Unapologetic Transitions

“There is a way that seems right to a man, but its end is the way of death.”

‭‭Proverbs‬ ‭14‬:‭12‬ ‭NKJV‬‬

There was a time when I thought my disappointment came from people not choosing me. But the deeper truth is this, my ache was never rooted in their decisions, it was rooted in mine. I had not chosen myself. Not fully. Not courageously. Not consistently.

For a long time, I kept arriving for others in the very spaces where I kept abandoning myself. I gave presence without protection. I gave support without boundaries. I gave energy without replenishment. I learned how to function empty and convinced myself that emptiness was noble. I kept telling myself that sacrifice was love, that endurance was loyalty, that exhaustion meant I was doing something right.

But my soul was starving.

I spent so much time trying to explain myself to get permission. Shrinking my voice so it would not disrupt the room. Toning down my God-given boldness so my light would not blind anyone else. I called it peace. I called it maturity. I called it grace. But the truth is, it was slow self-erasure.

From a distance, everything looked fine. I was smiling. I was serving. I was showing up. But internally, I was unraveling. I was losing myself quietly and dangerously at the same time.

I had romanticized what support was supposed to look like. I believed that love would prove itself through effort. That loyalty would sound like consistency. That people would show up the way I showed up. Instead, I learned how often silence replaces commitment and how easily absence disguises itself as misunderstanding.

That realization brought me to my knees. Not in performance. Not in Polish. But in desperation. I remember whispering, “God, this cannot be Your will for my life.”

And that is when truth began to confront me.

The chicken has come home to roost. Not to shame me. Not to expose me publicly. But to reveal what had been bleeding underneath my faith for years. Old wounds I survived, but never healed. Fresh wounds I ignored, because survival felt more urgent than restoration.

And something inside me finally said enough!

I began to notice the imbalance. How supporting me had always been optional for others, while supporting them had become mandatory for me. I had become the fire that kept everyone else warm. I had become the ash that made comfort easy for everyone except myself.

That season is over.

Now, I am choosing to show up for myself without apology. Without guilt. Without shrinking my healing to make it digestible for people who benefited from my brokenness. This is not rebellion, this is recalibration. This is not abandonment, this is alignment. This is not selfishness, this is obedience.

God is no longer accepting my language without my life. Faith without works is dead, and obedience still costs something. I am learning that surrender is not what I say, it is what I choose when the choice is extremely hard, very expensive, and super inconvenient.

So, this is my “yes”! Not the pretty one. Not the convenient one. This is the “yes” that imposes boundaries. The lonely “yes”. The misunderstood yes. The uncomfortable “yes”. The “yes” that changes rooms. The “yes” that ends access. The “yes” that rearranges relationships. The wilderness “yes”. The blind-faith “yes”. The “yes” that interrupts patterns. Completely, “yes”!

I am saying “yes” to discomfort. “Yes” to distance. “Yes” to being questioned. “Yes” to being misread. “Yes” to being released from places that only remember me when I am useful. Because if my obedience costs popularity, then popularity was never my covering.

I feel fear sometimes, but I am not ruled by it. I feel loneliness at times, but I am not alone in it. I feel uncertainty, but I am not abandoned in it. I am held. I am guided. I am kept.

This transition is unapologetic, because it has to be. I will no longer break my own heart for the sake of belonging. I will no longer confuse availability with calling. I will no longer call depletion love.

God is asking me to trust Him with a version of myself I have never lived before. The healed version. The rested version. The obedient version. The woman who finally stopped negotiating her own worth.

And this time, I am listening.

Closing Reflection

If any part of this story echoed in your own life, let it be permission. Permission to pause. Permission to take inventory. Permission to stop offering loyalty to spaces that demand your silence, your shrinkage, or your slow disappearance. Choosing yourself is not betrayal. Setting boundaries is not abandonment. Obedience to God will rarely be convenient, but it will always be clarifying.

Whatever your next “yes” is, let it be honest. Let it be anchored. Let it be yours!