It’s been three years since I packed my car and left the life that was familiar to me. Cried across every state line until I got to South Carolina, where I stopped and ate a picnic lunch. The air smelled different and I knew I was almost home. A few hours later, I crossed into Georgia and there it was. Home.

I’ll never forget pulling into the garage for the first time. Unloading my things in a corner of the kitchen before heading to Target for cleaning supplies and a frozen dinner. I couldn’t wait to nest into my new home. I swept and mopped the floors and set up the coffee maker, before laying my mat down and falling into a restful sleep.

The next morning I was up, bright and early for a sunrise walk at the beach. After years of taking care of others, I was finally ready to take care of myself.

Starting over does that to you, if you let it. Maybe it was being alone in a quiet house with only the noise of the birds, cicadas and frogs. No one vying for my attention. No needs except my own. Or maybe it was because I had exhausted myself by all the ways I had tried to get my needs met up to this point. But living on my own for the first time in my life gave me a golden gift. The gift to finally come home to my self.

So here I am, three years later, in love with myself and my life in ways I never have been before. Not that it’s been easy. I’ve made friends and lost friends. Had a potentially terminal illness. That journey deserves its own telling, and I’ll share it soon. I fell in love. And then lost the person I thought I was going to grow old with. Again.

I’ve gone quiet for awhile. Gone deep inside and found incredible healing. Experienced altered states of consciousness that allowed me to revisit childhood trauma and heal the little girl that thought she was forgotten. I’m slowly integrating mystical experiences and learning to bring them forward into the outer world. I’m learning to take up space and stop making myself small. I have gone quiet for a time, to heal even deeper. But now it’s time to bring some of the medicine I have experienced forward.

There is so much on my heart that I have to share with you. But for now I leave you with this.

Home is so much more than a person, place or thing. It’s more than a memory, a dream, a longing. Home is what you carry with you in your one beautiful heart. Come home to that first, and the rest will find you.

Want to hear more? You can also find me on Instagram @marshandmoon1and Facebook Marsh and Moon. Drop me a line if you want to be added to my email list.