When I find myself going through something, big or small, I’ll often think about how I might phrase it for this newsletter. What Lesson or Funny Story does the experience impart that I can pass along? And then sometimes, I’ll catch myself putting the cart before the horse. I’ll think about a theme or subject matter and then search for proof or stories or examples as I go about my days, even if they’re a stretch. It pretty much never works, but I can’t help trying to see into the future. Will this become a newsletter? Or is it a one-off? Best case scenario is when I write what comes to me, rather than turning over emotional rocks looking for a lede.
The last few months, a number of things in my life have been circling the same theme. (A hopeful newsletter topic.) That theme is boundaries. Well, it’s recognizing how far I’ve come in the practice of sticking to my boundaries. Or maybe it’s learning (finally!) that I can trust myself and my own experience as valid. Not to the degree that I resist or ignore feedback and others’ experiences. But to the degree that I can stand firm on where I value my experience (and needs, wants, feelings) the same as others’. And that’s new for me.
Where once I valued others’ feelings and opinions far more than my own, I now recognize just how self-defeating that is. First, I had to learn that I deserve to hold as much space as those around me. Then, I had to realize that staking claim to that space might not be everyone else’s favorite thing, and that’s okay. It still doesn’t mean that I shrink myself down. Finally, I had to put those things into practice.
I’ve tried to write about this many times over the last few months and it was often forced. I was trying to write about it before it came to me. (Ital’d for effect; I want you to read it in a new age-y voice. Please don’t call it an aha moment.)
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