What if I said all you need to do is let yourself exist?
Um, hello, I’m already here reading this. How am I not existing?
Listen. We are not taught anything about our brains. As we grow we learn to change or avoid pieces of ourselves to be likable. We try to shrink and reshape. Although we often fail at fitting in we succeed in withering the root that connects us to ourselves. As the years pass we lose any ability to tell the difference between our voice and everyone else’s. We are shadows of ourselves.
Ghosts.
We linger at the edges of our lives, never fully stepping into them, haunting ourselves while we wait for things to change. We will wait forever.
Having a point of origin within ourselves allows us to interact with our unpredictable world and remain steady. We must have a solid place from which we begin. We need roots so we have the strength to expand up and outward.
It is standard, especially for women, to grow into adulthood having skipped this part of development altogether. Without a solid inner foundation we are easily pulled in any direction, without a moments peace, because we depend on others to hold us steady. They cannot.
We are always reaching.
We end up believing we have no control and that life just happens. This belief contributes to our disconnection. We practice a voice we think we should have and muzzle our truth. We let ourselves wilt inside like a neglected house plant. As women we are raised with expectations that put us in conflict with ourselves from our first breath. It drains us because we keep searching for a solution that doesn’t exist. We are a society obsessed with validation from others. We mistake it for true self-actualization.
This is how most of us reach adulthood without existing. We don’t know how to be.
