There are seasons in life when you realize—you haven’t really been living.
You’ve just been surviving.
Breathing, but not present.
Moving, but not progressing.
And then something happens—something loud, jarring, impossible to ignore—and it shakes you awake.
Suddenly, the life you’ve been coasting through feels unfamiliar.
You start asking yourself:
How did I get here?
When did I stop paying attention?
Why does everything feel so stuck?
The Truth Is—I Knew
I knew when I stayed quiet about the things that mattered.
I knew when I told myself, “I’m fine,” even though I wasn’t.
It’s not that I was unaware—it’s that I was stuck.
Stuck in the fog.
Stuck in the pause between pain and clarity.
It’s Okay to Be Sad
Here’s what we don’t talk about enough:
It’s okay to be sad.
Not everything has to be productive. Not every emotion needs to be turned into a lesson right away.
We live in a world that rushes us to the next thing—
The next goal.
The next distraction.
The next version of “better.”
But healing doesn’t follow that pace.
Most of us don’t even understand how we really feel, because we’ve never learned how to sit with our emotions—we’ve only learned how to solve them.
We move too quickly to fix, and forget to feel.
Maybe that’s why we stay stuck.
Not because we’re broken.
But because we’ve skipped the part where we’re just supposed to be—sad, uncertain, overwhelmed.
Sometimes that means sitting in silence.
Sometimes it means crying alone in your car.
Sometimes, with tears that feel like they last forty nights.
The Answers Come Eventually
What’s funny—what’s frustrating—is that when I finally do sit with myself, I usually figure it out.
Sometimes through a messy list.
Sometimes in the margins of an old journal.
Sometimes in the quiet, when everything else falls away.
And every time, I come back to the same truth:
The answer was always within me.
I just needed the stillness.
I just needed permission to feel it all first.
A Gentle Reflection
What feeling are you avoiding today—
and what would happen if you simply allowed yourself to sit with it?
Tips for Sitting With Your Feelings
Remember: This is temporary.
No emotion is forever. Let it pass through you—not around you.
Name it.
Don’t overthink it. Start simple: “I feel ___.” Naming your emotions is the first step to understanding them.
Let it exist.
You don’t need to justify your sadness or explain your anger. Let your feelings be what they are—without guilt or apology.
Journal without a plan.
Begin with, “I don’t know what I’m feeling, but…” and write freely. You may discover more than you expected.
Be still.
Set a timer for 5–10 minutes. No music, no distractions. Just breathe. Even if it’s uncomfortable—stay.
Cry, if you need to.
Crying is a release, not a weakness. Let it out. Let it move through you.
Ground yourself.
When feelings are too big, use your senses to come back:
5 things you see
4 things you can touch
3 things you hear
2 things you smell
1 thing you taste
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