The Results of Choosing Me

The other day, I was sitting here reflecting over how much my life has changed this past year and realized something. When I turned 40, I made a quiet promise to myself:

“I’m taking my energy back.”

At the time, I don’t even know that I fully understood the weight of what I was saying. I just knew I was tired. Tired of being tired. I wasn’t tired in a dramatic way. I wasn’t angry at the world or planning some revenge tour 😭. I wasn’t on some “cut everybody off” journey either. I was just exhausted from constantly pouring outward. Pouring into people, situations, expectations, responsibilities, and carrying things that were never really mine to carry in the first place.

Somewhere along the way, I had become really good at showing up for everybody else while quietly placing myself on the back burner. If you’re a woman, especially a mother or caregiver, you probably know exactly what I mean. You wake up one day and realize you’ve spent so much time being what everybody else needed that you haven’t stopped to ask yourself what you need.

So yeah. Last year, at 40, I made a quiet decision to take my energy back.

Looking back now, I realize it wasn’t about withdrawing from people or becoming cold. It wasn’t even really about boundaries, although boundaries definitely came with it. It was more about finally asking myself a question I should’ve asked a long time ago: What would happen if I poured all this energy into me instead of everyone else?

Apparently… a lot.

As I’m coming up on the one year mark of turning 40, I’m literally living in the results of that one decision.

As I’m coming up on the one year mark of turning 40, I’m sitting here realizing that I’m literally living in the results of that one decision. When I stopped pouring all of my energy outward and started pouring it into myself, something shifted.

I started accomplishing the things I had been hoping for, praying for, and honestly wondering if I’d ever actually get to experience. I reached my goal weight. If you’ve ever been on a long health journey, then you know that sentence carries a whole lot more than numbers. After bariatric surgery, after plateaus, after seasons of feeling stuck, after learning what healthy actually looked like for my life instead of chasing extremes, I got there.

But here’s what really hit me: It wasn’t just about the weight. It was about finally following through on me. The energy I used to spend overextending, overthinking, over giving, and carrying things that weren’t mine? I redirected it inward.

Into my health.

Into my healing.

Into my peace.

Into becoming the woman I kept saying I wanted to be.

And little by little, the goals started happening. My life had finally met me halfway because for once… I stopped abandoning myself.

And you know what else? My vision got bigger. Not from that place of “I’m still not enough,” like before, but this time from a place of realizing: Wait… if I accomplished this, what else is possible for me?

I used to dream about feeling comfortable in my own skin. Dream about walking into a room feeling natural confidence. Dream about looking in the mirror and recognizing me instead of some traumatized misrepresentation. And now I’m here. Really HERE and it still doesn’t feel real sometimes.

My nervous system is at peace in a way I don’t think I even knew I needed. If you’ve spent years in hustle mode, survival mode, constantly going, constantly carrying, you know peace can feel unfamiliar at first. Like your body doesn’t know what to do when things finally get quiet.

Somewhere between slowing down and choosing myself, I realized something else too:

I’m not in survival anymore. I’m in alignment.

That’s a different kind of peace. These days, I crave that quiet. I crave intentionality. I crave slow mornings, good food, movement that feels good, protecting my peace, and actually enjoying the life I worked so hard to build.

And in the middle of all of this, I went back to school too. Me. Twenty years after the initial journey went left. I might take a minute sometimes, but one thing I’m going to do is finish what I start.

The funny thing about being a student again is, I genuinely love it. Learning lights me up in a way I didn’t expect. It feels different doing this now because I’m studying something I actually care about. I’m not just checking off a box from a list of expectations I didn’t fully understand at 18.

At 40, I’m curious. I’m invested. I’m connecting dots between psychology, transformation, behavior, wellness, storytelling, everything that interests me really, and connecting it with my own life.

Which brings me to the realization that hit me the hardest: I’m literally living my old dream. The things I used to hope and pray for. Journal about. Cry about. I’m standing in them right now.

Sometimes we get so busy adjusting to the things we once wanted that we forget to stop and acknowledge we even have them.

Like hold on… Look around for a second. You prayed for this. You worked your ass off for this. You SURVIVED for this. And realizing that has done something really powerful for me.

It’s helped me trust myself with the next dream.

If I could love a version of life I once thought felt impossible, why wouldn’t I trust that I’ll love what comes next too? That part feels important. Especially if you’re in a season where life feels a little shaky. We can’t afford to forget that growth leaves clues. And one of the biggest clues in my own life has been this: Every single time I chose myself, things got better.

For the longest time, I believed pouring into myself meant I was somehow taking away from others. But now I actually think the opposite is true. When I became healthier, more peaceful, more aligned, everybody around me benefited. My kids get a happier version of me. My marriage gets a more present version of me. My community gets a more grounded version of me.

And I get… Me back.

So yeah. Taking my energy back was the best decision I ever made and now, with 41 around the corner, I can honestly say this: The greatest gift I gave myself at 40 wasn’t something I bought.

It was permission. Permission to slow down. Permission to pour inward. Permission to choose myself.

And baby… Look what happened 💚