The Rediscovery Pt. 4
Living without Disappearing
The hardest part of rediscovering myself hasn’t been the big moments.
It’s been the ordinary ones.
The ones where life keeps moving — where kids need things, schedules fill up, holidays approach — and the old urge to disappear quietly slips back in.
Because staying present sounds simple.
Until it isn’t.
The season that tests what I’ve learned
The holidays have a way of revealing patterns we didn’t realize we still carried.
The pressure to make things special.
To hold everything together.
To show up fully for everyone else.
For years, this season meant disappearing in plain sight.
Being physically present but mentally elsewhere.
Managing moments instead of living them.
Measuring my worth by how smoothly everything ran.
I was there — but not really there.
And I didn’t even realize how often I vanished until I started choosing to stay.
Disappearing doesn’t always look dramatic
I used to think disappearing meant shutting down or checking out.
But most of the time, it looks much quieter than that.
It looks like:
staying busy so I don’t have to feel
over-functioning so no one notices I’m tired
anticipating needs before anyone asks
putting my own presence last because it feels optional
It looks responsible.
It looks capable.
It looks like love.
But it slowly erases you all the same.
Staying looks different than I expected
Living without disappearing hasn’t meant doing more.
It’s meant doing less — on purpose.
Letting moments be imperfect.
Letting traditions be lighter.
Letting the house be messier than my anxiety would prefer.
It’s choosing to sit on the floor instead of finishing one more thing.
It’s watching instead of fixing.
It’s noticing when my mind drifts into management mode — and gently coming back.
Sometimes staying looks like laughter.
Sometimes it looks like boredom.
Sometimes it looks like resisting the urge to fill every quiet space.
Presence doesn’t mean performance
This is something I’m still unlearning.
Being present doesn’t mean being endlessly engaged or grateful or joyful.
It means being available — to the moment, to myself, to the people I love.
Even when the moment is loud.
Even when it’s uncomfortable.
Even when it doesn’t look the way I imagined.
Presence doesn’t require perfection.
It requires honesty.
Choosing myself inside my real life
For a long time, I believed choosing myself meant stepping away.
But living without disappearing has taught me something different.
I don’t need to leave my life to be present in it.
I can choose myself inside the mess, the noise, the routines, the relationships.
I can stay with my kids without losing myself.
I can love deeply without self-erasure.
I can hold space for others without abandoning my own.
This season isn’t about doing it all right.
It’s about staying.
Where I am right now
I still catch myself disappearing sometimes.
Old habits don’t vanish overnight.
But now, when I notice myself slipping away, I pause.
I come back to my body.
To the room.
To the moment that’s actually happening.
And I remind myself:
I don’t have to disappear to belong here.
Reflection question:
As this season gets louder, where might you choose presence over performance?
Even for a moment.
Even imperfectly.