There are chapters in life that are no joke.
They pull you. Tear you. Stretch you. Uproot you. Grow you.
For me, this has been one of those chapters.
I spent a long time in the wilderness—trying to learn, trying to heal, trying to understand, trying to find my way through. I was not only doing the work; I was vigilant. My head was buried in finding answers and figuring out how to get to the other side.
But something has changed.
I realized that the chapter ended.
When you do the work, chapters do end.
Not because you become perfect. Not because life stops happening. But because you become different.
You learn what the season came to teach you. You apply it. You grow through it. And eventually, you realize you don’t have to keep living from the place you had to survive in.
I’ve been saying for a while that God is moving me from surviving into thriving.
And I’m beginning to understand that thriving isn’t always about doing more.
Sometimes thriving is breathing.
Slowing down.
Being present.
Resting.
Allowing yourself to enjoy where you are instead of constantly preparing for what could happen next.
I’m still human. I don’t show up perfectly every day, and I don’t believe we’re supposed to. But I also know I’m not the same person I was when I entered that wilderness.
I didn’t ignore my shadows. I didn’t run from the places God was revealing. I allowed the light to reach them.
And what I learned brought me here.
So now I’m learning how to rest.
I’m resting without waiting for outside circumstances to give me permission.
I’m resting because I choose to.
I’m sitting in the meadow.
I’m breathing.
I’m exhaling.
Because sometimes the greatest evidence that you’ve healed isn’t that you can explain everything you went through.
It’s that you no longer feel the need to keep fighting your way out.
You made it through.
The chapter taught you what it came to teach you.
And now you get to live differently.
You get to exhale.