For over ten years, year-end blog posts have been my favorite tradition. I love reflecting on how I’ve grown, what I’ve learned, celebrating the wins, and naming what felt hard. Writing these posts usually brings clarity about what I want to focus on in the future or how to take one step closer to being who I want to be.

As I prepared to write this year’s reflection, I reread the last five year-end reflections I’ve written and noticed a common theme: life felt heavy. Each year seemed harder than the last.

I remember how challenging those seasons felt. I can still hear my internal dialogue, including,  “When will it ever get easier?” and “I seriously can’t catch a break.” I also wondered if some people were simply handed a heavier load than others, even if that didn’t feel fair.

And you know what? Yes, life was difficult. But that wasn’t the entire picture.

The reason life felt so unbearably heavy each year wasn’t just because of my circumstances – it was because of my inability to handle whatever life threw at me. That inability wasn’t my fault. I was operating from a place called “survival mode.”

I didn’t just visit survival mode – I set up camp there. I pitched the most glamorous, eye-catching tent you could imagine. It looked like it had everything you’d ever need and more, but lacked the actual tools and resources required to survive outside. It lacked protection and stability, but it looked great from the outside. And I didn’t just go there for a long weekend, but I got dropped off there as a child and lived there ever since.

The tent could only handle ideal, perfect conditions. Any disruption – emotional, relational, or otherwise – made it feel unsafe and unlivable. Because of that, I stayed constantly alert, anticipating what might go wrong and emotionally bracing for disappointment. I believed that it was only a matter of time before circumstances or people let me down.

And all of that vigilance is exhausting.

When you’re constantly yearning for and trying to create safety, you have little energy for anything else. Your relationships, health, and overall life begin to suffer under the weight of chronic stress. And I had been living that way for years – always anticipating the worst, tallying every hardship as proof that “life is heavy” or “nothing goes well for me.”

In each of the last five years, I experienced some major challenges: burnout, breakups, broken relationships with loved ones, and health issues. Each one felt like confirmation that life was impossibly hard. And because I was operating from survival mode – just trying to get through each day – it often felt like I barely made it through each of those seasons.

And don’t get me wrong – those experiences were genuinely difficult. But going through tough situations while operating in survival mode changes everything. I became hyper-alert and hypersensitive. I constantly searched for safety but often found the opposite because I had learned to see the negative more quickly than the positive. I suppressed my emotions instead of pausing to ask myself what I was feeling and what I needed – which eventually led to depression. I overreacted to small things and distanced myself from people as a form of protection, even when it hurt others.

Simply put, I was just trying to get by without realizing how deeply stressed I was.

I genuinely believed it was normal for life to feel this heavy, and that one bad conversation or small mishap could ruin an entire day or week. Even though I appeared “put together” on the outside, I was barely surviving on the inside.

I knew something had to change after 2024 ended in a particularly tough way. I entered 2025 determined to prioritize my mental health after hitting an all-time low that affected me and the people I love. I started seeing a new therapist in-person, and in our first session, she told me I had been living in survival mode and chronic stress since I was five years old, following my father’s farm accident.

For the first time, I felt lighter and things made sense. Everything before that moment had felt harder because I didn’t feel safe in my own body.

After that session and her explaining what this all meant, I immersed myself in learning about nervous system regulation – how to feel safe in my own body, regardless of what’s going on around me. I spent this year learning to sit with stillness, identify what I’m feeling and where I feel it in my body, practice breathing and grounding exercises – all of which have made me feel safer, no matter what’s going on in my life.

As I look back on 2025, I am so thankful for everything that I have learned. I still have work to do, but I genuinely feel like a different person. I’m less anxious. I know how to bring myself back to safety after something difficult has happened. I have a better perspective on the world – looking for the good, rather than expecting the bad (or worst). I can see how my old patterns affected my relationships and mental health. And truthfully, for the first time ever, I feel like the best is yet to come.

So instead of that beautiful yet fragile tent I once lived in – I now picture myself in a simple, sturdy one at a different campsite. It isn’t flashy. It has just enough space, protection, and stability to do its job, and that’s enough.

Because I’ve learned that it isn’t about the tent. It’s about the person inside it.

It’s not about the circumstances we face, but our ability to create safety within ourselves and trust that we can handle whatever comes next – even when it’s hard.

And my friend, you can. You will get through it. And learning to trust yourself makes all the difference.

The best is yet to come. I believe it. Do you?

If this reflection resonated with you, here are a few questions you might sit with as this year comes to a close:

• What are some practices or habits you do that calm you down or help you feel safe, even when you’re stressed?
• What emotions are underneath the overwhelm or heaviness you may be feeling? In those situations that feel hardest, how can you get someone to help you through it? (Asking a friend to listen or for their perspective, going to a counselor once a month, hiring a contractor, etc.)
• What patterns helped you survive in the past but might be holding you back now?
• What would it look like to trust yourself more in the next year?