The Cult of People and What It Means to Be Free

“Sometimes walking away is the only way to stop walking away from yourself.” ~Unknown

I was between sessions. My TV was on in the background—something I’d half-started watching called The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives on Hulu—as I walked into the kitchen to make myself some lunch.

It’s about a group of Mormon wives who became TikTok famous and got into what they call “soft swing.” In one scene, a young woman argues with her mother, who has a long list of rules about how her daughter should behave. The daughter has been avoiding church, tiptoeing around the threat of excommunication, and trying to hold onto her freedom without losing her family.

I stood there watching, lunch forgotten, because something in it stopped me.

She’s struggling between who she truly is and belonging. And isn’t that just the human condition?

We crave connection. We are hardwired for it, for better and for worse. But connection to the tribe comes with a price. It always has. You follow the rules. You tuck in the parts of yourself that don’t fit—sometimes small parts, sometimes enormous ones—and in exchange, you get to belong. It’s a transaction. Just without a dollar bill changing hands.

The implicit agreement is this: earn your place, stay in your lane, and the group will keep you. It’s a kind of token economy. An unspoken loyalty contract. And most of us sign it before we’re old enough to read the fine print.

I Was in a Cult for Forty-Three Years

It wasn’t a religious cult. There were no robes, no compound, no charismatic leader asking for your savings account. It was subtler than that and more pervasive.

It was called the cult of people. The cult of people is the one most of us are born into.

It’s the constant noise of other people’s needs, opinions, and expectations.

It’s the performance of connection—the seeking of external validation, the addiction to being liked, needed, included.

It’s organizing your entire inner life around what the people around you can tolerate.

It’s making yourself small enough, palatable enough, agreeable enough to keep the peace and keep the people.

For forty-three years, I was a devoted member. I didn’t know I was in it. That’s how cults work.

Seven Years of Deprogramming

Nearly seven years ago, I started leaving. Not intentionally, at first. It came as a byproduct of things I didn’t choose—the pandemic, raising a child with special needs largely on my own, and the slow, unglamorous work of therapy. I started to see, for the first time, just how much reaching and earning and contorting I had done most of my life. How much of myself I had tucked away to stay connected to people who needed me manageable.

I didn’t want to earn anymore. But I didn’t know what or who not earning would make me.

So I found out.

Seven years of tears. Of loneliness that had no bottom. Of massive anxiety attacks in the middle of ordinary days. Of heartbreak and losses I didn’t see coming. Of watching my circle get smaller and smaller and sitting with the terrifying question of whether I had somehow caused it. Of feeling, at times, like I was in hell.

I don’t want to paint this as something beautiful, because it hasn’t been. But it has been something. And it hasn’t been wasted.

What Deprogramming Actually Looks Like

In actual cults, deprogramming requires distance. You have to step away from the group that demanded your self-betrayal—physically, emotionally, sometimes permanently—before you can begin to see the water you were swimming in. The same is true here.

When you start creating distance from the cult of people, a few things happen.

First, it looks like something is very wrong with you. You get quieter. You stop performing. You decline the invitations you used to accept out of obligation. Your circle shrinks. The people around you—still inside the cult—don’t understand it, and some of them take it personally. Because in the cult, withdrawing is the most threatening thing you can do. The cult needs your participation to survive.

But something else happens too. Since you’ve already been abandoned by the people who couldn’t follow you into honesty, abandonment loses some of its power. You stop lying to yourself to stay connected. You start seeing the implicit agreements you’ve been making your whole life—all the ways you made a deal with the group, traded pieces of yourself for belonging, and called it love.

You start seeing clearly. And clarity, it turns out, is both the gift and the grief of this whole process.

The Both/And of It

Here’s what no one tells you about leaving the cult of people: it doesn’t feel like freedom right away. It feels like loss. It feels like loneliness. It feels like you made a terrible mistake.

And at the same time, underneath all of that, something else is growing. Something quieter and steadier. A self that isn’t performing. A voice you can actually trust. An internal compass that works because it isn’t being scrambled by everyone else’s signals.

This is the both/and that healing actually looks like—not either/or, not broken or healed, not lost or found. Both. Simultaneously. Breaking down and breaking through at the same time. Sad and longing and also, somewhere underneath it, knowing you deserve better. Making all the right decisions and still watching things fall apart. Hearing the voices in your head that tear you down and still—still—holding the younger version of yourself with kindness.

That’s not weakness. That’s what it actually looks like to be a human being in the middle of becoming more honest.

The Road to Freedom

I’m not fully deprogrammed. I don’t know if that’s even the goal. I still get lonely. I still sometimes feel the pull to earn my way back into rooms that cost me too much. I still grieve the connections that couldn’t survive my becoming more myself.

But I’m more comfortable with the sadness than I used to be. It doesn’t scare me like it did. I’ve learned to sit with myself in a way I couldn’t before—not because the discomfort went away, but because I stopped running from it.

This is what I know now: the same thing that means no one is going to save you is also the thing that means no one gets to stop you. The aloneness that felt like abandonment turns out to also be the open road. When you stop organizing your life around what the group can tolerate, you find out—maybe for the first time—what you actually want. Who you actually are. What you’re actually capable of.

That’s not a consolation prize.

That’s the road to freedom.

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About Allison Briggs

Allison Jeanette Briggs is a therapist, writer, and speaker specializing in helping women heal from codependency, childhood trauma, and emotional neglect. She blends psychological insight with spiritual depth to guide clients and readers toward self-trust, boundaries, and authentic connection. Allison is the author of the upcoming memoir On Being Real: Healing the Codependent Heart of a Woman and shares reflections on healing, resilience, and inner freedom at on-being-real.com.

