The Urgent Life

How do you live fully when life keeps breaking your heart? In The Urgent Life, Bozoma Saint John asks—and answers—that question through a searing memoir of love, loss, resilience, and spiritual awakening. Well-known as a marketing powerhouse at Netflix, Apple, and Uber, Saint John dives beneath her success story to explore how tragedy shaped her instincts for living with intention. Her core argument is that we must live not just the length of life but its width, echoing the Diane Ackerman quote on her epigraph: to occupy every moment rather than let it slip by.

The Heart of an Urgent Life

Saint John contends that urgency isn’t about rushing—it’s about presence. Losing her first love, Ben, to suicide, and later her husband Peter to cancer, alongside the death of her child Eve, forced her to confront time differently. Each loss amplified her awareness that tomorrow is not promised. To face fear and grief, she learned to act decisively, speak her truth, and appreciate the beauty woven through everyday existence. The book moves from tragedy to transformation, illustrating how urgency can become a spiritual compass that directs every choice.

Love, Grief, and Survival

At its core, Saint John’s story is a dialogue between love and loss. She falls deeply for two men—first Ben at Wesleyan University, a creative spirit who wrestled with mental illness, and then Peter, a white advertising executive she met in Spike Lee’s agency. Both relationships challenge her ideas of identity, race, and belonging. When Ben dies suddenly, Saint John learns that grief can be violent and transformative; when Peter dies years later, she discovers how to channel gratitude into action. Through these experiences, she redefines the meaning of survival—not merely enduring tragedy but allowing it to expand your capacity for love and empathy.

The Intersection of Identity and Resilience

Saint John writes from the intersection of many worlds: Ghanaian heritage and American upbringing, faith and corporate ambition, motherhood and loss. Her identity as a Black woman navigating predominantly white spaces deepens the book’s urgency. Whether facing subtle racism in professional settings or societal judgments around interracial love, she insists on inhabiting her truth without apology. The memoir mirrors the dual energy found in other modern Black narratives—unflinching sorrow balanced by fierce self-celebration (similar to works by Jesmyn Ward or Michelle Obama).

Faith, Signs, and Spiritual Awakening

Faith threads through every chapter. Raised in both Ghanaian tradition and Christian belief, Saint John weaves together stories of ancestors, spirits, and divine signs—from hearing God’s voice after losing her job to seeing Peter’s presence in a rainbow after his passing. These mystical encounters prompt her to believe that grief connects us to something larger. Living urgently means living spiritually, trusting unseen forces while acting boldly within the physical world.

Why It Matters

Saint John’s experiences remind you that urgency can follow heartbreak rather than precede it. Instead of letting trauma harden her, she uses it to soften—to claim gratitude, creativity, and emotional honesty. For anyone navigating loss or searching for purpose, her story offers a roadmap: face what breaks you, tell the truth without embellishment, and keep moving toward the dawn. In doing so, you learn to live not for longevity but for depth—to measure life, as she says, not by its length but by its width.

Saint John begins her memoir with fear—the moment she senses impending doom before learning that her husband Peter’s cancer has turned terminal. Instead of turning away, she learns that survival starts by facing fear head-on. This motif—seeing instead of fleeing—becomes central throughout her life. When she arrives at the hospital and hears Peter’s devastating words, she discovers that denial only prolongs pain. The lesson: confronting darkness allows light to enter.

The Courage to Name Pain

In that pivotal morning scene, Saint John’s body reacts before her mind knows—the queasy stomach, the racing heart. But she resists the tendency to dismiss intuition. When Chad, her colleague, tells her she will be okay, she learns a new meaning of courage: the ability to walk into the hospital knowing that life may change forever. Later, she likens fear to the childhood act of shining a flashlight under the bed to see the monsters. Once you look directly, fear shrinks. This visual becomes a blueprint for emotional resilience.

Learning to Stay Present

The author’s mantra, “Take it one day at a time,” transforms from cliché into survival strategy. When two people she loves are dying, she must live minute to minute—making lists, calling family, and refusing paralysis. Instead of grand plans, she answers fear with structure: daily rituals, tangible tasks, and small acts of care. Her journey parallels Viktor Frankl’s teaching in Man’s Search for Meaning: purpose and focus combat despair.

Fear as a Messenger

Later, she reframes fear not as an enemy but as a guide—a messenger directing attention toward what matters. “When you feel fear,” she writes, “shine a light on what scares you.” This realization becomes her recurring lesson in love, career, and faith. Whether facing racism in the workplace or grief at home, Saint John learns that avoiding fear delays transformation while confronting it opens the way to growth. You too can take fear as a signal to look closer, not run faster.

