Grief, Choosing Yourself & the Relationships That Teach Us

Grief has a way of revealing what we couldn't see while we were living through it.

In this deeply personal episode, I reflect on the quiet sadness that surfaced during my morning shadow work and the realization that healing isn't simply about letting someone go—it's about grieving every moment you didn't choose yourself.

I explore what it means to honor your own boundaries, tell yourself the truth, and take responsibility for the outcomes that come from abandoning your own needs without falling into shame or blaming others. Along the way, I wrestle with a difficult question: If the healthiest version of someone you loved came back into your life, would you finally be able to show up differently?

We also unpack one of the most uncomfortable truths about personal growth: you don't become better at relationships by avoiding them. Healthy relationships don't simply comfort us—they expose us. Our triggers, our conflicts, and even our grief become invitations to deeper healing.

This episode is an honest meditation on heartbreak, accountability, intimacy, and the courage it takes to choose yourself—not in isolation, but in connection with others.

If you've ever found yourself missing someone while simultaneously recognizing that your greatest work is becoming the person who can fully honor herself, this conversation is for you.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:01

Grief. Grief is such a god-awful, exhausting emotion or experience. I woke up this morning sad. And as I did my shadow work prompt, I did that prompt sad. And as with all shadow work, it all boils down to learning to choose yourself ultimately. That's what it all boils down to. But in choosing yourself, there's also a lot of grief. Because you start to reflect on how experiences, relationships, intimate partnerships, and even the relationship that you have with yourself are. I don't want to use the word tainted because of its meaning, but in my grief, it's the best word to use for now. But you begin to realize how tainted those experiences are because you didn't choose yourself. And this is not to blame myself or shame myself because in those past experiences I didn't choose me, and therefore I didn't show up in ways that um fulfilled me or allowed me to be seen in ways that I need to be seen. No, it's not to do that, and nor is it to absolve anyone else who was an actor and participant in the relationship, the experience, or the partnership, either. It's not to absolve them of their actions or um pedestalize them either, but it's an effort to try to look at it clearly because for every action or non-action, there is going to be a reaction and also non-action on the part of the other person, too. So in today's grief, once again, I'm hit with the emotion of missing her, and it's really hard to sit with wanting another chance, an opportunity with someone, wanting an opportunity to allow yourself to be seen, wanting to show up again, wanting an opportunity to show up again in ways that you previously were too afraid to show up, and knowing, knowing that that opportunity is not gonna come, knowing that if the opportunity did present itself, not only would I have to do the things that I said just a few moments ago, but also now there are additional things to work through that weren't necessarily present the first time. So the road to repair would be even more challenging than it would have been the first time around. But that doesn't change that I grieve, that doesn't change that I'm sad today, it doesn't change that I miss her, and it doesn't change that question that I asked myself or the answer to it that I asked myself a few weeks ago. If the most healed version of your ex were to reappear, would you take them back? And my answer was yes. My answer was yes, but that question asks another question as well. Okay, but can you show up in the ways that you need to show up for yourself if this were to happen? That's the other question. Can you show up for yourself if this were to ever come to pass? Can you choose yourself if this were to happen? And by choosing myself, this doesn't mean getting into an argument, being confrontational, holding grudges. No, it means when conflict arises, because it will, can you honor yourself in the conflict? When boundaries are being pushed, can you speak truth to your boundaries? And can you hold your boundaries? It means if you are being disrespected, if you are being willfully misunderstood, if they're not seeing you or hearing you or loving you in the way that you need, can you speak truth to that? And it's not about speaking truth to that for them, no, it's about speaking truth to that for yourself. That's what the second question asks. Because one of the things that I'm realizing is that the only way I am going to have the intimate partnership that I desire is one, I have to learn to choose me. And in the process of learning to choose me, which is what I'm walking myself through, is it's it's it's a lot of grief because I have to grieve the ways in which I did not choose me, and I