There is No Place Like Home

Finding it is the problem

I felt trapped in a life that gave me everything I ever wanted but left a huge hole in my soul. Back in the 90s and deep in despair, I had bouts of situational depression. Crying alone in my bedroom, hoping no one would hear, I was repeatedly saying out loud to no one but myself,

“I just want to go home. I just want to go home. I just want to go home”

I was home, so my spontaneous outcry sounded ridiculous. I loved our storybook house, with its quirky charm and endless projects. My six kids were happy, my husband was supportive, and our shared business was thriving and made it possible for us to work from home. I thought I was doing everything right. I should be happy. And yet, I had this puzzle of unhappiness to solve. What was this home I wanted to return to?

For too long, I had left myself behind. I had poured every ounce of energy into being a wife, a mother, and a diligent daughter, sacrificing my wants, my needs, and my identity. That’s what we’re told is right, isn’t it? To give everything for those we love? I had thought so, and I followed that belief without question.

But the cost was steep. Somewhere along the way, I had lost sight of who I was. I hadn’t paused to ask, What do I need? What do I want? In my 20s and 30s, I believed I knew myself, but the years proved otherwise. The gift of aging reveals what we don’t know. The older we get, the more we realize how much we don’t know, and the reward is getting to know ourselves better.

I will give myself credit for knowing some things back then. I liked to make things. But I was too busy making children to find the time to make other things. I was out of alignment with my true self.

Why should doing the right thing require us to lose ourselves in the process? Jen Hitze

Not comprehending what this home I wanted to go to was, I did come to the realization that I needed to be doing something for myself. It wasn’t a single moment of clarity but a series of small, deliberate steps.

No one complained that I was off taking a class or workshop. Even going back to college part-time was supported. I was out in the world meeting like-minded women, and along the way, I began to recognize myself. As I got to know myself, I found a new kind of happiness that filled a hole inside that I didn’t even know existed. I forgot all about wanting to go home.

I waited 40-some years before I took life-changing action to come home to myself. The Universe had been waiting all along to respond in beautiful, unexpected ways as I began my journey home.

The realization crept in, slow but undeniable: the home I longed for wasn’t a place at all. It was me. Somewhere along the way, I had lost the path to myself.

There is no surer way to locate your self, if you have misplaced her for a moment,
than to ask yourself what you want.
Rufi Thorpe

I am home now. Over the last 30 years, I’ve come to know myself—to listen to my wants, care for my needs, and make space for myself. Recently, it struck me: this life is the home I yearned for all those years ago. Coming home is our lifelong journey of becoming who we truly are.

And the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time. TS Eliot

Quotes of the Week

And I am out with lanterns, looking for myself. Emily Dickinson

To pursue yourself is an interesting and absorbing thing to do. Once you have caught the scent of a hidden being, your own hidden being, you won’t readily be deflected from the tracking down of it. Cynthia Propper Seton

‘Finding yourself’ is actually returning to yourself. An unlearning, an excavation, a remembering who you were before the world got its hands on you. Emily McDowell