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Why I Couldn’t Stop Reacting (Even Though I Knew Better)

“Knowledge is not skill. Knowledge plus ten thousand times is skill.” ~Shinichi Suzuki

I knew exactly what to say to my narcissistic mother. I just could never say it.

For twenty years I studied every technique in the book. Gray rocking (becoming emotionally neutral and unreactive). Broken record (calmly repeating the same boundary). Don’t JADE (Justify, Argue, Defend, Explain). I could explain these strategies to a stranger at a coffee shop with complete clarity.

But when my mom was sitting across from me at dinner, pushing every button she knew I had, all of it vanished. Every single time.

My body would take over. My chest would tighten, my palms would sweat, and within seconds I was either frozen or firing back with the exact emotional reaction she was looking for. Then I’d hate myself on the drive home, replaying what I should have said instead.

This went on for two decades.

The Cycle

Both of my parents fit every pattern of narcissistic abuse I’ve ever read about. My dad wasn’t around much, so it was mostly my mom from my teenage years onward.

We went through multiple rounds of no contact. The longest stretch was three years after too much toxic stuff happened between her and my wife. I thought distance would fix things. It didn’t.

Cutting her off completely didn’t feel like the answer either. I’d come back, things would be fine for a while, and then the cycle would start again. A family dinner. A phone call. A comment designed to get under my skin.

And I’d react. Every time.

The frustrating part was that I understood what was happening. I’d watched hundreds of videos from psychologists who specialize in narcissistic abuse. I’d read the books, joined the forums, and nodded along to every post that described my exact situation.

I knew the theory cold. But knowing isn’t the same as being able to do it when someone is looking you in the eyes and twisting the knife.

The Dinner That Changed Everything

Last December my dad got cancer. I flew back to my home country to visit them. Dad refused to see me, saying he didn’t want me to see him “like that.” So I got stuck with my mom.

We spent a surprisingly pleasant day together, talking about everything in the world except anything personal. I was almost caught off guard by how nice she was being.

Then after dinner she dropped it: “We need to talk about what happened three years ago.”

Here’s what I did differently this time. Before the meeting, I’d spent days repeating one idea to myself: if she had Alzheimer’s or dementia, I wouldn’t argue with her. There would be no point. Her brain wouldn’t allow her to hear me no matter how perfect my argument was.

I decided to apply the same logic. She’s sick. It’s her illness talking. There is zero point in explaining myself or justifying anything.

So when she started, I said, “I’m not going back to the past. What happened, happened. Let’s focus on the present and on supporting dad with his recovery.”

She didn’t accept that. She kept digging, throwing out things she knew would get under my skin. “Your wife is cold and heartless. She didn’t even offer me coffee when I was at your house.” “You sat me at the worst table at your wedding.” Stuff from years and years ago.

I had a comeback for every single one. I always do. But that never works with her. She recycles the same topics because she knows they trigger me.

It was hard. I felt like I was in a high-stakes interrogation. I could literally feel the sweat running down my back. Every part of me wanted to fire back and “put her in her place.”

But I kept thinking: Alzheimer’s. No point. She’s very ill.

After about ten minutes, she just stopped. Completely changed the subject to something random she saw on the news. I couldn’t believe it.

About twenty minutes later she tried again. It was getting late, my defenses were low, and she stepped up her game with even more provocative topics. But I held the line. Same sentence, over and over: “I’m not discussing things from the past.”

Then she stopped again. Changed her whole demeanor. And said, “Thanks so much for coming. I’m so happy you’re back.”

I called my wife that night and told her that the meeting was transformational. For the first time in my life, I walked away from a conversation with my mom without being completely wrecked. I felt liberated. I felt empowered. I felt like I’d stopped being a victim, like I’d actually chosen to stop being one.

That feeling was the most powerful thing I’ve experienced as an adult.

Why This Time Was Different

I didn’t learn a new technique that night. “Broken record” is the same strategy I’d known for years. What changed was that I’d practiced the words out loud, over and over, in the days before the meeting.

Not in my head. Out loud.

There’s a massive difference between thinking, “I’ll just gray rock her” and actually hearing your own voice say, “I’m not discussing things from the past” fifteen times in a row until it becomes boring and automatic.

Athletes don’t prepare for big games by reading about their sport. Pilots don’t train for emergencies by watching YouTube videos about flying. They rehearse the exact movements until their body can execute them under stress without needing their brain to cooperate.

That’s what was missing for me for twenty years. I kept trying to think my way through moments that were happening in my body, not my mind.

When a narcissist triggers you, your nervous system reacts in milliseconds. Your prefrontal cortex, the part of your brain that holds all those smart techniques, goes offline. You’re operating on instinct and emotion. No amount of reading can override that.

But repetition can. When you’ve said the same phrase out loud dozens of times, it stops being a conscious decision and starts being a reflex. That’s the difference between knowing what to do and actually doing it.

What I’d Tell Someone Who’s Stuck in the Same Loop

If you know all the right things to say but can never say them when it matters, here’s what helped me.

Practice out loud, not in your head.

Say your boundary sentence, your gray rock response, whatever phrase you want to use, out loud, over and over. It feels silly at first. Do it anyway. Your voice needs to know what it sounds like saying those words so your body can find them under pressure.

Pick one sentence and commit to it. 

