When Your Old Life Comes Knocking

What a month it’s been! 😂

I’ve been talking about coming home to myself, leaving old patterns behind and creating a life with more peace, joy and freedom. Yet, lately, life has felt anything but peaceful. Have you ever had one of those months where you look up at the sky and quietly wonder:

Why am I here again?

I’ve asked myself that question more times than I can count over the years.

Why does this keep happening?
Why do I find myself in situations that feel so familiar?
Why, after all I’ve learned and all the healing I’ve done, am I facing something that feels like it
belongs to an older version of my life?

This month gave me another chance to explore that, in the end, it brought some really meaningful clarity.

Oh, I Know You. We’ve Met Before!

Something happened recently that brought a lot of disruption into my life.

I felt frustrated.
I felt overwhelmed.

And if I’m honest..... I felt a little sorry for myself too. For a day or two, I let myself sit with those feelings. Sometimes we need a little space to feel disappointed before we’re ready to see things differently.

As things began to settle, I started to get curious.

Did I play a part in creating this situation?
Was I moving too quickly?
Was I putting too much pressure on myself?
Was I slipping into an old habit without noticing?

And then I saw it - Oh, I know you. We’ve met before.

There it was, an old familiar pattern. One I truly thought I had moved beyond.

The Habits We Don’t Always Notice

Isn’t it interesting how much we can do without consciously realising it? We develop patterns over years, sometimes decades. Some are beautiful and supportive, others are behaviours we learned when we were younger, when we were trying to fit in, feel safe, be accepted or simply find our way through life.

Maybe you learned to say yes when you really wanted to say no.
Maybe you learned to keep your thoughts to yourself.
Maybe you learned that you had to work extra hard to deserve good things.
Maybe you became so used to putting yourself last that you barely noticed you were doing it.

These patterns can become so familiar that we begin to live from them automatically. Often, we only notice when something happens that invites us to pause and take a closer look. That’s what happened to me.

I didn’t recognise the behaviour while I was in it. I recognised it when I began experiencing the consequences and that awareness opened the door to something different.

Look How Far I’ve Come

This was the part that felt especially important.

Yes, I was frustrated.
Yes, I felt emotional.
Yes, I wondered why I was being met with something that felt so familiar.

But I also noticed how differently I responded. There was a time when something like this would have completely consumed me. I might have spent much longer criticising myself, questioning myself and feeling weighed down by the situation.

This time, I allowed myself to feel what I was feeling. Then I began looking for solutions, I got curious about my behaviour - I recognised a familiar pattern. Then I started thinking about what I could choose differently next time.

That is progress.

We become so focused on what still needs healing that we forget to honour everything we have already healed. We can measure our growth by whether an old habit shows up again.

Perhaps a kinder measure is how we respond when it does.

Maybe you notice sooner.
Maybe you find your way back to yourself more quickly.
Maybe you spend less time being hard on yourself.
Maybe you ask for support.
Maybe you make a new choice.

Those moments matter. They are signs of growth, and they deserve to be celebrated.

Thank You, My Old Friend

I’ve been reflecting on something else this week. What if, instead of getting frustrated with ourselves when an old pattern appears, we met it with acknowledgement? After all, many of these behaviours began for a reason.

They may have helped us feel safe.
They may have helped us navigate difficult relationships.
They may have helped us cope when we didn’t yet have another way.

At one point, they served a purpose.

So instead of judging myself for recognising an old habit, I’ve been saying:

Oh, I know you.
We’ve met before.
Thank you for helping me get through what I needed to get through.
Thank you for the lessons.

But I’m ready to choose a different way now. It may be time for us to say goodbye.

There’s something very peaceful about that. I don’t need to fight with my past or criticise the woman I used to be. I can appreciate how far she carried me, while still choosing something different for the woman I am today.

Awareness Changes Everything

This is why awareness is the first of my four pillars.

Awareness. Pause. Healing. Becoming.

We can’t change a pattern we haven’t yet recognised. Sometime awareness arrives before we act, sometimes it arrives in the middle of a familiar situation and sometimes, as it did for me this month, it arrives when we’re dealing with the aftermath. But once we notice, we have an opportunity.

We can pause and become curious about what happened. We can begin healing the beliefs and feelings that may be keeping that behaviour familiar. We can continue becoming the women we want to be. Not through perfection, but through awareness, practice and choosing again.

Life will always have its challenging moments.

There will be difficult days.
There will be disappointments.
There will be mistakes.
There will be times when we look up at the sky and wonder what on earth is going on.

That’s part of being human and while life can be so beautiful, the path is not always smooth. The difficult moments do not erase the distance we’ve travelled, thye show you how much you have gorwn / changed / learned.

And look at you now! 💗