Walking Backwards Toward Myself
In the first six months after my relationship ended, I hiked miles through the forest and dictated notes into my phone. I didn’t think about what the notes would become or if they were coherent; I just spoke aloud to the trees and captured the words. It was kind of like a walking meditation journal. I remember passing people on the trail and not worrying whether they were listening. The need to allow my voice to flow freely felt urgent, so I opened the depth of my heart and poured it into my digital notepad.
Around the same time, I was also reading Pixie Lighthorse’s The Wound Makes the Medicine. The book grew out of the author’s stream-of-consciousness notes, journaled during her personal heartbreak and grief and later woven together to support others as they navigated their own journeys. Sometimes the most painful paths—the ones we spend our lives trying to avoid—end up being the ones of deepest service to another human being.
I remember wondering if I’d ever be on the other side of the grief far enough to turn my own raw notes into something that might help someone else. Everyone told me I would be there eventually, but I questioned whether this was true. And that’s the thing about grief processes: they are all so unique. Resistant to timelines and assurances. And even though I grappled with my own unknown future, I found some level of comfort in the convergence with another’s lived experience. A place where I didn’t have to feel so alone in my own.
My brand of grief is probably one I will carry with me my entire life. I can’t imagine not feeling surges of emotion when I think about the great losses that shaped me. But something does seem to happen over time. Not a clearing, exactly, but more a softening around the edges. A way of staying with what is, rather than bracing against it.
I’m careful not to assume this is true for everyone. I only know that, in moments when my own future felt impossible to picture, I kept returning to the page. Not to make sense of things, but to stay connected to myself while everything else was shifting.
It is now a new year. 2026. I tend to give myself the space between the Gregorian New Year (January 1) and the Lunar New Year (this year, February 17, the year of the Fire Horse—a potent one) to listen more closely for what wants my attention.
Last night, I took an evening walk around the neighborhood to pick up some litter and breathe the cool air. I was gifted with capturing the precise moment when an owl, in its vast wingspan, landed on the top branch of a tall pine. Then, just minutes later, geese flew overhead, briefly arranging themselves into a perfect composition for a hasty photograph. Small moments, ordinary and unmistakably alive.
Later, I lay in bed sifting through my journals, both on my phone’s notepad and in the six watercolor paper notebooks I’ve filled in the past year-and-a-half. The entries move back and forth in time, each one written without knowing what would come next. And today, I sit at my desk working on this post and see several of the many Post-It affirmations I wrote during the deepest ache.
I love how you laugh.
You are so intuitive; trust yourself.
Hold lightly and adapt.
You get to be exactly who you are and be loved and accepted, and you get to love and accept others for exactly who they are.
Let go of what is not yours.
You create magic so others can experience joy and light. This is a beautiful way of connecting.
You do not have to be good. (Gotta give Mary Oliver credit for this one.)
Reading them now, I’m struck by something I couldn’t see then. The voice in these notes is steady. Kind. Unmistakably wise. In my most unraveled moments, I was closer to myself than I realized. The grief stripped away performance and pretending, and what came through the writing was not confusion, but clarity. Messages written by me, meant for me.
I realize I’ve been walking backwards. I am visiting my past self in order to locate my present one more clearly, so she can guide me forward. An instinctual, quiet knowing that sometimes backtracking is what allows me to move ahead with intention.
I’m reminded of a book I once read about wilderness survival. When lost, people rarely turn back. Instead, they keep moving forward, mistaking motion for progress. Some people will even conjure a mental map, imagining landmarks are just ahead, ones that feel familiar or reassuring. Many times, even when skilled, smart, and prepared, people get lost and do not survive simply because they refuse to retrace their steps.
Sure, walking backwards to revisit the past might mean dealing with some cringe moments. But mostly, I find myself softening with compassion for who I was then and pausing in awe of the wisdom that came through during such a devastation.
Over the holidays, I attended a gathering with some old friends. We’d connected in life over having newborns at the same time. And now, many of our first babies are fifteen. As we stood in the kitchen, someone reflected aloud, “We’ve all been through so much.” And then added, “Especially the three of you.”
At first I wasn’t sure how it felt to be one of the three who has been through a lot in the past fifteen years. I’ve always thought of myself as a steady person, an introvert at heart, a lover of the simple life.
Maybe these aspects of self helped carry me through the tumult and uncertainty. The same survival book asserts that the people who survive wild, unpredictable terrain are the ones who create some kind of rhythm for themselves. Some chant. Some hum. Some walk in a steady beat that they can rely on. Their bodies find a pattern, and the pattern becomes a rope back to themselves.
I’ve been thinking about my own ropes: yoga, weekly therapy sessions, Al Anon meetings, conversations with friends and family, hiking miles through the woods in all weather, slow cooking, parenting rituals, and always, always writing. Over the next few weeks, as I continue to walk gently toward myself, I hope to arrive not at the answers but at the next questions that ask me to listen more closely.
This year, I will be focusing on creating more content for my paid subscribers. Journaling prompts, memoir excerpts, and other extra treats!
Good stuff, Ker. That Mary Oliver poem is a favorite.