Back in 2021, as I was turning 30, I had this quiet realization: I didn't really know myself. From the outside, everything looked good. I had a stable job, close friends, a supportive family. But inside, something felt subtly off. Like I was living my life on autopilot. I was making decisions based on what made sense, or what I thought I should be doing, but I wasn't actually listening to myself. And if I'm being honest, I lost touch with what it meant to listen to myself.
Instead of pushing forward and hoping it would resolve itself, I decided to hit pause on everything. I wanted to KNOW what it means to be connected to myself. I took a year leave from my job. I hired a coach, went on retreats, read books, but mainly I spent long stretches of time in silence, observing my mind and body.
And what I was confronting was uncomfortable. It was fear. Confusion. Uncertainty. Unworthiness. I had this constant urge to do something because I believed I was wasting my life. My people pleasing pattern and deep fear of rejection was put on display. The stored trauma of inadequacy that I had been avoiding my whole life, was flooding my body. But instead of reacting to all this agitation, I was practicing doing something different: Staying, Listening, Allowing my experience to be there without trying to fix. It was confusing and disorienting at first. I was retraining years of conditioning that had taught me my default state wasn't enough.
But slowly, something began to shift. I noticed that when I wasn't avoiding my emotions or getting pulled into my thoughts, there was a quiet peace in the background. And within that peace, a felt sense of direction. It wasn't loud or dramatic, but it was steady, intimate, and quietly clear. It was my inner knowing. The paradox was, it only revealed itself when I stopped trying to control my experience. That realization changed my life.
Over the next few years, I deepened my connection to that place, which I call our true self, and it's transformed how I live. Life feels more playful. I trust myself more. I'm less caught in my thoughts. Decisions feel clearer.
This isn't to say that life is always easy, but I developed the capacity to stay with myself even when it isn't. And that's the work I love teaching. Learning how to reconnect with ourselves even when we feel the most disconnected, the most stuck, and the most unsure of what to do next. Because clarity and self trust is always available, you just need to practice coming back to it.
