The Cost of Becoming: One Year Later

Today marks one year since I made one of the most important decisions of my life — July 6, 2026

I decided to face my shadows, integrate the parts of myself I had spent years avoiding, and intentionally start rebuilding the way I lived.

It's kind of funny that one year later, I'm writing this from one of my favourite places—a quiet beach shack somewhere in Queensland.

There is no electricity here. Phone reception comes and goes. I've been away from social media for a week. There isn't much of the usual noise that comes with everyday life.

It's mostly the ocean, the wind through the trees, long stretches of silence, and quality time with myself and my relatives.

It's a disconnect from the external world, but somehow, a reconnection with my inner one.

There is something wholesome about being here.

I finally get to read 1984 by George Orwell, which I've been wanting to read for a while now. Although, to be fair, it's also one of those books that requires undivided attention and some serious cognitive effort LOL.

My days are pretty simple.

I fish. I journal. I reflect. I work. I swim. I play with my nephews. We go boating. I drive the tinnie. I soak in the sun and get my tan.

I take morning winter walks with Duke, go on afternoon sunset walks with my nephews, and occasionally swim in 14-degree water—which is less "peaceful retreat" and more "why am I doing this to myself?"

At night, we go crab hunting under a ridiculous amount of stars, carrying nothing but torches.

I am genuinely happy here.

And grateful.

As I sit here thinking about the past year, I realise how fitting it is that I'm spending this anniversary in a place like this.

The quiet around me reminds me of the kind of quiet I had to intentionally create in my life last year.

Because growth rarely begins in noise. Sometimes, it starts when everything gets quiet enough for you to finally hear yourself.

Last year I Had to Disappear

This was the phase when I discovered shadow work and began learning about Carl Jung's work

Last year, I ditched almost everyone and entered what I jokingly call my ghosting era. I deactivated my social media for 56 days. And yes, I told people it had been banned for some reason. Yes, I lied LOL. I just didn't want anyone convincing me to come back online. For almost two months, my world became very small. It was mostly work, my dogs, my routines, my notebook—and me. I wasn't socialising. I stopped going out. I wasn't trying to keep up with what everyone else was doing. It wasn't because I suddenly stopped caring about people. It was deliberate. I needed to remove enough external noise to hear what was actually happening internally.

Every morning, I would wake up around 5 AM and sit in silence with a notebook, a pen, and myself. And I started asking questions. A lot of questions. Why do I do the things I do, especially the things that don't serve me? Why do certain patterns keep becoming my patterns? Why do certain things trigger me? Why do I respond the way I respond, and why am I so reactive? Why did I experience certain things? What parts of those experiences still live in me? Am I limited by what I've experienced before? Is that it? How can I actually avoid putting myself in that position all over again? How do I bridge the gap between where I am and where I want to be? And probably the question that kept coming back: What is actually happening underneath all of this? I wanted to understand myself beyond the surface. I became curious about the psychological, social, neurological and cultural influences behind my behaviours. Not so I could excuse them, but so I could understand them well enough to make different choices. I didn't want to simply say, "That's just how I am." I wanted to know why I was that way, and whether I could actually change it. That curiosity became a huge part of my transformation.

The Uncomfortable Part

Those mornings weren't peaceful in the way people usually imagine solitude to be. They were uncomfortable. Sometimes, they genuinely scared me because I literally had to sit there with myself in silence. When you deliberately remove enough distractions, there isn't really anywhere else to look. Eventually, you have to look at yourself. And I had to face a lot—shame, fear, guilt, embarrassment, regret, anger, pain, confusion, resentment. The parts of myself I didn't particularly like and the things I wished had happened differently.

I started questioning all the things I had been avoiding. Why am I avoiding these? I was thinking a lot about the things that were completely outside my control and asking myself, why am I forcing outcomes that are not within my control? And, perhaps even harder, I had to look at the things that were actually within my control. There were moments when I felt incredibly small. Moments when I felt ashamed of myself—by myself. Moments when I wanted to stop looking.

But I kept looking. I kept asking, I kept writing, and I kept answering from my raw truth. Slowly, something started to change. I wasn't necessarily becoming a different person yet, but I started to recognise that I was becoming more honest about the person I already was. And that distinction mattered.

Three Days of Going Even Deeper

At that point, I spent three days on a liquid fast while continuing the same practice. I would wake before dawn, sit in silence, journal and pray, and go back to the notebook. I started taking particular experiences and tracing them backwards. What happened? Why did that happen? Why did it trigger me? Why did I experience those? What did I feel? What did I do? What did that behaviour cost me? And if something similar happened again and put me into a situation that is not within my control, what are the steps am I taking to respond to that? I wasn't just writing about what happened. I was trying to understand the sequence and the patterns, especially the actions that I’d normally make. I wanted to see the connection between the experience, what I made it mean, how I felt, and what I eventually did. And then I started writing down the response I wanted to practice instead. I was very objective and honest with myself, I had to. Because I thought, wtf would be the point of this anyway?

Those were some of the most intense days of my life. There were moments when I felt incredibly clear, physically weak, wanted to break the fast, and wanted to give up on the whole process. But I had made a commitment to myself because it felt like a pact. I wanted to know what would happen if, for once, I followed through on something I had committed to myself even when it became uncomfortable. I filled almost an entire notebook. Page after page of questions. Page after page of answers. And in between the journaling, I was praying—asking for clarity, understanding, strength, and the wisdom to be honest with myself. Not answers I thought other people would approve of. Just answers that were honest. And honestly, that was uncomfortable. But one of the most liberating experiences I had in my life.

The First Taste of Sovereignty

Something happened during that process that I didn't fully understand at the time. I started to feel a sense of sovereignty over myself. Not because I had suddenly mastered myself—I hadn't—but because I had stopped running from myself. I could look at the parts of me I had avoided and say, "You are part of me." I didn't have to like every part, justify every reaction, or keep being the person I had been. I could simply acknowledge what was there, understand it, learn from it, and decide what I wanted to carry forward. That was a revelation for me.

For a long time, I thought change meant becoming someone different. But I started to realise that some forms of transformation require you to become more familiar with yourself first—to face the parts you've rejected, understand where they came from, recognise how they shaped you, and eventually decide what you want to do with them. That was the beginning. Not the moment I became "better" or figured everything out, but the moment I stopped abandoning myself whenever I encountered something uncomfortable.

One Year Later

Looking back, those quiet mornings were the beginning of something much bigger than a new routine. They changed my relationship with myself, and eventually, the way I think, make decisions, and live. A year later, I'm sitting in another place without electricity, with limited reception, surrounded by nature and family. But this time, I'm not here because I need to disappear. I've simply learned to appreciate the quiet. Last year, I needed solitude to hear myself. Today, I can be in the world without feeling the same need to escape from it. Maybe that's one of the clearest signs of how much has changed. I'm deeply grateful for the person who had the courage to begin this journey. She didn't know exactly where it would lead. She simply knew that the way she had been living was no longer enough. So she chose to face herself. And maybe the goal was never to become someone else, but to finally become more fully myself.

If you made it until here, thank you for your time and patience reading this.

This is just the one out of seven part of this series I am writing :)

-Vanesa

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