38
Reclaiming your voice doesn’t require volume. Just truth.
here are moments in life
when decisions don’t feel like
choices. They feel like survival.
When I finally said no more,
it didn’t come out strong or
confident. It was so quiet it could have
been lost in the hum of the refrigerator.
Just a hesitant breath rising from a part of
me I hadn’t visited in years. But I heard it.
And this time, I listened.
For so long, I had gotten really good at
disappearing. Shrinking myself to fit in.
Reading the energy in a room before I
spoke a word. I had mastered the art of
keeping the peace. Dimming my light,
softening my opinions, avoiding conflict
at all costs.
I could hold space for everyone else. I just
couldn’t seem to hold space for myself.
And I didn’t question it because I thought
that was strength. But it wasn’t. Endurance
isn’t strength. Endurance is survival.
Strength is something else entirely.
For me, strength arrived quietly and
unexpectedly. No drama, no fanfare. Just
a clarity sharper than the diamond on my
finger, mined from far away and polished
to perfection.
It was an ordinary day. I dropped the kids
at school, taught a yoga class, and came
home to tidy up. That’s when I stumbled
upon the kind of truth that stops you in
your tracks—the kind that silences you
before it sets you free.
Betrayal.
The irony is that it wasn’t the act itself that
broke me open. It was what it revealed.
A truth that had been gnawing at me for
years. One I had avoided naming until that
moment: I had been slowly abandoning
myself. I was the one polished to perfection
on the outside, yet so far away from myself
on the inside.
All the times I said yes when I meant no.
All the times I made myself small to feel safe.
All the times I pretended to be someone
else to be loved and accepted.
It all came rushing in at once, like someone
had suddenly turned on the lights in a dark
room I had been standing in for years.
And in that moment, I didn’t explode. I
didn’t scream. I didn’t fall apart.
Quiet
Boundaries
The Art of