I learned to speak when I was very young. And I also learned there were rules on what I could and could not say, if I wanted to be good, if I did not want to get in trouble. I learned I was not to brag, or “back-talk” (otherwise known as saying what I felt if it differed from what I was supposed to feel or what my parents wanted to hear).

That still, small voice within is stuffed so far down — covered up with so many layers of protective coatings reapplied day after day and year after year that it’s hard even now, after a decade spent seeking my own truth, to hear my truest self.

Even when I want so badly to live authentically, to speak my truth, to give wings to my soul’s desires, to live boldly and bravely and honestly, to be raw and vulnerable and simply me, freed of a lifetime’s worth of society’s coatings, I find I don’t know how. I read a poem, do a meditation, hear an inspirational speaker, see an Instagram quote that speaks to me and truly believe that this is it — that now I understand, that now, finally, I will get started on living my best life. That I will use my time efficiently, that I will spend my days “in the flow.” That I will stop endlessly scrolling through twitter or keeping up with email or wondering where the time has gone when I look up and see my well-planned morning is now afternoon. But the next day ends up the same. I still feel the spark of that latest motivation taunting me — “see,” it says, “you’re still the same. You still haven’t figured out how to do life differently, more expansively, more truthfully. You’re still wasting your one wild and precious life.”

What DO I want to say? Is there really some voice inside that I’ve never been free or brave enough to let loose? No bullet journal or Todoist or other tool has so far managed to get me on track. Perhaps by rambling and searching and putting out into the universe what comes into my head in this blog I will find my way. I’d love to have you along for the ride.