also have to own the results of not choosing me. I have to own those outcomes, and owning those outcomes is hard, is really, really hard. It means that there have been missed opportunities for intimacy. It means there have been missed opportunities to be held in the ways in which I needed to be held, it means there are missed opportunities to be understood and seen in the way that I really needed to be seen, and that would have resulted in my growth that would have fostered a stronger me, a better me. Because if there's one thing that I've always known and always believed is you cannot fully grow and become a better person in isolation. None of us can. And I don't give a shit about all of this, you know, I'm I'm I'm keeping my peace and I'm staying out the way, and all I need is me. Listen, as someone who has literally had to exist as an all I need is me because all I had was me, because I've been out on my own since I was eight, 17, 18. Baby, you don't want that. You really don't know what the hell you're talking about, and you really don't want that, and it's not healthy. First of all, the only reason your life feels peaceful, for a lot of people who love to say this, the only reason your life feels peaceful is because there's nobody around to trigger you. The trick, the growth is in the triggers. That's where growth lies. The growth is in the damn triggers, and we're not talking about, or I'm not talking about, I'm not talking about abuse. No, but I'm asking you just as much as I'm asking myself to be accountable and to understand a very real fact, a painful reality about growth. The only way you get better at relationships is getting in a fucking relationship. That's the only way you get better at it, and that's the only way you actually learn how to undo what we love to call right now generational curses. Or resolve your karma or whatever catchy phrase is being promulgated on social media right now. God, everyone's obsessed with sovereignty. Another word and phrase is getting ready to give me the ick. But it's true, even though these are catchy and poppy and buzzworthy, it's true. Your triggers are little lanterns that light the path towards healing. That's what they are. Even your therapist will say that. I know my therapist has said that to me. And again, I'm not talking about abuse. I'm not talking about your narcissistic mother, my narcissistic mother. No, run up, stay away from those people. I'm not talking about the abusive ex who put their hands on you or psychologically abused you, or my abusive ex, the man who shall not be named but definitely deserves to be named, who I dated when I was fucking 20 years old. No, I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about regular human relationships that involve two personalities, two different histories, two different perceptions, two different lived experiences that bump up against each other, and that must figure out how to resolve conflict in order to remain in communion with one another, in order to strengthen the bonds, to foster intimacy, and ultimately allows for the highest expression of self for each individual person, and that allows for the highest growth, most optimal growth for each individual person. That is what I'm talking about. And that shit is hard, and that shit demands that we learn to choose ourselves, and that we respect others when they are choosing themselves. In fact, that we encourage it. Because when I look back at my breakup, it was a moment when I had to choose myself and when she had to choose herself. Does that suck? Yes. Do I miss her? Yes. And so now I have to sit with the grief of that, and I have to sit with the grief, comes up in waves from time to time, and with each wave of grief comes new realizations. This is not a new realization that I'm recording here. No, this is one that hits me over and over, just like the tide ebbs and flows, and waves keep crashing against the shoreline. This keeps crashing against me and has been crashing against me for the last few months as I work to sort my shit, sit with my shit, work through my shit, so that when the next person comes along, I'm ready, I'm able, I have the capacity. And that I can choose myself and show up for myself. Because if you can't choose yourself and show up for yourself, you don't have the ability to allow somebody else to choose you and show up for you. They will serve as a mirror of you not doing the thing you need to do, and that's what all relationships are ultimately. Relationships are a mirror of the things that you need to work on, as well as the things that you are doing solidly good work on. Oftentimes, your relationships are a direct reflection of the relationship that you have with yourself or lack thereof. And it works both ways, just as much as they are your mirror, you are their mirror as well. So it does go both ways. It's not a one-way mirror in an interrogation room. And life is not an interrogation, even though we treat it as such sometimes. But yeah, so today that's what I sit with. Grief. It's such a powerful experience and a lonely experience, but a necessary one. So yeah.