Something very small happened this morning.
And I almost missed how important it was.
I was lying in bed, resting after a long, exhausting day yesterday.
I had written an article for The Bench. As I had just finished, I thought “now, choose the featured image, write the excerpt, select the categories and publish it.”
And I said no.
I wasn’t at my computer.
I was in bed.
I was tired.
And I wanted to rest.
Nothing dramatic happened.
No confrontation with my inner-critic.
No great declaration of independence.
I simply said:
No. I’ll do the rest later.
And almost immediately, I realized what I had just done.
I had stayed home to myself.
Coming Home Is Only the Beginning
The words at the heart of everything I’m creating these days are:
Come Home to Yourself.
I’ve spent much of my life learning what that means.
For me, coming home to myself means returning to the person I actually am underneath all the expectations, conditioning, fears, old beliefs, roles, obligations and voices telling me who I should be.
It means listening to my heart.
Speaking my truth.
Honoring what I feel.
Recognizing what I need.
Making choices that are mine.
But I’ve realized something else.
Coming home isn’t enough.
Once we get there, we have to learn how to stay there.
And that may be the harder part.
It Is So Easy to Leave Ourselves
We abandon ourselves in tiny ways all the time.
Someone asks us for something and everything inside us says no.
But we say yes.
We’re exhausted and our body is asking us to stop.
But we keep going.
Something doesn’t feel right, but we don’t want to disappoint anyone.
So we agree.
We know what we want, but someone else has a different opinion.
And suddenly we begin questioning ourselves.
Sometimes nobody is even pressuring us.
We do it automatically.
We override ourselves before anyone else gets the chance.
And often these moments are so small that we don’t recognize what just happened.
But every time I ignore what I know is true for me, I move a little farther away from myself.
Saying No Can Be an Act of Love
This morning, saying no to doing more work was easy.
Saying no to doing more work meant saying yes to myself, to caring for myself, to attending to my needs.
But human relationships aren’t always that simple.
Sometimes saying no risks disappointing someone we love.
Sometimes setting a boundary makes us uncomfortable.
Sometimes speaking our truth changes the dynamics of a relationship.
Sometimes we worry someone will think we’re selfish, difficult, unkind, or uncaring.
And that’s where staying home to ourselves requires courage.
A boundary isn’t a wall against another person.
Sometimes it’s simply a door we choose not to walk through.
Not because we don’t love them.
Because we are learning to love ourselves, too.
It Requires Commitment
Coming home to ourselves sounds peaceful.
And ultimately, I believe it is.
But let’s not pretend it’s always easy.
It requires commitment.
It requires intention.
It requires courage.
It requires persistence.
Because the world is constantly asking for our attention.
There is always another message.
Another responsibility.
Another opinion.
Another problem.
Another person who needs something.
Another thing we should be doing.
And if we aren’t paying attention, we can spend an entire day responding to everything outside ourselves without once asking:
What is true for me right now?
That’s how easily we can leave home.
The Little Moments Matter
We tend to think transformation happens through enormous decisions.
Sometimes it does.
But I think much of it happens in very ordinary moments.
I’m tired. I’m going to rest.
No, I don’t want to do that.
Yes, I do want this.
That doesn’t feel right to me.
I need some time.
I’ve changed my mind.
This is what I think.
This is what I need.
Those little sentences may not look particularly courageous from the outside.
But for someone who has spent years overriding herself, they can be revolutionary.
Every time I honor one of those truths, something happens inside me.
I trust myself a little more.
And every time I trust myself, home becomes a little easier to recognize.
You Can Always Come Back
Of course, I still leave.
We all do.
I get distracted.
I override myself.
I occasionally say yes when I mean no.
I listen to my head when my heart is whispering something completely different.
The goal isn’t to become perfect at this.
The goal is to notice.
Oh.
I left myself again.
And then come back.
No punishment.
No self-criticism.
No great drama.
Just return.
Again.
And again.
And again.
Perhaps that is what coming home to yourself really is.
Not one magnificent arrival.
But a lifetime of small returns.
A commitment to keep listening.
To keep choosing.
To keep speaking your truth.
To keep honoring your needs.
To keep loving yourself enough to say yes when you mean yes—and no when you mean no.
Come home to yourself.
And then, with intention, courage, commitment and persistence—
stay home. ❤️