Getting Honest Was Not Comfortable

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Getting to inner peace and acceptance of myself was not an easy path.

When I made the decision to deep dive into building a different life — for myself, and even for the people around me — the decision itself was not terribly hard. My life was chaotic. My mind was chaotic. I was tired of being me, and I had no coping skills to speak of. But I thought the chaos was about the world around me. The people. The places. The bottle. If I could just change enough of what was out there, I thought, I would finally feel okay in here.

What I did not realize was that I needed to get vulnerable. I needed to get honest with myself about myself.

And wow, did that make me uncomfortable.

When I finally looked, I found a lot of what people like to call character flaws. I have made bad decisions. I have acted from the wrong motives. I can be selfish. Jealous. Distrusting. The list did not stop quickly, and none of it was easy to sit with.

But here is the lesson underneath all of that digging: looking at my flaws did not mean I was broken. It meant I was human.

And once I could see them — really see them, without flinching away — something shifted. I was no longer at their mercy. I had a choice.

Now, when one of them starts to peek out — the jealousy, the distrust, the old selfish reflex — I notice it. I see it coming. And because I see it, I get to choose what happens next. That choice was never available to me when I refused to look.

Awareness is not always comfortable. Sometimes it is the most uncomfortable part of the whole process. But it has become my lesson plan now — the ongoing work, not a thing I finished once and moved past. It is growth. And if I am not growing, I am not really living.