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Hi, I'm Mary. 

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For a lot of my life, I was searching. 

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Searching for home. 

Searching for meaning and direction. 

Searching for where I belonged. 

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And I was looking outside myself for all of it. 

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I changed careers, moved across the country, and started over more than once.

 

So much of that searching showed up in my relationships. I was searching for, "The One."

 

I think some part of me believed that if I found the right person, I'd find the life I was looking for too.  

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And when I chose something, I went all in. I would pour so much of myself into a relationship or the life I was building that eventually, I couldn't hear myself at all.  

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If it wasn't working, I often tried harder... pushing and overriding myself, determined to make it work. 

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Until sometimes leaving felt like the only way to find myself again. 

 

I really didn't know how to live in the messy middle. 

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I lived very much in an "all-or-nothing" world. 

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Looking back, I can see how often I lost myself... both in staying and in leaving.  

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I didn't know, yet, how to stay connected to myself in the middle of a relationship, a decision, or even just the noise of everyday life. 

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​​​I read the books. I asked people I trusted what they thought. I wanted to know what they would do, what they thought I should do. 

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And I became really good at listening to all the voices around me...

 

But I didn't know how to hear my own. 

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Part of the problem was that I didn't really know how to be with myself when things felt uncomfortable. Nobody every modeled that for me. 

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For a long time, I thought of emotions as good or bad. I wanted more of the "good" ones and none of the "bad" ones.

 

And when I had BIG emotions... especially conflicting ones... I felt like something was wrong with me. 

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I didn't yet know how to let an emotion simply be an emotion... without needing to fix it, escape it, or make it mean something. 

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So I learned to stuff a lot of what I felt...  

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But emotions don't stay stuffed forever.

 

They create pressure. 

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And I was already really good at creating plenty of pressure on my own. ​​

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I had learned to motivate myself by pushing, criticizing, overriding, and demanding more of myself. 

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What I didn't understand was that all of that pressure was creating a sense of unsafety inside me. 

 

And when I didn't feel safe with myself, it was really hard to sit quietly with fear, sadness, uncertainty, or conflicting emotions. 

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It was really hard to hear my own voice. 

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Slowly, I began learning to be with myself differently... with the same compassion, patience, and kindness I would offer someone I loved. 

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I began to slow down. To care for myself. To listen instead of adding more pressure. 

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And something changed. 

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I began learning how to come home to myself.  

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I learned that I could be sad without needing to escape the sadness. I could be afraid without assuming the fear meant stop.

 

I could hold two conflicting truths without forcing myself to immediately choose between them. 

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I learned that life didn't always have to be either/or... 

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Sometimes, it could be both/and. 

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And when I slowed down, something else happened. 

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I could hear myself. ​

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Not perfectly, and not all the time.

 

But instead of pressuring myself to have the answer, I started to get curious.

 

I began to wonder, What am I feeling? What do I need? What feels true to Me? 

 

Curiosity gave me room to explore without having to immediately decide. 

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​And I stopped believing I had to figure out the whole path before I can take the next step.

 

And over time, something bigger changed. 

 

I stopped trying so hard to find the answers outside of myself, or to find the perfect answer at all. 

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Now, I trust myself to listen, to choose, and to change direction when I need to.

 

I'm building a relationship with myself where I trust that I won't abandon myself.  

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​I'm coming home to myself... again and again.  ❤️

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​​​​Maybe some of this feels familiar?​​​​​​​​​​

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If something here is speaking to you, I invite you to follow your curiosity. 

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You're welcome here. ​

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