Tag Archives: empowerment

There were versions of me I used to resent—

the overthinking one, the one with her guard welded to her ribs,

the one who could never rest because she believed the world would collapse

the moment she dared to exhale.

For a long time, I thought these versions were flaws I needed to fix.

Parts of me I should hide or outgrow.

Evidence that I was “too much,” “too serious,” “too damaged.”

But healing has a strange way of shifting the lighting on your own story.

And when I look back now, I see something different.

I see a girl who learned to survive with the tools she had.

I see a woman who adapted faster than she ever should’ve needed to.

I see protectors—imperfect, yes, but loyal in their own rough-edged way.

There was the Hyper-Independent One,

the version of me who believed asking for help was a burden.

She carried everything—grief, responsibility, guilt, expectations—

until her spine bent under the load.

She didn’t trust anyone to stay, so she trusted no one at all.

And the truth is: she kept me safe when I didn’t have anyone.

There was the Perfectionist,

the girl who sharpened herself into something unbreakable.

If she never messed up, no one could punish her.

If she kept every room spotless, every word edited,

maybe the chaos around her would be a little less loud.

She was terrified of disappointing anyone,

and she tried so hard to earn a sense of safety she never should’ve had to earn.

There was the Silent One,

who swallowed her needs so no one would think she was weak.

She held entire storms inside her chest because she didn’t know

that feelings are meant to move through you, not calcify.

She believed stillness equaled strength.

But she was just trying not to drown.

There was the Vigilant One,

a shadow leaning forward in every room,

scanning faces, predicting shifts in tone,

anticipating danger that wasn’t there anymore.

She was tired all the time.

But she kept watch because no one ever kept watch for her.

All of these versions—

the too much, the too quiet, the too strong,

the “why am I like this?” versions—

they weren’t mistakes.

They were guardians.

They did not fail me.

They saved me.

But here’s the truth healing demands:

sometimes the things that kept you alive

cannot carry you into the life you’re building now.

So I’ve been learning to thank them,

to sit with each version like an old friend,

to tell them,

You did your job.

You kept me alive.

You don’t have to run the show anymore.

I can take it from here.

The hardest part of healing isn’t letting go of the past—

it’s letting go of the selves you became to survive it.

And maybe that’s the quiet miracle of all this:

recognizing that I’m not broken,

I’m simply evolving—

gently, slowly, into someone who doesn’t have to fight so hard

just to exist.

Someone who is allowed to rest.

Someone who is allowed to need.

Someone who is allowed to be held.

Someone who is, finally, safe.

For years, my nightmares were reruns my mind never stopped airing—dark corridors of memory where I was assaulted again and again. The dreams didn’t just revisit the past; they replayed my helplessness. They held me hostage in a story I never chose.

For a long time, I woke up shaken, sweat-soaked, heart pounding like it was trying to outrun the past. I would lie there, staring at the ceiling, trying to convince myself I was safe, even while my body insisted I wasn’t. Trauma has a way of blurring time like that. It’s hard to feel the present when your nervous system is stuck in the past.

So I began writing it out with my therapist. Not to relive it, but to untangle it. To give shape to the shadows. To say, “Here is what happened,” and then slowly learn to say, “And here is who I am now.”

Putting the dreams on paper felt like cracking open a locked door. It let in air. It let in truth. It let in possibility.

And then came something unexpected: talking to my martial arts instructor about how to change the ending.

Not metaphorically. Literally.

We walked through the moments that haunted me. We broke them down, named them, reframed them. We practiced how I would move—how I could defend myself, break grips, angle my body, use my voice, create space. We practiced what my body could do when it wasn’t frozen in fear. Strength over silence. Skill over shock.

For the first time, I wasn’t replaying the trauma. I was rewriting the narrative.

In real life, I pray there is never a “next time.” But if there is, I now know something that my nightmares never showed me: I am not powerless. I am not cornered. I am not at the mercy of the story that once swallowed me whole.

And something shifted.

I still dream—but now I fight back.

The dreams haven’t vanished. But the endings are different. I am different. In the places where I used to be frozen, I now see myself moving. In the scenes where I used to collapse, I now stand up. My subconscious—once a battlefield—has started to understand that I am capable, that I am stronger than I’ve ever been, that the fear isn’t the only truth.

This isn’t about glorifying survival. It’s about honoring the quiet, steady courage of reclaiming your body, your voice, your story. Healing doesn’t erase the nightmares, but sometimes it teaches you how to walk through them with your hands open, your stance grounded, your breath steady.

And one day, maybe the dreams will stop.

But until then, I’m not running anymore.

I’m fighting back.

Tonight, I tried to soften.

I tried to breathe slowly, to anchor myself in the present, to speak gently to the parts of me that were trembling. I did everything I’ve learned to do—the grounding, the reminders, the slow orientation back into the room. I told myself I was safe.

And still, it wasn’t enough.

There are moments in healing no one warns you about—the moments when all the coping skills in the world feel like trying to stop a tidal wave with cupped hands. When you reach for softness and your body is too overwhelmed to accept it. When the logic of “I’m safe now” disappears under the weight of old fear that still knows your name.

