I'm super excited to introduce my latest piece, “Break Free”!!
Here's a deeper look at the message behind it...
Everyone has had a season where they felt like they were drowning. Physically, professionally, mentally, emotionally, or maybe all the above. The tangled chains of our past, mistakes, traumas, addictions, and/or fears drag us deeper to the point where the pressure of it all overwhelms us and we can’t breathe. No matter how hard we try to break free, we can’t. It’s dark. Terrifying. Suffocating.
Healing often feels like this. Progress feels like one step forward, 5 steps back. We’re all too aware of the things we need to heal from, but have no direction as to how to work on it all. No matter what we do, it doesn’t feel like enough. Guilt and helplessness threaten to swallow us whole. Trying to untangle one thing tangles everything else. It takes immense courage every day to continue one’s healing journey. But whether we see it or not, every effort we make, strategy we try, time we stand back up, matters. It may not be linear progress, but it’s still progress. And one day at a time, we’ll get there.
If someone you love is struggling like this, please understand that what you may see as “not trying hard enough” may really be more like this - fighting internally, paralyzing fear, feeling like we’re failing. Breaking free from all that holds us down is not an overnight process. The reality is, everyone’s journey is different. In these moments when we literally feel like drowning, what we need isn’t your judgment, or asking how long this will take, or telling us we need to move forward. It’s not your invalidation of how we feel at any given moment - which often changes. It’s not you throwing advice at us, saying what YOU can do in these situations.
Maybe what we desperately need in these moments, is someone to stay with us through it....still see our worth through the struggles. Understand that we are trying to learn who we are, unlearn who we are not, and how to navigate all this at the same time. Most days, it’s beyond hard. Maybe these are the moments we need to know we’re loved the most…because we definitely can’t see that for ourselves. Maybe it’s someone who isn’t afraid to weather the storms with us through the anxiety, panic, trauma responses, and scars. Maybe we need to be seen, heard, loved, and accepted for all we are, not just the “good” parts. That kind of support…..means more than you know.