self-growth isn’t always TikTok glow ups, “that girl” trends, cookie-cutter morning routines and productivity maximization spreadsheet bibles
self-growth isn’t always TikTok glow ups, “that girl” trends, cookie-cutter morning routines and productivity maximization spreadsheet bibles.
don’t get me wrong — it can be. but it’s also silent tears on an operating table. it’s quiet mornings and savoring their daffodil sunlight. it’s getting rid of high school clothes that no longer fit, the absurd yet very-much-there grief that they no longer fit, but realizing that you don’t really want them to anyway. it’s learning to be gentle with yourself. it’s driving to the ER at 11pm with shaky hands and never knowing when your hands stopped shaking but realizing that at some point they did. it’s moments of stillness. it’s letting go of things that once brought you joy but now bring you pain. it’s doing the thing that makes you anxious, having a panic attack but doing it anyway. it’s repeatedly telling your body that the storm is over when you’re still trapped in fight or flight. it’s salty ocean breezes and pastel sunset skies and dew drops on spiderwebs and refusing to stop seeing the beauty in the small moments. it’s finding balance between your softness and your hard edges. it’s realizing that just because the night is over, that doesn’t mean it won’t return… and trying to accept that. it’s understanding that life is way too complex to be filtered into “bad times” and “good times”. it’s desperately pining after a previous version of yourself until you realize that she’s never coming back, but also that she never left. it’s realizing that even in a return to “normalcy” she is changed — it’s realizing that you don’t go back, you emerge something new.
it’s unique. it’s variable. it doesn’t look one way because it is different for each person, their own journey, and the phase of life they’re in.
