The Reset

I lost people I once thought I couldn't live without. Friends, lovers, companions; people whose presence had shaped my days, whose voices I had woven into the soundtrack of my life. I thought losing them would crush me, leave me hollow and gasping for air. as if the weight of absence would be too heavy to carry.

And for a while, it did. I cried quietly in rooms that suddenly felt too large too empty. I replayed conversations that had long ended, wondered what I could have done differently, what words might have held them here. I felt untethered like a leaf caught in a storm, drifting without direction, unsure if I would ever anchor again.

But then, slowly, a realization emerged. A quiet, almost imperceptible truth: I never really lived with them. I had only survived around them.

I had adapted my life to their rhythms, their moods, their expectations. I had minimized my own needs to avoid conflict, swallowed my own voice to keep them comfortable, and bent myself into shapes that weren't entirely mine. The laughter I shared, the memories I made, even the love I felt, it had all been filtered through the prism of their presence. IU had survived in their orbit, yes, but I had not truly lived.

The first step in reclaiming my life was small and unremarkable. I sat in silance, really silence, and allowed myself to breathe without checking for their approval. I noticed how the air felt lighter, how my chest could expand freely. I realized how long it had been since I had moved for myself alone., walked down a street, made a decision, or taken a moment without thinking about how it would land in someone else's world.

Then I began to act differently. I deleted old messages that had tied me to regrets, cleared out reminders that made me small, and stopped checking for validation I didn't need. I chose moments that felt good to me, even if they didn't make sense to anyone else. I laughrd alone. I ate alone. I worked alone. And I started to feel really feel the pulse of my own life.

It wasn't easy. Old fears whispered that I was being selfish, reckless, even unloving. But each time I resisted, I reminded myself: I had been living in their shadow for too long. Surviving was not enough. Living meant taking up space unapologetically, embracing both the light and the messy edges of my own existence.

And slowly, almost imperceptibly, the weight lifted. I could walk into a room and notice colors, textures, sounds without thinking of them. I could make decisions that felt right to me and see them bloom into unexpected joy. I could sleep at night without replaying past conversations, without worrying if my absence would hurt someone else. I was alive in ways I had never been when I thought I needed them to survive.

I realized that losing people is not always a tragedy. Sometimes it is a liberation. Sometimes the people we think we cannot live without are the ones who keep us small, tethered to survival instead of life. And sometimes, only when they are gone do we find the courage, the absolute freedom to live.

I survived long enough to see it, long enough to understands that the life I had been waiting for was never outside of me. It was in he moments I carved for myself, in the breaths I took without apology, in the laughter I made that had nothing to do with anyone else.I had survived around them. But now, finally, I was living for me.