Saint John’s marriage to Peter Saint John—a tall, Italian American marketing executive—frames one of the memoir’s most dynamic explorations of identity and love. Their union challenges cultural boundaries and racial assumptions, exposing the subtle tension of loving across lines in America. Through humorous and painful vignettes, Saint John portrays how interracial relationships can illuminate both personal courage and collective blind spots.

Defying Expectations and Family Pressure

Raised in a Ghanaian Christian household, Saint John’s choice of a white partner unsettles her family. Her father—steeped in tradition and faith—flies from China to confront her for planning to move in with Peter, demanding that she set an example for her younger sisters. This moment crystallizes competing cultural codes: obedience versus autonomy. Saint John decides to follow her intuition, learning early that love often requires rebellion. It’s a lesson mirrored later when she confronts corporate systems that expect conformity.

Racism, Class, and Everyday Encounters

Their marriage also exposes racial dynamics that outsiders project onto intimacy. On New York subway platforms, Black men accuse her of betrayal; in boutiques, white women roll their eyes. Peter doesn’t always notice, protected by his privilege, while Saint John feels the sting acutely. Yet she gradually transforms frustration into teaching moments, helping Peter understand how context shapes perception. In this way, interracial love becomes activism—an act of living truth in the face of social discomfort (comparable to James Baldwin’s reflections in Notes of a Native Son).

Finding Common Ground

Over time, their shared humanity transcends barriers. Through lasagna lessons with Peter’s mother and Ghanaian wedding rituals with her own, their families embody cross-cultural tenderness. Love becomes the intersection where cultures collide yet coexist. Saint John’s message to readers: when love challenges norms, treat the discomfort as growth. Cross-cultural connection demands patience, humility, and a willingness to see difference not as threat but as invitation.

Grief is the engine of The Urgent Life. Saint John doesn’t simply survive loss—she mines it for meaning. Each death she endures reshapes her sense of control and surrender. Losing her college sweetheart Ben to suicide, her daughter Eve to preeclampsia complications, and her husband Peter to cancer propels her toward a new rhythm of existence: living urgently through pain.

Ben’s Death and the First Awakening

At Wesleyan, her relationship with Ben begins as an intoxicating mix of hip-hop, philosophy, and romance. His suicide after a spiraling mental illness shatters her innocence. Saint John blames herself, replaying missed phone calls and words unsaid. She learns forgiveness slowly—understanding that no amount of love can heal another person’s hidden battle. This early tragedy teaches her compassion and the importance of emotional honesty.

Eve’s Short Life and Maternal Courage

Years later, pregnant with her first child, Saint John endures medical trauma. Choosing between her life and her baby’s becomes an unbearable moral crossroads—Peter must decide to save her. Baby Eve lives for minutes. Through mourning, Bozoma realizes that grief doesn't vanish; it evolves. Every act of nurturing—from nursing her second child, Lael, to guiding colleagues—is shaped by Eve’s memory. She learns that motherhood can mean loving beyond physical presence.

Peter’s Final Days and the Practice of Urgency

Peter’s recurrence of cancer reveals urgency’s full meaning. Together they live as if time were condensed—taking fishing trips, eating gelato, renewing vows, and revisiting their wedding video. Through this vivid compression of life, Saint John discovers gratitude even in countdowns. Peter’s death teaches her the paradox at the book’s heart: living urgently doesn’t mean escaping loss; it means embracing love fully before it disappears.

Transforming Pain Into Purpose

Instead of compartmentalizing grief, Saint John integrates it into ambition and faith. Like Joan Didion in The Year of Magical Thinking, she refuses to mythologize strength. Loss remains hard—but it fuels her devotion to presence, creativity, and motherhood. The lesson for you: survival is not stoicism; it’s evolution. When confronted with tragedy, you can let pain shatter you or let it stretch you wide enough to hold gratitude too.

Throughout the memoir, Saint John portrays faith not as doctrine but dialogue—a living conversation between God and human resilience. Her Ghanaian upbringing merges Christianity with ancestral spirituality, shaping a worldview where signs, dreams, and intuition hold divine weight. Faith becomes her companion in grief and her guide in uncertainty.

Ancestral Roots of Belief

Saint John recalls childhood stories of her father’s imprisonment during a Ghanaian coup and his promise to serve God if freed. This origin story rootes spiritual resilience in her lineage. Later, her mother’s strength during illness and her own encounters with visions—like seeing a rainbow shaped like Peter’s face—reinforce belief that the spiritual realm touches daily life. Faith becomes less about ritual and more about recognition: the ancestors are never gone.

Conversations With the Divine

One transformative moment occurs after her divorce and job loss: she hears God’s voice saying, “Dawn always comes.” That phrase revives her purpose and leads to a new career chapter. Through such dialogues, she interprets divine messages not as miracles but as reminders of continuity. The ordinary dawn becomes sacred—an emblem that daylight follows darkness.

