There are moments when I can feel myself drifting.
Not all at once. Not dramatically.
Just enough that I recognize the familiar pull.
My thoughts start reaching for certainty. I replay conversations. I search for reassurance. I begin looking outside of myself for something to steady me.
For a long time, I didn’t know that was what I was doing.
I thought I was trying to solve a problem.
Now I know something different.
Sometimes there isn’t a problem to solve.
Sometimes my nervous system is simply remembering what it was taught years ago—that uncertainty isn’t safe, that love can disappear without warning, that I need to stay alert.
But I’ve been learning something new.
I’ve been learning to catch myself.
Not because I’ve stopped feeling deeply, but because I’ve learned that my peace deserves my attention, too.
Not with criticism.
Not with shame.
Just with awareness.
“I know this feeling.”
“I know where this road leads.”
“I don’t have to follow it.”
Catching yourself isn’t pretending everything is okay when it isn’t.
It isn’t swallowing your feelings or convincing yourself you don’t need people.
It’s noticing when fear quietly takes the steering wheel and gently taking it back.
Sometimes catching yourself looks like putting your phone down instead of picking it up again.
Sometimes it looks like stepping outside and noticing the flowers that bloomed overnight.
Sometimes it looks like making a cup of tea, taking a deep breath, or allowing yourself to sit with a feeling instead of trying to make it disappear.
It’s choosing to remain rooted in yourself instead of getting swept away by uncertainty.
That’s the part I’m still learning.
The strongest version of me isn’t the one who never gets knocked off center.
She’s the one who notices sooner.
The one who pauses.
The one who says, “There you are,” and reaches back for herself with kindness instead of judgment.
Maybe healing isn’t becoming someone who never wobbles.
Maybe healing is simply becoming someone who knows how to find her way back to herself again.
Again and again.
As many times as it takes.