the positives without denying the reality. It’s about taking care of yourself and your people while everything falls apart around you.

And sometimes, it’s about wearing seven shirts on a mystery flight to Athens and discovering that the most unexpected detours can lead to exactly where you need to be.