Don’t try to have a perfect response for every possible attack. Pick one line and use it for everything. Mine was “I’m not discussing things from the past.” It doesn’t matter if it doesn’t perfectly address what they’re saying. That’s the point. You’re not engaging with the content. You’re holding a line.

Expect it to feel terrible. 

The sweat, the racing heart, the overwhelming urge to fire back. That’s all normal. It doesn’t mean the technique isn’t working. It means your nervous system is doing what it’s always done. The difference is that this time your mouth is saying the right thing even while your body is screaming at you to react.

Reframe who they are. 

The Alzheimer’s reframe changed everything for me. When I stopped seeing my mom as someone who could be reasoned with and started seeing her as someone whose illness makes reasoning impossible, the urge to explain myself disappeared. You don’t argue with dementia. You don’t argue with narcissism either.

Know that they will stop.  

This was the most surprising part. After ten minutes of getting nothing from me, my mom just… stopped. Narcissists feed on your reaction. When there’s no reaction, the conversation has no fuel. It burns out on its own. Knowing this in advance makes it easier to hold the line when every second feels like an hour.

It Gets Easier 

That dinner with my mom was the first time I held my ground. It wasn’t the last.

The conversations since then have been different. Not because she changed. She hasn’t. But because I showed up differently. And each time I practice, the responses come faster and the emotional charge gets a little smaller.

I spent twenty years believing that if I just understood narcissism well enough, I’d be able to handle it. Understanding was never the problem. The problem was that I never trained my body to do what my brain already knew.

If you’re stuck in that same gap between knowing and doing, try practicing out loud before your next difficult conversation. It won’t be perfect. But it might be the first time you walk away feeling like you chose how it went, instead of feeling like it happened to you.

That shift is worth everything.

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About Tim Wekezer

Tim Wekezer grew up with two narcissistic parents and spent twenty years learning techniques he could never use in the moment. The gap between knowing and doing led him to build Nagi (nagipeace.com), an app that lets you practice narcissistic abuse conversations out loud with an AI until your responses become automatic. He recently shared his story on Reddit, where it reached over 300,000 people. Say hi at hello@nagipeace.com.

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Learning to Speak Up When You Were Taught That Your Feelings Don’t Matter

“A proper grown-up communicates clearly and assertively.”

This is something I have heard many people say.

By that definition, I wouldn’t have been classed as a proper grown-up for most of my life.

There was a time when I couldn’t even ask someone for a glass of water. I know that might seem crazy to some people, and for a long time I did feel crazy for it.

Why couldn’t I do the things others did without even thinking about it? Why couldn’t I just say what I needed to say? Why couldn’t I just be normal?

Those questions would just feed into the shame spiral I was trapped in at that time in my life.

But the question I should have been asking myself was not how I could overcome being so damaged and flawed, but how my struggles made sense based on how I was brought up.

Because based on that, I was perfect, and my behaviors made perfect sense.

I was the child that was taught to be seen and not heard.

I was the child whose feelings made others angry and violent.

I was the child whose anger got her shamed and rejected by the person she needed the most.

I was the child that got hit again and again until she didn’t cry anymore.

I was the child whose needs inconvenienced those who were in charge of taking care of her.

I was the child whose wants were called selfish, attention-seeking, or ridiculous.

I was the child who was made wrong for everything she felt, wanted, or needed.

I was the child who was called a monster for being who she was—a child.

I was the child that grew up feeling unwanted, alone, and entirely repulsive.

So why would that child ever speak? Why would that child ever share anything about herself? She wouldn’t, would she? It all makes sense. I made sense. It was a way of living. A way of surviving.

I had been taught that I didn’t matter. That what I wanted or needed and how I felt was something so abhorrent it needed to be hidden at any cost. And I did it to avoid getting hurt, shamed, and rejected. Even when I was with different people. Even when I was an adult.

That pattern ran my life. I just couldn’t get myself to say the things I wanted and needed to say. It felt too scary. It felt too dangerous. It was too shame-inducing.

So if you struggle to express yourself and feel embarrassed about that, I get it. I did too. But I need you to know this: It’s not your fault. It was never your fault.

And yes, life is harder when you didn’t get to be who you were growing up. When the only way you could protect yourself was by being less of you. When you could never grow into yourself because that would have gotten you hurt. When you couldn’t learn to love yourself because that was the biggest risk of all.

But today, that risk only lives on within you. In your conditioning. And that’s where the inner healing work comes in.

For me, that meant getting professional support to help me learn how to safely connect to myself and my truth, and how to banish the critical, demanding, and demeaning internal voice that told me my feelings, needs, and wants were wrong.

It meant learning to regulate my nervous system so that I could get past my fear and be honest about what worked for me and what didn’t. This was a major turning point in my relationships because I started to represent myself more openly and assertively, which meant that my relationships either improved dramatically or I found out that the other people didn’t really care about me and how I felt.

It also meant opening up emotionally and learning to understand what my feelings were trying to tell me. Since I’d learned to avoid and suppress my emotions growing up, I knew it would be challenging to truly get to know myself.

I had the great opportunity of reparenting myself—giving myself the love, affection, and attention I didn’t receive as a kid.

And that’s what ultimately allowed me to finally feel safe enough to express myself.

The relationship I had with myself started to become like a safe haven instead of a battleground, and my life has never been the same since.

Everything on the outside started to align with what was going on inside of me. The safer I became for myself, the safer the people in my life became, which allowed us to develop deeper, more meaningful and intimate relationships.

