The messy reality of doing the inner work.
Somewhere along the way we were sold the idea that healing is some beautiful, peaceful journey. Like you light a candle, start journaling, drink a little more water, maybe go to therapy. You’d confront the pain, process the trauma, learn the lesson. Then, suddenly you emerge as this calm, emotionally evolved version of yourself.
That is a whole lie.
Real healing is messy. It’s confusing. It’s two steps forward. One mega emotional meltdown in the grocery store parking lot. And then, a random Tuesday where something small hits a nerve and has you questioning your entire emotional stability for a day or two.
Healing isn’t linear.
It’s more like a drunk squirrel trying to cross a four-lane highway.
One minute you’re making progress.
The next minute you’re running in circles.
Then suddenly you freeze halfway through the road questioning every life decision you’ve ever made.
And somehow… you still make it across.
The Lie We’re Told About HEALING & Growth
Somewhere along the way, healing got turned into a brand.
It’s sold to us in pastel Instagram graphics and ten-second motivational videos. Light a candle. Start a gratitude journal. Drink green juice. Take a deep breath. Don’t forget to ground. Suddenly you’re on a peaceful journey toward becoming the best version of yourself.
Clean. Calm. Enlightened. Graceful.
But anyone who has actually done the work knows that’s not how this goes.
Real healing is uncomfortable. It’s messy. Healing is realizing that some of the habits you built to survive are now the very things holding you back. It’s recognizing patterns you didn’t even know were patterns. It’s setting boundaries that make other people uncomfortable and then lying awake at night wondering if you were too harsh.
Sometimes it looks like growth.
Sometimes it looks like sitting in your car in silence trying to understand why something small hit you so hard.
Finally, it can look like making progress for weeks, only to have one moment pull you right back. It will have you questioning your entire emotional stability for a day or two.
That doesn’t mean you’re failing, or that you’re crazy.
It means you’re doing real work.
The Truth
The truth is, healing doesn’t follow a neat little timeline. There isn’t a magical moment of clarity.
If someone claims “I did *insert random scam program full of lies here* and I was immediately fixed. Now, I am an elevated being, and I’ll never have to deal with that again.” Please pray for them. Because that is NOT how it works. They just drank the kool-aid.
Growth is rarely graceful.
It’s more like learning to walk through the same rooms of your life with new awareness. Seeing things you didn’t see before. Understanding things you couldn’t understand before.
And sometimes that awareness hurts.
But it’s also the beginning of real change.
The Messy Reality of Doing the Work
Doing the inner work sounds noble when people say it out loud. It looks beautiful when you see an IG post of a woman on the beach in a perfect Dancer Pose, promoting the latest healing program.
But the reality?
It’s awkward. It’s uncomfortable. (Not unlike when you start doing yoga poses.) And sometimes it feels like your emotional wiring is being pulled apart and put back together in real time.
Doing the work means noticing things you used to ignore.
It means realizing that some of the ways you learned to survive- people pleasing, avoiding conflict, shutting down emotionally, or laughing things off are actually coping mechanisms. Probably built many years ago. They kept you safe.
But now they’re showing up in places they no longer belong.
Suddenly you’re catching yourself mid-reaction.
People Pleasing becomes noticeable.
Over apologizing. You start speaking up when you have something to say.
And that awareness can feel jarring.
Because once you see the pattern, you can’t unsee it.
Doing the work also means facing the uncomfortable truth that not everyone in your life will understand the version of you that’s growing.
Some people were comfortable with the old version of you.
The one who didn’t speak up.
The person who overextended to keep the peace.
When that version of you starts to change, it can shake things up in ways you didn’t expect.
And then, there are the emotional curveballs.
The random memories.
The triggers you thought you were past. The triggers you didn’t know were triggers.
The moments where something small suddenly carries the weight of something much bigger.
One minute you’re feeling strong and grounded.
The next minute you’re a blubbering mess. Wondering why a passing comment or old memory just knocked the wind out of you.
