The Relief of Not Fixing Yourself

This is me, witnessing Yayoi Kusama exhibit

This year is wrapping up and slowing down, but I'm not. Actually, I am doing the opposite. My calendar is full. The book launch is revving up, and I am creating more content than ever.

But internally, things have changed.

For a long time, I treated my own healing like a renovation project. Identify the problem. Analyze the root cause. Apply the framework. Fix it. Move on. I had spreadsheets for my trauma. (Okay, not literally. But spiritually? Absolutely.)

I thought that if I could just therapize the pain enough, it would finally leave me alone. I thought healing meant eviction. But recently, I hit a wall. All the strategies and "inner work" started to feel like I was just renovating the same room over and over, convinced that this time, the new paint color would finally make me whole.

Then, one afternoon, I was on my couch, doing nothing in particular. And that familiar ache showed up, the fear of abandonment. You will be left. You are too much and not enough. People will leave you.

Usually, when this part of me surfaces, I spring into action. I pull out my tools. I try to patch it up, make it "healthy," transform it into a lesson or a piece of content. (The hustle never stops, even in my own psyche.)

This time, I just... didn't.

I looked at that pain, and for the first time, I didn't see a broken thing that needed to be exorcised. I saw a kid. A version of me who got hurt and never stopped bracing for the next blow.

She didn't need a lecture on attachment theory or to be optimized. She just needed someone to sit with her.

So I did. I offered presence instead of a solution. I stopped trying to fix the crack in the foundation and just sat down next to the girl who had been living in a house that always felt like it was about to collapse.

And in that moment of doing absolutely nothing productive, a massive weight lifted off my chest.

The relief was physical. It was tremendous.

For that part of me, presence was just a more powerful medicine than performance. I had a very clear realization that the wound didn't need to be closed. It just needs a witness.

I'm not saying I've arrived anywhere. I still have my spreadsheets. I still catch myself mid-renovation, paintbrush in hand, ready to "fix" something that was never asking to be fixed.

But now, sometimes, I put the brush down. I sit in the mess. I let the room stay unfinished.

It feels like giving up. It also feels like the first honest thing I've done in years.

If this landed somewhere, I'd love to know. You can reply to this post or find me on Instagram @masharusanov.