So I know that that kind of change is possible. Even if it doesn’t feel like it right now. I know that it is possible because today I am the most authentic and expressed version of myself I have ever been.

Just look at everything I am sharing here with you. That’s a far cry from asking for a glass of water.

Today I no longer choke on the words that I was always meant to speak. I speak them.

Today I no longer hold back my feelings. I feel them. I share them. Freely.

Today I no longer deny my needs and play down my desires. I own them. I meet them. I fulfill them.

Today I own who I am, and I don’t feel held back by toxic shame in the ways that I once did.

Back then I would have never thought this was possible for me.

I hope that in sharing my story and my transformation you will follow the spark of desire in you that wants you to express yourself. To share your thoughts and desires. To express what it’s like to be you. To finally get to meet more of you and eventually all of you.

That’s what you need to listen to. Not the voice of fear or shame. Not your conditioning. Not anything or anyone that reinforces your inhibitions or trauma.

You were born to be fully expressed. That was your birthright. That is the world’s gift.

Just because the people who raised you didn’t understand you as the unique miracle that you are, that doesn’t mean that you have to deprive the world, and yourself, of experiencing you. More of you. All of you.

It’s never too late to open your heart and share yourself in ways that feel healing, liberating, empowering, and loving to you.

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About Marlena Tillhon

Marlena is a highly experienced psychotherapist and success coach specialising in healing inner trauma and breaking unhealthy patterns that stop her ambitious clients from having the success they know they can have in their lives, relationships, and careers. You can find her on Instagram or Facebook and receive her free training and gifts on her website.

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Two Free Events for Less Pain and More Love

When I shared my recent sound bath experience last week, many of you responded letting me know life has been particularly challenging for you too lately. If you’re in that same boat—and especially if you’ve been feeling lonely, down on yourself, or overwhelmed—I have a feeling you’ll appreciate two free events that are coming up soon.

hen I emailed last week about my recent sound bath experience, many of you responded letting me know life has been particularly challenging for you lately too.

If you’re in that same boat—and especially if you’ve been feeling lonely, down on yourself, or overwhelmed—I have a feeling you’ll appreciate two free events that are coming up soon.

The first is The Power of Love Summit, a free online event that’s happening June 2–8, featuring conversations with 40+ leading voices in psychology, spirituality, trauma healing, and conscious relationships—including Tara Brach, Kristin Neff, Sharon Salzberg, Rick Hanson, Nicole LePera, and the Gottmans.

Some of the topics include:

• healing emotional wounds and rediscovering your inherent worth
• cultivating radical self-love and quieting the voice of self-doubt
• creating deeper connection and intimacy in your relationships
• mending family ties, even when facing past hurt or estrangement
• transforming heartbreak and rejection into greater strength and a deeper capacity to love

Throughout the summit, you’ll also experience breathwork, guided meditation, journaling, dance, affirmations, a sound bath, and more.

What sets this summit apart is its depth and scope. Presentations move well beyond surface-level advice to address the root causes of disconnection, self-doubt, and the emotional patterns that have made love feel distant or hard to hold onto.
​
The event covers every dimension of love—including self-love, romantic partnership, family bonds, friendship, and the expansive role love plays in healing our communities and our world.

Whether you’re healing from heartbreak, longing for deeper connection, or simply ready to live with a more open heart, this might be just what you need.

You can sign up here (and instantly claim five bonus gifts):

Reserve Your FREE Spot for the Power of Love ​

Now onto the second event.

A few weeks ago, I shared a free week-long online event called The Seven Strengths, focused on finding calm and steadiness in stressful times.

Since this event starts tomorrow (on the 13^th), and I know many of us are feeling stretched thin and emotionally overloaded right now, I thought it was worth mentioning again.

This event includes short daily teachings and guided practices designed to help you:

• feel calmer and less reactive
• reconnect with compassion and clarity
• build emotional resilience
• create a steadier inner foundation

It also features teachers I deeply respect and admire, including Rick Hanson, Sharon Salzberg, and Kristin Neff.

The Seven Strengths course is normally valued at $110, but for this live experience, it’s being offered for free as a gesture of support during these challenging times. You’ll also receive three bonus gifts instantly when you register.

You can learn more or sign up free here:

Save Your FREE Spot for the Seven Strengths

I hope these free teachings bring a little more peace and love into your life.

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About Lori Deschene

Lori Deschene is the founder of Tiny Buddha. She started the site after struggling with depression, bulimia, c-PTSD, and toxic shame so she could recycle her former pain into something useful and inspire others to do the same. You can find her books, including Tiny Buddha’s Gratitude Journal and Tiny Buddha’s Worry Journal, here and learn more about her eCourse, Recreate Your Life Story, if you’re ready to transform your life and become the person you want to be.

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When You Feel Trapped in a Life That Looks Good on Paper

“When something isn’t right for you, it has a way of letting you know. Not in one big announcement, but in a thousand small nudges.” ~Martha Beck

I was sitting at the kitchen table with my coffee one morning when a thought slipped in that I hadn’t let myself think before: This can’t be the rest of my life.

There wasn’t one dramatic moment I could point to and say, “This is why I have to leave.”

Part of me wished there had been something obvious, some clear betrayal or breaking point I could point to and say, “There. That’s the reason.” Then I wouldn’t have had to rely on my inner experience alone. My husband hadn’t cheated, and I wasn’t being mistreated. From the outside, my life looked stable, respectable, even successful. I had built it around loyalty, commitment, and doing things the “right” way.

