On losing yourself, believing in magic and returning home to who you were always meant to be.
I first fell in love with writing at around 8 years old, when I won a national writing award at primary school. By 14 I had my first blog, and over the years writing became the thread running through everything I loved. Until I stopped.
It might not surprise you that my whole world now centres around writing, through the Higher Self Journal. Yet somewhere along the way I stopped writing for myself, and I've missed it dearly.
So why did I stop?
Surviving, and what kept me alive inside
I'm 33 now, and I have survived a lot. It changed me. The journey to this moment has been full of ups and downs, love and loss, and I've had to dig deep to find the courage to overcome it all. That's another story, for another day.
But can I share my secret to thriving through surviving? I don't know where I'd be without it, and I hope it can help you too.
Awe and wonder.
No matter how violent the storm inside me, how dark it becomes in my mind, or how overwhelmed I feel, awe and wonder are my way back to feeling alive, even when parts of me feel like they're dying.
A dying star becomes a supernova. Rebirth, awakening, shedding, whatever you want to call it, is often painful. But there can be something extraordinarily beautiful within it. A dying star burns so brightly that its light travels far beyond its death. It leaves something behind. It lives.
We're not reinventing ourselves. We're returning home.
When I was a little girl, before secondary school and before I learned the need to fit in, I loved my ginger hair. I was a gamer, a bookworm, a total nerd with a wicked imagination. I believed in fairies and magic. I was completely and authentically myself, and unafraid to be.
Then I went to secondary school.
I dyed my ginger hair dark brown. I changed myself to fit in and, somewhere amongst it all, stopped loving myself and many of the things that had once brought me joy. As happens for so many of us, the magic faded, and so did my inner light.
We go through life putting on masks and changing ourselves to feel worthy of love. We wear other people's opinions of us until it's difficult to know where they end and we begin.
So who are you, really?
Perhaps this is what leads to some of our most chaotic "rebirths": boundaries, cutting ties, quitting jobs, moving across the world, letting go of beliefs, people and relationships. We feel an urge to shed them because perhaps they were never really ours in the first place.
Is it reinvention? I don't think so. I feel deeply in my heart and soul that it's the return home to your centre, to your soul, to your true, authentic self.
I call this the Middle Pillar.
The journey home can be messy, full of high highs and low lows. It's certainly not linear. But reclaiming yourself is one of the most liberating acts of rebellion there is: becoming you, again.
Strength isn't carrying it all alone
The last year has been one of the hardest of my life. When I finally opened up to my best friend, completely unmasked, after carrying so much alone for so long, we cried together. Her words made me ask myself: how am I still here? How did I go through all of that and not let the world turn me cold?
For a long time, I thought strength meant carrying everything alone. I learned to people please. I struggled with perfectionism. I learned to mask like a master, while privately feeling completely overwhelmed by the rocks in my invisible backpack.
But when I finally spoke up, I realised that was the strongest I had ever been. It took more courage to be seen, and to face what I'd carried for so long, than it ever did to believe I should carry it all alone.
I realised I was brave. Courageous. Strong. Capable. A Warrior Goddess.
And through it all, I never stopped believing in the impossible. When I gaze into the night sky, life here on Earth feels intricately impossible. And yet here I am. Here we are.
I'm made of stardust. So are you.
I didn't turn to hate. I turned to magic.
Underneath every mask, my authentic self still found ways to shine through. I never stopped believing in magic. My curiosity never left me, nor did my love of learning. That same friend once said to me: "Bianca, your ability to connect with awe and wonder in everyday life is the most magical thing about you."
She was right.
My wild imagination led me to become an alchemical meditation guide, taking people on journeys into the nucleus of their soul to meet their Higher Self. My love of writing and journaling became the Higher Self Journal, which guides me every single day and now guides many others home to their centre.
I've watched the people I work with unburden themselves and reconnect with who they really are. I've seen them leave relationships and careers that no longer lit them up, move through anxiety and loneliness, and become lighter, brighter and happier. They felt alive.
They did it by guiding themselves home to their Middle Pillar. Their Higher Self showed them the way. I simply held the lantern.
Walking each other home
Today, I am choosing to reclaim my voice. Over the years I'd been silenced and, somewhere along the way, I began silencing myself. Writing again feels like coming home.
My hope is that through me figuring all of this out, I can help even one person see their way through too. Maybe we'll relate to one another. Maybe we won't. But I understand now what it means to walk each other home.
So I invite you to put on something calming, light a candle, take some space and journey with me.
I've got this. You've got this. We've got this.
Love,
Bianca x
If you're going through a difficult time, please reach out to someone you trust or a professional. You don't have to carry it alone.
Come home to yourself: journaling prompts
If this stirred something in you, take ten quiet minutes with your journal and one of these:
- Who were you before you learned the need to fit in? What did you love, believe in and get lost in?
- Which masks do you still wear, and who are you wearing them for?
- What are you carrying in your invisible backpack that was never yours to carry alone?
- Where did you feel awe and wonder this week, even for a moment?
- If coming home to yourself was one small act today, what would it be?
Keep walking home with me
- The Higher Self Journal. My 90-day guided journal for coming home to your centre, one page at a time. Shop the journal
- Signature workshops and experiences. Tell me where you'd like to join me, including the Maldives retreat coming soon. Keep me a place
- My Substack. Where I write longer, more personal pieces like this one. This post was first shared there. Read on Substack