Tonight was one of those moments.

People talk about healing like it’s a series of successes, as if every trigger should be met with wisdom and calm responses. But sometimes I get pulled under. Sometimes the past is louder than my breath, more vivid than the room I’m standing in. Sometimes my nervous system doesn’t listen to the gentleness I offer.

And that doesn’t mean I’ve failed.

It means the trauma was loud.

It means the memory was strong.

It means my brain was doing what it learned a long time ago to survive.

Sometimes I can soften into the moment.

Sometimes I can’t.

Both are part of healing.

Tonight, I didn’t find comfort. I didn’t win the battle with my own body. I didn’t light a candle and breathe my way back into peace. I shook. I spiraled. I felt myself slipping into a place that didn’t feel safe, even though I knew logically nothing around me was dangerous.

But here is the quiet truth I’m holding onto:

Not every moment of healing will feel triumphant.

Not every trigger will dissolve.

Not every grounding technique will soothe.

And even on the nights when nothing works, I am still surviving them.

Sometimes, the win is simply staying—staying in the body, in the moment long enough to feel it pass. Sometimes the only courage I have is not giving up on myself even when I can’t calm myself.

This wasn’t a soft night.

It wasn’t a poetic night.

It was a survival night.

And survival still counts.

Even when it feels messy.

Even when it feels like failure.

Even when it feels like the past swallowed the present whole.

Healing isn’t only found in the moments you rise.

It’s also found in the moments you endure.

There was a time when I believed strength meant never needing anyone.

If I could carry it all, hold it all together, and never ask for help — that meant I was strong. If I could keep my voice steady, my smile convincing, my pain buried deep enough that no one could touch it, then I was safe.

I wore control like armor, perfection like a medal of honor. Every detail, every plan, every emotion managed — because if I let go, even for a second, everything might fall apart. I might fall apart.

Hyper-independence became my survival. It wasn’t confidence; it was self-preservation. It was the belief that the only person I could rely on was myself — because depending on others had once led to disappointment, abandonment, pain.

So I learned to be the strong one. The capable one. The one who didn’t flinch, didn’t falter, didn’t cry in public. The one who built her life with her own hands, brick by brick, wall by wall.

But here’s what I know now:

Walls keep you safe, but they also keep you lonely.

Control feels like protection until it becomes isolation.

Perfection feels like purpose until it becomes a prison.

Metal becomes strong not by resisting flame but by being reshaped within it. There’s a difference between steel that’s brittle and steel that’s tempered. One breaks under pressure. The other bends, flexes, adapts — because it’s been through the fire and come out changed.

I was brittle for years. I mistook my rigidity for strength. I thought if I just held on tighter, I wouldn’t break. But life, in its mercy, has a way of teaching softness through breaking us open.

Grief cracked me.

Loss hollowed me.

Love — real love — softened me.

And in that softening, I began to see that what I once called weakness was actually the most courageous act of all: to stay open, to stay kind, to let myself be seen without the armor.

The crow teaches this too. She is clever and resilient — but she also knows when to soar and when to rest. She doesn’t spend her life gripping the branch in fear of falling. She trusts her wings. She knows that flight isn’t control; it’s surrender to the wind.

I am learning that kind of trust.

To let life move me instead of trying to hold it still.

To believe that I can bend and not break.

To accept that sometimes, the truest strength is in the softening.

Softness, I’ve realized, is not the absence of pain — it’s the willingness to feel it. It’s the decision to stay human when it would be easier to harden. It’s crying when you need to. It’s saying “I can’t do this alone” and believing that doesn’t make you weak.

It takes strength to unclench your fists.

To stop fighting the world long enough to let it touch you.

To stop striving for perfection and start reaching for peace.

It takes strength to stay soft when you have every reason not to be.

There are days I still catch myself slipping back into old habits — reaching for control when I’m scared, hiding behind independence when I feel small. My instinct is still to fix, to manage, to perfect. But now I catch it. I breathe. I remind myself that I am safe even when I’m not in control.

I remind myself that survival taught me how to be strong — but healing is teaching me how to be soft.

There’s a quiet bravery in that shift. A surrender that isn’t giving up, but giving in — to trust, to love, to life itself.

Softness doesn’t mean I no longer have boundaries. It means I honor them with compassion instead of fear. It doesn’t mean I let everyone in. It means I let myself out — out of the armor, out of the constant vigilance, out of the illusion that I must carry everything alone.

Today, the flame that once burned me now refines me. The crow still perches on the edge of that heat, black feathers gleaming in the firelight, watching as I melt down what no longer serves me.

And when I emerge, I am not brittle anymore. I am tempered.

Soft, but unbreakable.

Gentle, but fierce.

Open, but grounded.

Because the strength it takes to stay soft — after everything that tried to harden you — is the kind of strength that builds worlds, that heals hearts, that transforms survival into living.

It is the strength that doesn’t shout, but breathes.

Doesn’t command, but trusts.

Doesn’t fight to prove it’s strong — because it already knows it is.