I had gotten married at nineteen and was deeply involved in my church, even mentoring newly married couples. On paper, I was living the life I was supposed to want.

But something in me had changed. At first, it showed up as a quiet kind of exhaustion, not the kind that sleep fixes, but the kind that comes from forcing yourself through a life that no longer fits. I woke up tired and went to bed tired, and even on days when nothing was particularly wrong, everything felt heavy.

It felt like I was moving through my life instead of living it.

The Thought That Wouldn’t Go Away

That thought kept returning: This can’t be the rest of my life.

It showed up in quiet moments, folding laundry, driving to the store, standing in the shower. Nothing dramatic was happening, but I kept feeling the same jolt of recognition: something about my life no longer fit.

Each time it surfaced, I pushed it down by reminding myself to be grateful, by listing all the reasons my life was good. But it didn’t go away. It got harder to drown out.

So I did what I knew how to do. I tried to figure it out.

I read self-help books, listened to podcasts, and asked friends what they would do if they were me. Most of them said some version of the same thing: If you’re not happy, you should leave. But even as they said it, I knew I wasn’t going to. Because I was terrified of what it would mean.

I kept telling myself it wasn’t bad enough to leave, and that was the problem. If something had been obviously wrong, I think I would have trusted myself faster. But when your life looks fine from the outside, it’s easy to talk yourself out of what you feel on the inside. You tell yourself you’re lucky. You tell yourself other people have it worse. You tell yourself wanting something different must mean something is wrong with you.

Because I had no clear reason to want something different, I kept asking myself, “Why can’t I just be happy? Why can’t I just be grateful for what I have?”

I wasn’t asking because I didn’t know. I was asking because I didn’t want the answer to be what I already knew. I wanted someone to give me permission to keep things the same—to tell me this was just a phase, that I’d get over it.

Somewhere along the way, without meaning to, it felt like I had opened something I couldn’t close. I tried to put the lid back on. I tried to go back to how things were. But I couldn’t.

I couldn’t un-know what I knew. The life I built fit who I used to be, but I wasn’t that person anymore.

If This Is True… Then What?

That realization made things clearer, and a lot scarier. Because if I wasn’t that person, then who was I?

If I fully acknowledged what I was feeling, it meant everything could change, not just my marriage but my sense of who I was. I had built my life around loyalty, commitment, and being sure. So I kept circling it, because not knowing what came next felt easier than admitting what was already true. I didn’t know who I would be if I stopped being that person.

For someone who had always been clear on who I was and what I was working toward, not knowing felt like losing the ground beneath me.

For a while, I kept trying to think my way to certainty before doing anything. But eventually, I got tired of waiting to feel sure. I was ready to do something about what I already knew.

I asked a coworker about a therapist she had mentioned, made the call, and showed up to the appointment. No one looking at my life would have seen that phone call as a turning point, but I did. It was the first time I acted like what I felt mattered.

I was no longer just sitting with the thought. I was responding to it.

In that first therapy session, I realized how disconnected I was from my own feelings. The exhaustion and overwhelm I had been carrying for years weren’t just stress. They were signs of how long I had been pushing my own experience down. It had felt normal for so long that I didn’t know there was another way to live.

As I kept working with my therapist, I started noticing how hard it was to answer simple questions about how I felt.

In one session, I told her about leaving home at nineteen because my dad was an alcoholic and it didn’t feel safe to stay. I couldn’t afford to pay the bills on my own, and in the Bible Belt culture I grew up in, marriage felt like the only real option.

She asked what that experience had been like for me, and I said something like, “You just do what you have to do.” She replied, “But what was it like for you? What was your experience of feeling like you had no good options?”

I started reaching for words like “unfair” and “impossible.” Then she asked, “Did it make you angry?” I burst into tears. I was furious, angrier than I had ever let myself admit. Angry that I didn’t feel supported. Angry at the rules I grew up with that made me feel like I had no choice. Angry at myself for giving my power away and staying in a situation that wasn’t supportive of me for over a decade.

And I had never recognized it or allowed myself to feel it. No wonder I had worked so hard to stay busy, stay grateful, and keep going. Some part of me had been trying to protect me all along.

But once I started being honest about what I felt, something began to shift. I found my voice. I could hear my own intuition again. I stopped moving through life on autopilot and started making choices with more intention.

A couple of years after that first phone call, my external life looked completely different. I had divorced my husband, and we remained good friends. I had left my corporate job and started a freelance business, something I had wanted for years. I had also found the love of my life.

And all of it began with a thought I tried so hard to dismiss: This can’t be the rest of my life. At the time, I thought that thought was a problem, proof that something was wrong with me. What I understand now is that it was the beginning of finally listening to myself.

What I Understand Now

Looking back, I understand something I couldn’t see then: the lives that are hardest to leave aren’t always the worst ones. Sometimes they’re often the ones that are fine, the ones that give you no clean reason to go.

So when something in you starts asking for something different, it’s easy to call it selfish, dramatic, or ungrateful. But that voice is not always asking you to blow up your life. Sometimes it’s only asking you to admit that something no longer fits. That’s often how change begins, not with a dramatic decision, but with the moment you stop pretending you don’t know what you know.

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About Patti Bryant

Patti Bryant is a writer and coach for women who feel like something in life no longer fits, even if they can’t explain why yet. Learn more at pattibryant.com.

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What Happened When We Chose Not to React in Anger

“Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response.” ~Viktor E. Frankl

A few months ago, I was on a crowded highway with my wife and son. Traffic was barely moving. Vehicles were inching forward, one small gap at a time, with the usual impatience hanging in the air.

