What exactly are boundaries? I used to think they were just about stopping people from doing things I didn’t like. Now I understand that they're actually about knowing who I am, what I need, and how I move through the world. Boundaries aren’t selfish. They’re the way we teach people who we really are, and the key to feeling seen, secure, and at ease in our own lives.

Isn't self-surveillance is exhausting? I feel compelled to monitor myself almost constantly. So I am not only having the experience, I also have opinions about it. Critiquing it, narrating it, judging it, judging me. It's like I have several fussy assistants hovering over me at all times. They're like gnats. I was talking to a dear friend the other day who is also sober. She is struggling with a different compulsion now, it's drinking but in a different shape. It amazes me how this is what...

What I’m learning is that fear doesn’t go away if I try to push past it, it actually wants me listen. Maybe that’s what home really is: the place where even my fear starts to trust me.