New Chapters ◦ Chapter Three: Return to Self ◦ Entry 1
This essay is part of my New Chapters series — a collection of personal essays organized into themed chapters that trace different seasons of rebuilding and becoming.
On finding my way back through running and writing. 🌿
After I finally let myself be seen again, after I hit publish and stopped hiding, I expected the shift to feel external. More feedback. More movement. Some visible sign that I had crossed into a new chapter.
But what changed first wasn’t the outside of my life. It was the inside of it.
Somewhere in the weeks that followed, I started to notice myself returning in quieter ways. Not as a performance or a reinvention, but as a reclaiming. A settling back into my own body, my own preferences, my own instincts. The parts of me that had gone dormant during survival began to wake up again, almost without my permission.
It felt less like becoming someone new, and more like finding my way back to myself.
Once I stopped standing still again, I kept thinking about the things that used to make me feel like myself. The first was writing. The second was running.
The first time I went back to the track last September, it felt strange. Familiar, but distant, like walking into a memory that didn’t quite fit anymore. My shoes were new, but the air, the curve of the lanes, even the sound of my footsteps brought something back I hadn’t realized I’d been missing.
But I kept going back. Not every day. Not perfectly. Some weeks I only made it once. Some days I told myself I’d go and didn’t. But it was enough that it started to become part of my week again.
Running had once been the thing that steadied me: the rhythm that quieted my thoughts, the place where I proved to myself I could keep going. Then life unraveled, and I stopped running. I stopped trying. I stopped showing up.
Coming back was humbling. My muscles ached sooner than I expected. My lungs burned in a way I didn’t remember. I wasn’t chasing personal bests anymore; I was chasing a feeling… the one where my body and mind used to move in sync, where I could hear my thoughts clearly, where I still felt like me.
This time, starting over felt different. It wasn’t a race to rebuild what I’d lost, but a quiet reunion with the parts of me I’d missed. With movement. With rhythm. With the part of me that had gone quiet but never disappeared.
Each lap became proof that I could still commit to something. Still build stamina instead of just surviving the day.
The same thing happened when I opened my blog again. The blank page felt like a track too, stretching out before me, equal parts daunting and familiar. I’d open the document, type a sentence, delete it, and sit there longer than I wanted to admit. The words used to come easily; now they stumbled. But there was comfort in the act of trying: of typing through the silence, of hearing my own voice find its footing again.
Running and writing have always mirrored each other for me, though I didn’t realize how much until I had lost both. Both are a kind of motion. Both a way of listening inward. Neither requires perfection. Both ask the same thing: show up, move forward, trust that the rhythm will return.
And once I began to show up there — on the page, on the track — I started to feel myself return in other ways too.
My days gained shape again. My body had a rhythm. My weeks had something I was moving toward instead of just getting through.
I began to care again. To leave the house. To text people back, even when part of me still wanted to stay quiet. To plan things, no matter how small. I had forgotten what it felt like to do things simply because I wanted to, not because I had to. I had forgotten that I could still do hard things, and that I was still capable of building a life that felt like mine.
Maybe that’s the real work. Not rebuilding from nothing, but finding what’s still here. The strength. The voice. The foundation I thought I’d lost, but hadn’t.
Not rewriting what’s already been told, but instead, learning how to keep writing forward.
I used to laugh easily. To find joy in small things: a good song on the radio, a Diet Coke at the end of a long day, the way my boys’ voices filled a room. Somewhere along the way, I lost that version of myself. But little by little, she’s coming back too. The one who feels, who laughs, who notices. The one who believes she still deserves a life that feels like her own.
So I’ll keep showing up, awkward and out of rhythm, still learning the pace of this version of me. The words will come back. The strength will too. And with it, so will I.
And maybe that’s what this really is: a slow return to self. Not a reinvention, but a remembering. A coming home to who I’ve always been, while slowly learning who I might still become.
But what changed first wasn’t the outside of my life. It was the inside of it.
Somewhere in the weeks that followed, I started to notice myself returning in quieter ways. Not as a performance or a reinvention, but as a reclaiming. A settling back into my own body, my own preferences, my own instincts. The parts of me that had gone dormant during survival began to wake up again, almost without my permission.
It felt less like becoming someone new, and more like finding my way back to myself.
Once I stopped standing still again, I kept thinking about the things that used to make me feel like myself. The first was writing. The second was running.
The first time I went back to the track last September, it felt strange. Familiar, but distant, like walking into a memory that didn’t quite fit anymore. My shoes were new, but the air, the curve of the lanes, even the sound of my footsteps brought something back I hadn’t realized I’d been missing.
But I kept going back. Not every day. Not perfectly. Some weeks I only made it once. Some days I told myself I’d go and didn’t. But it was enough that it started to become part of my week again.
Running had once been the thing that steadied me: the rhythm that quieted my thoughts, the place where I proved to myself I could keep going. Then life unraveled, and I stopped running. I stopped trying. I stopped showing up.
Coming back was humbling. My muscles ached sooner than I expected. My lungs burned in a way I didn’t remember. I wasn’t chasing personal bests anymore; I was chasing a feeling… the one where my body and mind used to move in sync, where I could hear my thoughts clearly, where I still felt like me.
This time, starting over felt different. It wasn’t a race to rebuild what I’d lost, but a quiet reunion with the parts of me I’d missed. With movement. With rhythm. With the part of me that had gone quiet but never disappeared.
Each lap became proof that I could still commit to something. Still build stamina instead of just surviving the day.
The same thing happened when I opened my blog again. The blank page felt like a track too, stretching out before me, equal parts daunting and familiar. I’d open the document, type a sentence, delete it, and sit there longer than I wanted to admit. The words used to come easily; now they stumbled. But there was comfort in the act of trying: of typing through the silence, of hearing my own voice find its footing again.
Running and writing have always mirrored each other for me, though I didn’t realize how much until I had lost both. Both are a kind of motion. Both a way of listening inward. Neither requires perfection. Both ask the same thing: show up, move forward, trust that the rhythm will return.
And once I began to show up there — on the page, on the track — I started to feel myself return in other ways too.
My days gained shape again. My body had a rhythm. My weeks had something I was moving toward instead of just getting through.
I began to care again. To leave the house. To text people back, even when part of me still wanted to stay quiet. To plan things, no matter how small. I had forgotten what it felt like to do things simply because I wanted to, not because I had to. I had forgotten that I could still do hard things, and that I was still capable of building a life that felt like mine.
Maybe that’s the real work. Not rebuilding from nothing, but finding what’s still here. The strength. The voice. The foundation I thought I’d lost, but hadn’t.
Not rewriting what’s already been told, but instead, learning how to keep writing forward.
I used to laugh easily. To find joy in small things: a good song on the radio, a Diet Coke at the end of a long day, the way my boys’ voices filled a room. Somewhere along the way, I lost that version of myself. But little by little, she’s coming back too. The one who feels, who laughs, who notices. The one who believes she still deserves a life that feels like her own.
So I’ll keep showing up, awkward and out of rhythm, still learning the pace of this version of me. The words will come back. The strength will too. And with it, so will I.
And maybe that’s what this really is: a slow return to self. Not a reinvention, but a remembering. A coming home to who I’ve always been, while slowly learning who I might still become.
Visit the New Chapters landing page to explore each chapter and read the story in order.
No comments