It really did take a year….

Sometimes it’s the smallest sentence, an offhand comment, that lands just when you need it, and stays with you, offering food for thought long after it’s been said.

Last year, shortly after I turned my life upside down calling off my engagement and ending my relationship, I had a session with a coach I long admired. A vision board moment coming to life.

Serendipitously, we were at the same event a week after my life implosion and a week after that I had a coaching call with her.

Parts of me were excited, other parts nervous and others saying the timing was all wrong. I was emotionally frozen and hadn’t even begun to realize or feel the depth of what I had just done in my personal life. And while that was true, I also believe it was diving timing and I did hear her powerful questions as well as little nuggets sprinkled throughout our conversation.

One nugget that was small and likely insignificant to anyone but me, one that I held with me as I walked the Camino and the rest of the year, was when she said,“you’ll need a year to heal through this.”

A year? No way.
I had a plan (or more accurately, parts of me had a plan), and it did not include taking a year.
But damn… she was right.

Because now, at the one-year mark, I’m finally starting to see the truth in that statement.

I’m finally seeing clear evidence, I’m not the same woman I used to be.

And it’s very likely I would have been, if I hadn’t chosen to step out of the life I so wanted to fit into, but couldn’t without losing myself. A life where, even with all the inner work, I still struggled with asking for what I needed.

So yes, it really has taken a year.

A year of deeply getting to know the protective parts of me, that swoop in to shut things down, to numb, to escape.

A year to see the patterns, repeat some of the patterns and accept some hard truths.

A year of just me and my parts.
Meeting the younger ones still carrying fear, grief, and pain.

A year of revisiting stored memories, some remembered clearly, others only felt in my body as tightness, heat, or numbness. I sat with them. I listened. I brought compassion instead of judgment and most importantly I felt them. And over time, they began to soften.

A year of not always getting what I was hoping for. Life didn’t go the way I had planned. And I grieved that too. But eventually, I made peace with it and kept walking towards the discomfort.

And because of all of that, I’ve walked right into another version of my self.

I know this, because just the other day, I got triggered once again. An old part of me lit up and I reached for the same pattern I’d always used to escape the discomfort. But this time I paused and I watched the impulse to chase a false reward.

And then I saw it clearly: there’s no real relief on the other side of that pattern. Just the repetition of keeping the pain alive.

So I chose differently.

And in that moment, something clicked. I felt it in my body. I said to myself,
“I’m not that woman anymore.”
And this time, I believed it.

And still, I know mistakes will be made. I know I could repeat the pattern again in times of high stress.
But I also know, I will recognize it faster and return to my self more easily.

That’s the healing.
That’s the shift.
That’s the path forward.

Not just for me, but for you too. If you choose.

And yes it might take a year.
But it’s worth the year. You’re worth the year.
Every moment meeting your SELF is never wasted.

I didn’t do it alone, and most of us need support along the way. I had many angels and this is just one story of many. Sometimes we need other human beings to see what we can’t see, to say what we need to hear, to be that light when ours is dim. So my hope is this story is a glimmer for you, that you know it’s possible to heal and change.

Lastly, thank you Lisa Carpenter for sharing your wisdom and insight when I didn’t have full access to my own. Forever grateful.