The In-Between

The Chapter After the Ending, Before the Beginning

I am standing in the doorway
between homes,
between countries,
between identities I’ve outgrown
and ones not yet sewn to my skin.
People call it the messy middle,
but it feels less messy
and more like drifting.
An unanchored pause
in a world that refuses to pause with me.
Minutes stack into days,
days into months,
and still I hover
between the life I’m leaving
and the one calling me forward.
I look back.
That’s where the tangle sits,
behind me.
And I look ahead
to a place where passion
will spark again.
But here, in this suspension,
I can’t attach to anything.
And strangely,
beautifully,
I’m okay with that.
This is the land of possibility,
where the map dissolves
and every path hums,
yes, that could be yours.
Do I want my business to thrive?
Yes.
And I know how.
I’ve built success before,
just never for myself.
I spoke in rooms filled with leaders,
spoke with authority,
redesigned entire systems
with my mind and my skill.
But I was always the architect
of someone else’s vision,
the strength behind another’s name.
Now I’ve rewritten everything.
Walked away from corporate,
from sales,
from high-tech’s masculine edge,
and stepped into the warmth
of human design, soul work,
guiding not businesses
but lives.
I see myself filling rooms again,
but this time with the curious,
the open-hearted,
those ready to explore
meaning,
redesign,
co-creation.
I have the vision.
I have the tools.
But I’m still dipping my toe in,
watching from the wings,
waiting for permission
I’ve already earned.
The time is now.
Not to imagine it.
To do it.
To be seen doing it.
To risk the stumble,
the silence,
the room that doesn’t fill
the first time,
or the second.
I trust whatever the Universe
is cooking up offstage,
and I trust my own hands
to pull the curtain back.
Do I want a home that holds me
close to family,
close to the earth,
close to the quiet places
where my soul remembers itself?
Yes.
And I see a dozen ways
that could unfold.
I’ve created sanctuary before.
I know how to nest,
how to root,
how to call a place mine.
Do I want the man meant for me?
Strong, smart, warm, self-seeing,
funny, kind,
a little wild,
and unquestionably delicious?
Yes.
And I feel myself
waiting in the wings
as if we share a cue
only the future knows.
But I also know I’ve loved deeply,
been loved fiercely,
learned what I will and won’t bend for.
I am not waiting empty-handed.
So am I in limbo?
Or am I standing
in the soft corridor
between who I was
and who I’m becoming?
A wise friend asked me,
“Are you afraid to commit
because you fear the pain of disappointment?”
Ah.
That landed with the subtlety
of a falling piano.
Because maybe being “okay with whatever”
has kept me safe.
Always watching,
never risking,
imagining the life I want
without daring to step inside it.
Failure?
I’ve met it.
Often.
Success?
Just as often.
I’ve danced with both,
learned their names,
watched them teach me
in ways I never asked for
but somehow needed.
But today,
after months of wandering
and one week tucked into a hotel room
with my dog and the cold North Sea
shaking the thoughts out of me,
I wake with a gentler intention.
To allow this pause.
To stop waiting for March,
for contracts,
for clarity to come tap me on the shoulder.
To remember that imagined destinations
are just lighthouses.
Not prisons.
Because here’s the truth
whispering through the seams:
I am not waiting.
I am becoming.
And the woman I’m writing now,
this next chapter of me,
carries nearly six decades
of hard-won wisdom,
soft-won love,
and all the exquisite mistakes
and triumphs
that have shaped my bones.
This is not a fix,
or a healing,
or a renovation.
This is evolution.
The kind my soul has craved
since before I knew the word for it.
She, my truest self,
has been patient,
watching me numb and justify and hide.
But her time has come.
This is the evolutionary moment.
The chapter where the ground solidifies,
the walls brighten,
and life meets me
breath by breath.
Not yesterday.
Not someday.
Just now.
Only now.
Always now.