Suddenly, there was a loud bang. It sounded like something had burst.

For a second, I didn’t understand what had happened. Then I realized a motorcyclist trying to squeeze through the narrow space between cars had hit us. His side bar had torn into our rear tire, and he had fallen onto the road.

We stepped out immediately. We were all shaken. The motorcyclist was getting up, visibly startled.

My first reaction was anger.

We had already been stuck in that traffic jam for over an hour, and now there was a damaged tire to deal with in the middle of it. The inconvenience, the carelessness, the sudden disruption—it all came together in that moment.

But something unexpected happened.

I didn’t react.

My son was driving, and I could sense the tension in him. The motorcyclist walked up, apologized, and offered to pay a small amount for the damage. It was clearly not enough, and under different circumstances, we might have argued.

I might have reacted very differently. Raised my voice, questioned his carelessness, and insisted on compensation right there on the road.

It could easily have turned into an argument, drawing attention and adding to the chaos around us. And it would have only added to that tension.

But we let it go.

Instead, we focused on the immediate problem. Changing a tire in that kind of traffic was not possible. Cars were packed too closely, and there was no space to do it safely.

So we made a tough decision. We drove on.

For nearly two kilometers, we moved carefully on a damaged tire, the car unsteady, the sound of it reminding us of what had just happened. Eventually, we found a small roadside tire shop and got it replaced.

The entire episode set us back by almost two hours.

For a while, there was still tension. We had already been irritated before the incident, and this had only added to it. But as we got back on the road, something shifted.

The tension eased.

We found ourselves talking normally again. We stopped for a delicious lunch and, almost without noticing, began to enjoy the rest of the journey.

Later, I thought about how easily that moment could have gone differently.

We could have argued with the motorcyclist. We could have held on to the anger, replaying the incident in our minds. It would not have changed what had happened. The tire would still have needed to be replaced. The delay would still have been there.

But it would have changed the rest of the day.

Sometimes, not reacting is not about being calm or patient in a deliberate way. It is simply about seeing clearly what the situation needs.

In that moment, what we needed was not an argument. It was a solution.

The anger came, but it did not stay. And because it did not stay, it did not take anything more from us than it already had.

That small difference changed the experience of the entire day.

It reminded me that we often carry moments longer than necessary, turning them over in our minds, letting them shape what comes next.

But sometimes, we can let them pass.

Not because they don’t matter, but because holding on to them does not help.

And when we do that, even an ordinary day that briefly went wrong can find its way back again.

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About Ashok B. Heryani

Ashok B. Heryani writes reflective essays on everyday life, exploring human behavior, social patterns, and the quiet forces that shape how we live and relate to one another.

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How to Heal on a Deeper Level After Moving On

“Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and you will call it fate.” ~C.G. Jung

For twelve years, I believed I was the architect of a perfect life. I had the “Summa Cum Laude” degree, a respected career in human services, a devoted husband, and two healthy daughters. I had checked every box on the “Success” list. I truly thought I had outrun my past.

But trauma has a way of waiting. It doesn’t disappear just because you stop looking at it. It simply goes underground, like a silent program running in the background of a computer, waiting for the right key to be pressed.

When I was twenty-one, I escaped from a ten-year, on/off toxic relationship that had consumed my entire adolescence. At the time, I didn’t have the words “narcissistic abuse” or “gaslighting.” I just thought he was a man who couldn’t get his act together. He went to jail and I moved on; I built a fortress of a life.

And then, twelve years later, I bumped into him. We’ll call him X.

The Return of the Familiar

It wasn’t a calculated move. It was an extreme chance encounter that felt like a lightning strike. Within weeks, the fortress I had spent over a decade building began to crumble.

I did the unthinkable: I separated from my family. I broke apart the peace I had cultivated to go back to the man who had nearly destroyed me as a girl.

From the outside, it looked like madness; from the inside, it felt like an irresistible pull. It was a biological “homecoming” to my nervous system that I had never actually healed; I had only suppressed it. My mind and body felt like magnets to the familiar trauma, disguised as “true love” and a “happily ever after.”

Within a month, X’s mask slipped. The same jealousies, the same mental games, and the same chilling gaslighting returned. But this time, I was different.

I was an adult. I was a mom. I was finishing my master’s degree and learning about abusive relationships at this very time, and I had spent years working in the human services profession.

And suddenly, I had the epiphany.

The Holes in the Wall

I remember standing in a cramped, crappy apartment—the one I had moved into just to be with X. I wasn’t DIYing a dream home like I had planned. I was holding a putty knife, trying to patch holes in the drywall that had been put there by X’s fists.

As I smoothed the spackle over the damage, the absurdity of the moment hit me with the force of a tidal wave. Here I was, a high-achieving professional, a woman who taught others about empowerment and boundaries, hiding the physical evidence of my own destruction. I was literally trying to cover up the holes in my life, hoping that if I made the surface look smooth enough, I wouldn’t have to face the rot underneath.

I realized that my entire “success story” over the last decade had been a version of this spackle. I had spent twelve years painting over the “adolescent me” with layers of professional accolades and academic achievements. But because I hadn’t addressed the original trauma of my youth, the foundation was still brittle.

At the first sign of heat—the first encounter with my past—those layers cracked.

That’s when I saw the “ghost in my system.” I wasn’t fighting the man standing in front of me; I was fighting a version of myself that had been stuck at age twelve. I had “moved on” at twenty-one, but I hadn’t integrated the experience; I had simply built a beautiful life on top of a broken foundation.

