Reflection

The beach has witnessed many versions of me. The woman on the left was becoming. The woman on the right is embodying.

Different seasons. Same soul.

Eight years have passed between these photographs. In that time there have been celebrations and goodbyes, a wedding, and many dreams that unfolded differently than expected, friendships, grief, joy, gardens planted, chickens raised, feathers found, countless sunrises, whimsy and more conversations than I could ever count.

Looking back, I don't see someone who needed to become someone else. I see a woman learning to come home to herself.

The ocean has always had a way of reminding me that life moves in rhythms. The tide doesn't apologize for retreating, nor does it rush its return. It simply trusts the timing.

Maybe that's what these years have taught me too.

To trust the unfolding. To release what no longer belongs. To welcome what does. To stop striving so hard to arrive, and instead fully inhabit where I am.

The smile is familiar. The heart is steadier. The roots run deeper.

The beach has witnessed many versions of me. And if these waves could speak, I think they'd whisper the same message they've been offering all along: Keep becoming.

Except now I understand...Becoming isn't about changing who you are. It's about embodying who you've been all along.