You're Not Doing It Wrong —You're Between Versions of Yourself

A few years ago, I stood in my kitchen at two in the morning eating cold pasta out of a plastic container, staring at a sink full of dishes I couldn't make myself wash.

The overhead light was too bright. The house had that eerie late-night quiet that makes every thought louder. Oz was asleep by the back door, twitching in his dreams.

And I remember thinking: something was wrong with me.

Not dramatic wrong. Not crisis wrong.

Just stuck.

Like everybody else had received instructions for how to move through life and I somehow missed the meeting.

 

I made lists. Bought planners. Listened to every podcast about productivity and healing and purpose I could find. I pulled cards asking the same question over and over in slightly different ways, hoping the universe would finally say something easier to hear.

 

Instead I kept getting The Hanged Man.

 

Pause. Stillness. Perspective.

 

I hated that card.

 

Because when you're exhausted and scared and desperate for movement, stillness feels offensive. You want clarity. You want proof that your life isn't quietly falling apart while everybody else somehow figures theirs out.

 

But after 50 years of reading cards — and a fair number of my own 2am kitchen moments — I've come to understand something that took me a long time to accept:

 

What feels like falling apart is often just the space between identities.

 

And that space is uncomfortable in a way most people aren't prepared for. Because we were taught to measure our worth by movement. Forward movement. Visible movement. Productive movement. If you're not launching something, achieving something, becoming something fast enough — it's easy to assume you're failing.

 

But I don't think that's what's happening.

 

I think a lot of people right now are standing in a doorway between lives. Not fully who they were. Not fully who they're becoming. And it feels lonely there — because the old coping mechanisms don't fit anymore. The old relationships feel strange. Even the things you prayed for can start feeling too small for the version of you that's trying to emerge.

 

That's the part nobody talks about enough: sometimes growth doesn't feel inspiring.

 

Sometimes it feels like grief.

 

The Two of Swords comes up constantly in readings lately. And every single time I see it, I think about how exhausting it is to already know the truth but not feel emotionally ready to accept it.

 

Because most people do know.

 

Underneath all the overthinking and bargaining and searching for one more sign — they know. They know the relationship has changed. They know they've outgrown the job. They know the version of themselves built around survival can't come into the next chapter.

 

But acceptance has its own timeline.

 

And I think we need to stop shaming ourselves for that.

 

There's this pressure — especially online — to heal beautifully. To leave instantly. To transform quickly. But real transformation is usually awkward and messy and deeply unphotogenic.

 

It looks like crying in grocery store parking lots.

Ignoring texts because you don't have the energy to explain yourself.

Sleeping too much. Questioning everything. Feeling disconnected around people you love.

Wondering why your old life suddenly feels like clothes that don't fit right anymore.

 

The Hermit speaks to that kind of season.

 

Not punishment. Not abandonment.

 

Sacred withdrawal. And there's a difference.

 

Isolation says: nobody cares about me.

Intentional solitude says: I need enough quiet to hear myself again.

Those are completely different things.

 

I think a lot of people are being called inward right now because they've spent years outsourcing their truth. Looking for permission. Looking for certainty. Looking for someone else to confirm what their intuition already knows.

 

But intuition is quiet at first. People expect it to feel dramatic — like lightning, like a psychic explosion. Usually it feels more like a tiny ache you keep trying to explain away.

 

A relationship that suddenly makes your body tense.

A job that leaves you exhausted in a soul-level way.

A version of yourself you can no longer tolerate pretending to be.

 

Ignore those whispers long enough, and eventually life gets louder. A lot louder.

 

I learned that the hard way. More than once. There were entire chapters of my life where I knew something was ending long before I admitted it to myself. I stayed because I was afraid of uncertainty. Afraid of grief. Afraid that leaving meant I failed.

 

But eventually the cost of staying became heavier than the fear of change.

 

That's usually when transformation begins. Not when you become fearless. When you become tired enough of betraying yourself.

 

So if things feel slow right now — if your life feels strangely empty, if your path feels unclear, if you feel suspended somewhere between endings and beginnings —

 

That does not mean you're off track.

 

You may just be between versions of yourself.

 

And that in-between space deserves more compassion than shame.

 

Because that's where people become real. Not polished. Not perfect.

 

Real.

 

The old version falls away there. And eventually — quietly, slowly, almost without noticing at first — something truer begins to emerge.

 

Not because you forced it.

 

Because you finally stopped fighting it.

 

You know I love you — I really, really do love you.

 

If this season has been feeling especially heavy, I'm holding space for that. You can book a personal reading or join me live — sometimes just hearing "you're not crazy and you're not alone" changes everything.