The Turning Point

I left that apartment. I went back to my family and did the grueling, messy work of repairing the damage I had caused. But this time, the “work” was different.

I wasn’t just healing from the mistake of my thirties; I was finally reaching back to that twelve-year-old girl and telling her, “I see you now. We’re going to fix the foundation this time.” I had to learn the hard way that we often mistake a change in scenery for a change in soul.

We think that because we have a house, a career, and a “perfect” family, we have outgrown our struggle. But healing is not a matter of time; it is a matter of awareness.

Lessons from the Foundation

Through this journey of losing and finding myself, I discovered three truths that changed how I view personal growth:

1. Success is not a substitute for stability.

You can be a high-achiever and still be highly vulnerable. Many of us use “doing” as a way to avoid “being.” My career success was my armor, but it didn’t make me immune to old triggers.

2. You cannot fix what you haven’t defined.

For years, I didn’t realize I was an abuse survivor. I thought I was just “strong.” It wasn’t until I used my professional training to look at my own life objectively that I could name the beast; but once you name it—gaslighting, narcissistic abuse, trauma bonding—it loses its power over you.

3. The “why” is in the roots.

I had to stop asking, “How could I be so stupid?” and start asking, “What did that twelve-year-old girl need that she is still looking for?” When we approach our mistakes with curiosity instead of contempt, we find the roadmap to the cure. Contempt keeps us stuck in shame; curiosity leads us home.

The Power of Giving Back

I realized through this experience that while I was lucky enough to have the education to eventually catch myself, so many people are left wandering in the dark without a map. Not everyone is ready or able to access traditional therapy or support systems. Those paths can often feel expensive, time-consuming, or even intimidating when you are already in a state of collapse.

I now believe that one of the most powerful steps in our own healing is the act of sharing what we’ve learned. Giving back isn’t just a kind gesture; it is a therapeutic necessity. When we translate our private pain into a public resource for others, we finally strip that pain of its power to shame us, and we turn our “devastation” into a “blueprint” that someone else can use to find their way home.

Practical Steps for Rebuilding

If you are currently standing in your own “broken apartment,” wondering how to start patching the holes, here is what I have found to be most effective:

1. Audit your foundation.

Stop looking at the “new paint” of your current success and look at the original wood. Ask yourself: Am I reacting to what is happening today, or am I reacting to a ghost from my past?

2. Name the beast/ghost.

Don’t just say you are “stressed.” Use specific language—whether it is gaslighting, a trauma bond, or a nervous system spiral. Once you name a pattern, you are no longer a victim of it; you are an observer of it.

3. Find a way to serve.

Even if it’s just sharing a single truth with a friend or posting an honest reflection online, the act of helping someone else navigate their challenging circumstances is often the very thing that pulls us out of our own.

The Ongoing Commitment

If my own mid-life crisis taught me anything, it’s that healing isn’t a destination you reach and then stay at forever. It’s a commitment to checking your own foundation every single day. It’s about making sure that the life you are building is one you actually want to live in – not just one that looks good from the street.

While the devastations we face are often our greatest teachers, my hope is that by sharing my story, I can help others leave the quagmire of confusion and emotional pain much sooner than I did.

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About Stephanie Nelson, M.A.

Stephanie Nelson, M.A., is a Human Services professional with over 20 years of experience. After nearly losing her "perfect" life to a ghost from her past, she founded MySelfGrowthTools.com to provide free, 24/7, no barrier, digital tools for those navigating recovery and self-growth. She lives for "aha!" moments and helping others rebuild their lives on a foundation of true self-trust. Follow along on Instagram @my.selfgrowthtools.

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Finding Peace with Money After Years of Feeling “Responsibly Broke”

“A big part of financial freedom is having your heart and mind free from worry about the what-ifs of life.” ~Suze Orman

During my upbringing, my parents often fought about money since we didn’t have much of it. My mom was more of an occasional spender, while my father would go as far as making me wear shoes that were a size smaller just so he could save money.

This conflict of opposites created real tension in our home, and eventually, my dad instructed my mom to give my father her entire salary so he could manage it. She had to ask for an allowance even for things like menstrual pads or coffee. Today, I understand that this type of dynamic is called financial abuse.

When my mom left my dad, it was very difficult for her to support our family financially since she was making less money than my father while they were together.

Even in spite of that, she wanted us to have more. I remember it like it was yesterday. I was twelve years old, and my mom took me to a clothing store called Mango. I loved that store but could never buy anything from there because it was outside of our price range.

I noticed a simple black sweater and immediately fell in love with it. I showed it to my mom. It was around $20, which was a budget for our groceries for the week. And as any child would, I started begging her to buy it for me. Eventually she gave in and said okay.

I remember we were standing by the register. She was to my right side, and when I looked at her, I could not only see but literally feel the stress she was going through by spending $20 on a sweater she couldn’t afford. My excitement was immediately replaced by profound guilt and shame that I was the reason she was stressed and sad.

Although I didn’t realize it for many years, this was a defining moment when I unconsciously decided I wasn’t deserving or worthy of having more money or making good money.

Years later, when I began my healing work, I understood that these seemingly small and insignificant moments shape the way we see money, how we feel about it, and whether we believe we deserve it or not.

At first, this seemed to have a positive effect. In my twenties, I became an extreme saver.

When I was twenty-two, I moved to the US. During my first year as an au pair, I lived with a generous family and still managed to save, believing I was good with money.

