“When something does not suit you, there is a way to let you know. Not in a big announcement, but in a thousand small hammers.” ~ Martha Beck
One morning I was sitting at the kitchen table with coffee when I had a thought that I would not let myself think before: This could not be the rest of my life.
There has never been a better time for me to point and say,This. That is why I had to leave. ”
Part of me wished that there was something obvious, a betrayal, or some obvious break point that I could point to and say, “There. That’s why“Then I do not have to rely on my inner experience alone. My husband did not cheat and I was not abused. From the outside, my life looked stable, respectable, even successful. I built it around honesty, commitment and doing things the” right “way.
I got married at the age of 19 and became very involved in my church, even introducing the newlyweds. On paper, I am living the life I want to live.
But something in me has changed. At first, it proves to be exhausting, quiet, not a type of sleep, but a type of self-indulgence. I wake up tired and go to bed tired, and even on a day when there is nothing wrong, especially things are heavy.
It felt like I was going through my life instead of living it.
Thoughts that will not go away
The idea kept coming back: This could not be the rest of my life.
It shows up in the quiet of the laundry, turning to drive to the shower stall. Nothing great happened, but I still have a sense of recognition: something about my life no longer fits.
Each time it popped up, I pushed it down, reminding myself of gratitude, outlining all the reasons why my life was good. But it did not go away. It gets harder to drown.
So I did what I knew how to do. I tried to solve it.
I read self-help books, listen to podcasts and ask my friends what they would do if they were me. Most of them said some version of the same thing: If you are unhappy, you should leave. But even though they said it, I knew I was not going. Because I’m afraid of what it means.
I still tell myself it is not bad to leave That. Is the problem. If something goes wrong, I think I will believe in myself faster. But when your life looks good from the outside, it is easy to talk about your feelings from the inside out. You tell yourself you are lucky. You tell yourself that others have it worse. You tell yourself that you want something different, that must mean something different from you.
Since I had no clear reason to want something different, I kept asking myself, “Why can I not be happy? Why can I not be grateful for what I have?”
I did not ask because I do not know. I ask because I do not want answers like I already know. I want someone to give me permission to keep things the same — to tell me that this is just one step I’m going through.
Somewhere in the street by no means does it feel like I’m opening something I can not close. I tried to put the cover back on. I tried to go back to the way it was. But I can not.
I can not ignore what I know. The life I build fits what I used to do, but I am no longer that person.
If this is true យ៉ាងណា What if?
That achievement made things clearer and more frightening. Because if I’m not the one, then who am I?
If I fully acknowledge my feelings, it means that everything can change, not just my marriage but my sense of who I am. I have built my life around honesty, commitment and certainty. So I kept drawing because I did not know what happened next, it felt easier than acknowledging what was already there. I did not know who I would become if I stopped being that person.
For those who always know exactly who I am and what I am doing without knowing how to feel lost under me.
For a while I kept trying to figure out my way before doing something. But in the end, I’m tired of waiting to feel certain. I’m ready to do something about what I already know.
I asked a colleague about the therapist she mentioned, made a phone call, and made an appointment. No one is watching my life, I will see that call as a turning point, but I did. It was the first time I did what I felt was important.
I did not just sit and think. I replied to it.
During that first treatment session, I realized how I had broken off my personal feelings. The fatigue and exhaustion I have carried over the years is not just stress. They are a sign of how long I have pushed my own experience down. It felt normal for a long time that I did not know there was another way to live.
As I continued to work with my therapist, I began to notice how difficult it was to answer simple questions about how I felt.
In one episode, I told her about leaving home at the age of 19 because my father was an alcoholic and it was not safe to stay. I could not afford to pay my own bills, and in the biblical culture of growing up, marriage felt like the only real option.
She asked what the experience was like for me, and I said,You just do what you have to do. She replied “But what’s going on for you? How does your experience feel like you didn’t have a good choice?”
I started looking for words like “unfair” and “impossible”. Then she asked “Does it make you angry?” I shed tears. I was angrier than I ever confessed. Angry that I felt unsupported. Anger at the rules I grew up with made me feel like I had no choice. Angry at myself for giving up my power and being in a situation that did not support me for more than a decade.
And I never acknowledged it or let myself feel it. No wonder I worked so hard to stay busy, grateful, and move on. Some parts of me tried to protect me all the time.
But as I began to be honest with myself about what I was feeling, things started to change. I found my voice. I can hear my own intuition again. I stopped traveling through life on autopilot and started making more deliberate choices.
A few years after the first call, my outward life looked completely different. I divorced my husband and we are still good friends, I left my corporate job and started a self-employed business, which is what I wanted for many years. I also found the love of my life.
And it started with an idea that I tried so hard to deny: This could not be the rest of my life. At the time, I thought that thinking was a problem, proof that something was wrong with me. What I understand now is that it is finally the beginning of self-listening.
What I understand now
Looking back, I understand something I did not see: Life is hard to leave, not always the worst. Sometimes they are always good people who do not give you a clear reason to go.
So when something in you starts to ask for something else, it is easy to call it selfish, scary or ungrateful. But that voice does not always ask you to blow up your life. Sometimes it just asks you to acknowledge that something is no longer right. That’s often how change starts, not with a big decision, but when you stop pretending you don’t know what you know.
About Patti Bryant
Patti Bryant is a writer and coach for women who feel like something in life no longer fits, even if they can not explain why. Find out more at pattibryant.com.
