I waltzed through my life until age 28 thinking I had it all together.
I’m not quite 30, yet, but it’s taken me until 30 to not care that I didn’t have it all together.

Wait. That’s not true. 28 was when I started to tear everything down so I could build it back up again.

I waltzed through my life pretending to waltz, pretending to be completely OK, pretending that everything was perfectly and exactly how I wanted it because it didn’t matter anyway, I was a victim of circumstance and could do nothing to change it.

I used to think I was an introvert. I acted like one. I had one friend that I spent the most time with until I graduated high school (thankfully, we’re still friends a 100 years later). College was kind of weird — I was an uptight but slightly reckless little bundle of pent-up anger and hurt that just wanted to be liked for who I was. . .I never felt like I was loved for who I was because I didn’t know who I was. And I knew that once everyone who claimed to love the “real” me saw the actual real me, they wouldn’t love that me. Only the fake “real” me.
Also, I am so not an introvert. I am an extrovert who craves deep connections with people. Connections that are authentic and raw and real. This soul-level need was so out of sync with everything inside me, that I was constantly fighting this unseen battle of wanting deep connections but being completely terrified that I was, in fact, completely unlikeable. The funny thing was, though, the version I chose to show wasn’t as pristine as it could’ve been, because I am a really bad faker. (I also have an awful poker face and I know one day it will get me into serious hot water in some social situation). I couldn’t fake being as together as I wanted.

This charade began to unravel starting in my mid twenties. I was beginning my journey to Mordor and had absolutely no idea what was coming. My “precious” I had to destroy was the “self” I thought I knew. It was the person I had fabricated in an attempt to ignore my need for connection. It was the wall I built around my self to keep all others out in the name of self preservation.

But, just as Frodo found a tribe of people to come to his aid and walk with him there and back again, so did I. The journey has been long, but it has not been lonely.

The wall I built to keep others out did nothing but keep my real self in. The real self who was longing desperately to be seen and heard and included could not be, ever, until she finally found the strength to tear the wall down. It was as if someone was picking at the foundation from the inside until the wall came crashing down all around. Once the wall fell, and the dust settled, I found my tribe. But the fabrication of self and self-preservation had to be completely destroyed, first.

The best part is, this tribe keeps growing. There is always room at the table no matter how big it gets.

Funny how the thing I wanted most for forever has come around in spades when I stopped frantically trying to find it.

Many places I have been, many sorrows I have seen. But I don’t regret, nor will I forget all who took the road with me. — J.R.R Tolkien

Peace be the journey.