After my year was up, I moved to Florida on my own and started to become aware of how the financial system works in the US. My husband at that time told me I needed to build credit because, well, everybody does it. We all need credit to live in this country. So I got my very first credit card. This was the time when my saving muscles began to weaken.

The standard of living I was used to in Slovakia was different here since I was starting from zero. Being a customer service representative, my mani-pedis, haircuts, and the desire to live the high life because I was in America ate a significant portion of my earnings while leaving me high and dry at the end of the month.

Looking back now, I’d say the breaking point happened when I had a tooth emergency. I woke up with my right side completely swollen and had to rush to my dentist for an emergency appointment.

I had insurance, but I wasn’t aware that often there is a significant portion you must pay out of pocket. Once the emergency was averted, I was standing at the reception desk, handing the receptionist my insurance card. After a few moments, she looked at me with a smile and said, “Your total out of pocket is $1,600.”

I froze, cold sweat pouring over my anesthetized face. Say what? I don’t have $1,600. She looked at me again, smiled, and said, “That shouldn’t be a problem. We have a payment plan available.”

And that’s how my path of debt cycles began.

Could I sit here and tell you that the reason I was in such a bad financial position was the system or the bankers and lenders that so freely offered me their money? Of course. But that is a very small part of the equation, and it actually isn’t the reason I ended up broke.

After about eight years of personal loans, medical debt, a car loan, and about six credit cards, I hit rock bottom and eventually filed for bankruptcy.

One thing I couldn’t wrap my head around was that I was responsible, reliable, and capable in other areas of my life, but when it came to money, I was failing horribly. Even my payment history was perfect because, well, I was a responsible borrower. Later on, I used to joke that I was responsibly broke.

The bankruptcy was a turning point for me. Once everything was over and my case was settled, I remember sitting on my bed in my studio apartment, asking myself: “How did I actually get here?”

After I reflected, I recognized that it was a combination of three things. First, I never healed my money blocks and beliefs, which affected my income level. Second, I refused to educate myself about money. And third, I was using debt as a way to finance my lifestyle, although I couldn’t afford it at the time.

Once I sat with this for a while, I made a commitment to myself that I would never again find myself in such a financial position. I decided to face my financial fears head-on and purchased my very first financial book, Total Money Makeover by Dave Ramsey.

As one of the first steps, he suggests you should save your first $1,000. I couldn’t see how I would be able to do that, but I stood strongly in my faith. I started with $50. Then it was $100, $200, and eventually, within two months, I saved my first $1,000.

Saving my first $1,000 was less about money and more about self-trust while rebuilding confidence in my choices. Suddenly, I felt more capable and reliable when it came to money, a feeling I wasn’t familiar with.

Step by step over the years, I started to make healthier financial choices. I opened my first brokerage account and started investing, and no matter what point system a credit card company offers, I am staying away from having any.

Looking back at this journey of financial struggle and how I tied it to my self-worth, there are three pieces of advice I’d offer when it comes to money.

1. Address your financial trauma.

Whether people grew up with money or without it, many of us have financial limiting beliefs that hold us back.

Five minutes in a clothing store with my mom at the age of twelve directed another twenty years of financial stress for me. Money directly affects our nervous system as well as our mental and emotional well-being.

Of course, for people who are truly struggling or living at poverty level, financial stress is inevitable. But for many of us, a paycheck-to-paycheck lifestyle is a combination of bad financial habits, a negative relationship with money, and a lack of financial knowledge.

Addressing your relationship with money won’t only help you understand your current financial situation but also uncover deeper wounds you might be carrying, like feelings of unworthiness or a desire for validation. Money problems are often symptoms of a deeper issue.

2. Spirituality and money can coexist.

I grew up atheist, so when I started to explore spirituality later in life, I developed a certain obliviousness toward money. I saw it as something materialistic that didn’t belong in the spiritual world.

I later realized that spirituality became another way for me to avoid my financial trauma, justifying that I was above money and could manifest my way out of being broke. Although I’m not minimizing the power of attraction and manifestation, I think it’s important to be practical and logical when it comes to our finances.

The hardest lesson was learning that I can’t reach higher states of consciousness or heal much of my trauma when I’m stuck in constant survival mode and my nervous system is paralyzed by fight-or-flight mode because I don’t know how I’m going to tackle my rent next month. We must take care of the survival aspects of our life before we can dive deeper.

3. Learn about money.

There are so many negative financial statements we hear all the time. Things like “money can’t buy happiness” or “money is the root of all evil” when in fact, there is nothing wrong with being interested in money, understanding it, and effectively working with it. Money is simply one of the many essential aspects of living a healthy and balanced lifestyle.

You don’t need to strive to be the richest person in the world, but understanding your budget, having an emergency fund, and saving for retirement are the basis of your financial health.

When I started learning about money, it gave me a sense of empowerment and competency. It made me feel more confident, gave me clarity, and brought a sense of peace into my day-to-day life. There is so much I was able to accomplish on a deeper personal level and heal because I wasn’t consumed by daily financial stress.

Today, I no longer carry the shame of that moment at the register. Instead, I carry the knowledge that I am capable, worthy, and deserving of financial stability, and so are you.

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About Silvia Turonova

Silvia helps financially independent women transform their relationship with money, addressing both the emotional and the practical side through a personalized money system. She created the HerEaseWithMoney Starter, a free 10-minute money guide for women ready to take their first step. Get it here. You can also find her on Instagram.

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