This is the part of healing nobody posts about. But it’s the truth.
The part where progress doesn’t look impressive. You won’t see an IG post of a someone struggling their way through Tree Pose.
It looks like pausing before reacting.
Taking a breath instead of snapping back.
Choosing honesty instead of pretending everything is fine.
Small moments. Quiet changes. Internal shifts that nobody else sees.
But those are the moments where real growth is happening.
Even if it feels a little chaotic along the way.
The Part Nobody Talks About
Here’s the part about healing that doesn’t make it into inspirational quotes.
Growth comes with grief.
Not just grief for things that happened to you. Grief for the pain you caused too.
There’s also the grief for versions of your life you thought would turn out differently.
Grief for relationships.
Grief for the version of yourself that didn’t know what you know now.
No one really prepares you for that.
Sometimes doing the inner work means realizing you can’t keep shrinking yourself to maintain peace. It means choosing honesty where you once chose silence. It means walking away from dynamics that once felt normal but now feel heavy. And sometimes, it means realizing that you caused hurt too. Not out of malice. But out of self-protection.
And that type of change can feel lonely. It can be overwhelming.
Not because you’re doing something wrong.
But because growth shifts the landscape around you, and within you.
You start seeing patterns more clearly.
Behaviors in yourself and everyone around you are more noticeable.
You start recognizing where your energy is constantly being drained.
Healing also asks something else of you that most people struggle with.
Forgiving yourself.
Not only forgiving yourself for your part in your pain but forgiving yourself for the boundaries you didn’t set sooner.
For the years you spent surviving instead of thriving.
That version of self-reflection can sting.
But it’s also where compassion begins.
Because the truth is, you did the best you could with the tools you had at the time. Every version of you was trying to navigate life with the information, strength, and support available in that moment.
Even the messy versions. Especially the messy versions.
Healing isn’t about becoming someone completely new.
It’s about understanding yourself with more clarity than you had before. It’s about offering yourself the same patience and grace you give everyone else.
And that process rarely looks pretty from the outside.
Sometimes it just looks like starting over.
The Reframe: The Drunk Squirrel Still Makes It Across
Here’s the truth that takes most people a life time to understand.
Healing isn’t about becoming perfect.
It’s not about never getting triggered again.
Or about always saying the right thing.
It’ isn’t reaching some magical (fictional) point where your past no longer touches your present.
Healing is about awareness.
It’s about noticing your patterns instead of repeating them blindly.
Pausing before reacting the way you used to.
It’s about choosing growth, even when growth feels uncomfortable.
Sometimes that progress looks graceful.
Most of the time it doesn’t.
Most of the time it looks like trying, failing, learning, apologizing, adjusting, and trying again.
It looks like acknowledging when you’ve been hurt and also having the courage to acknowledge the moments when you caused hurt too. Not out of cruelty, but out of fear, self protection, or wounds you hadn’t learned how to navigate yet.
That kind of honesty isn’t weakness. It’s intimacy. It’s growth.
And growth rarely moves in a straight line.
Some days you feel strong and grounded.
Other days old feelings show up out of nowhere and knock you sideways.
Some days you handle things differently than you used to.
Other days you catch yourself falling into old habits and have to course correct.
Those days do not erase the progress you’ve made.
They just mean you’re human.
Healing isn’t a straight road with clear lanes and perfect signs pointing the way.
It’s more like a drunk squirrel trying to cross a busy highway.
Running forward, darting sideways, pausing halfway through to reassess the situation.
Messy. Unpredictable. Slightly chaotic.
But here’s the thing.
The squirrel still makes it across.
Not because the path was perfect.
Because it kept moving.
And if you’re doing the work, questioning old patterns, taking responsibility for your growth, and choosing to keep going even when it feels messy…
You’re doing the same thing.
Even if it doesn’t feel graceful.
Even if it doesn’t look impressive from the outside.
You’re still moving forward.
And that counts.
Growth isn’t pretty. But it’s real.
And real growth is where everything changes.
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