Faith as Action

For Saint John, faith is lived urgency. She acts on intuition—sending spontaneous messages, accepting job offers, traveling after loss—trusting divine timing. Faith, she concludes, demands motion. You show belief by moving forward even when prayer yields silence. This active spirituality echoes Paulo Coelho’s notion in The Alchemist that “when you want something, all the universe conspires in helping you achieve it.”

Saint John’s relationship with her daughter, Lael, threads through the book as the anchor of her present and the echo of her past losses. Motherhood is portrayed as lineage—a living inheritance shaped by both ancestors and grief. After losing Eve, raising Lael becomes her spiritual practice: to nurture without fear, to teach resilience, and to embody gratitude.

Healing Through Connection

The scenes between mother and daughter are tender realism—a bath-time song in Fanti, shared laughter, and honest truth about Peter’s death. When Saint John tells Lael “Daddy is gone,” she learns that simple truth can carry complex emotion. Later, as Lael grows, Saint John leaves notes on her pillow before business trips, ensuring her daughter always knows she is loved. These gestures make maternal care not only emotional but ritualistic—a daily urgency of affection.

Continuing the Legacy

Lael and Eve together symbolize continuity. Saint John imagines Peter in heaven caring for Eve while she cares for Lael on earth. This duality dissolves boundaries between living and dead; motherhood stretches into eternity. Through storytelling, she transforms loss into lessons—teaching Lael that love can transcend mortality. Every act of nurturing becomes a conversation between worlds.

Motherhood as Urgency

Saint John’s parental insight mirrors Toni Morrison’s reflections on maternal power: love isn’t protection from pain but preparation for it. By raising Lael to be brave, curious, and emotionally articulate, she ensures her daughter will live with width, not just length. The takeaway: motherhood teaches urgency best—it reminds you daily that time is precious, and love is the most lasting legacy you can leave.

While The Urgent Life centers on personal loss, it also celebrates worldly accomplishment. Saint John’s climb from temp assistant at Spike Lee’s agency to global chief marketing officer at Netflix reveals how resilience translates into leadership. Her career mirrors her emotional evolution: audacity anchored in authenticity.

Breaking Through in Business

Saint John starts at Spike DDB fetching coffee, yet boldly critiques Spike Lee’s script, earning his respect. That moment of speaking up without permission crystallizes her ethos: “show up as your full self.” The corporate worlds of Pepsi, Apple, and Uber become her proving ground, each demanding balance between creative freedom and survival in male, white-dominated spaces. Through these experiences, she learns that purpose thrives only when aligned with truth—a lesson that many professionals overlook.

Work as Healing

Her creative success parallels her emotional recovery. When she hears God say “Dawn always comes,” she reenters Pepsi after being fired and later moves west to Beats and Apple—each transition representing rebirth. Work becomes spiritual practice, demanding the same urgency she applies to life decisions. By creating campaigns for empowerment and music, she channels grief into innovation.

Authenticity and Success

Saint John’s career story warns against conformity. Whether refusing to straighten her hair or speaking boldly at boardrooms, she disrupts expectations. Success, she insists, should not mute individuality. Her message to you: professional resilience requires emotional truth. Move toward roles that align with your spirit. In doing so, you embody the urgent life—even at work.

In the final chapters, Saint John opens the doors between life and the hereafter. After Peter’s death, she begins seeing patterns—rainbows, numbers, broken pottery. Instead of dismissing them, she interprets these as signs. The 4:44 that appears everywhere becomes her sacred number, symbolizing eternal connection and guidance. These mystical experiences serve as affirmation that love doesn’t end; it transforms.

Recognizing the Signs

The broken ceramic pill holder, the car license plate reading “Pete,” the rainbow in Anguilla—all arrive at moments of doubt. Saint John views them not as coincidences but communication. This perspective echoes spiritual psychology from authors like Elizabeth Kübler-Ross and Anita Moorjani, who see grief as a portal to expanded consciousness. When Saint John sees two rainbows, she reads them as messages from Peter and Eve—proof that the departed remain near.

Living With the Invisible

Instead of fearing the spiritual, Saint John accepts it as normal. Ghanaian cosmology teaches that ancestors watch the living, and Christianity teaches resurrection. She fuses these beliefs by seeing divinity in everyday occurrences. This synthesis restores peace, showing how grief can coexist with faith.

Finding Meaning in Continuity

Her tattoo of 444 becomes both memorial and mantra: a reminder that endings are beginnings. Living by signs enables her to move forward—to relocate to California, embrace new career opportunities, and continue mentoring others. For you, the message is clear: when loss darkens your world, look up. Guidance may appear in numbers, light, or memory. Love continues beyond logic, asking only that you pay attention.