Dare You To Move
The Day I Decided to Save Myself
Twelve years ago, my world collapsed. Everything I had built—my career, my support system, my relationship—came crashing down, revealing a life that felt unsustainable at best and utterly inauthentic at worst. It wasn’t just my external world falling apart; the illusion of who I thought I was shattered, leaving me in a state of shock. Grief has a way of freezing us in place, and for a long time, I couldn’t move forward. The weight of it all paralyzed me. How do you rebuild when you don’t even recognize yourself anymore?
It’s taken me 12 years to feel okay with being seen again. To write these words and put them out into the world feels both vulnerable and surreal. I never expected the process of healing to take this long—or to take me to places I could never have imagined.
Back then, in the depths of my paralysis, I had a dream. My Higher Self often speaks to me through song lyrics—fitting, since I love writing them even though I have no idea how to compose music. When Spirit wants my attention, it comes through in words I can’t ignore. In the dream, the lyrics from Switchfoot’s Dare You to Move echoed over and over, lingering in my mind the next day until I finally looked up the full song. Here’s the part that struck me:
Dare You to Move by Switchfoot (excerpt) I dare you to move I dare you to lift yourself up off the floor I dare you to move I dare you to move Like today never happened, Today never happened before Welcome to the fallout Welcome to resistance The tension is here, The tension is here Between who you are and who you could be Between how it is and how it should be Maybe redemption has stories to tell Maybe forgiveness is right where you fell Where can you run to escape from yourself? Where you gonna go? Where you gonna go? Salvation is here.
The power of those words hit me like a tidal wave. I cried—sobbed, really—because I knew the message wasn’t just a suggestion. It was a command. I had to pick myself up off the floor, no matter how broken I felt. At that moment, I believed I had nothing left to give the world. The visual of lying on the floor felt so painfully accurate. And yet, the line “Salvation is here” lodged itself in my heart. If I was going to climb out of this darkness, I had to start by saving myself.
That was over a decade ago. Now, on January 12, 2025, I can say this: the process of picking myself up has been long, messy, and anything but linear. Though I’ve faced more than my share of childhood trauma, this adult collapse tested my psyche in ways I couldn’t have imagined. If I were to diagnose myself, it would be Complex PTSD, the result of a lifetime of accumulated wounds—big and small. Healing has been a slow unraveling of those layers, and becoming my own salvation has been the hardest work of my life.
Today, I can write these words without panicking, without fearing judgment, harassment, or the disingenuous smiles of people secretly wishing for my failure. And if you’re wondering what actually happened back then, I’ll say this: I’m being intentionally vague. The details are complex and would take far too many posts to unpack. But here’s the truth: it doesn’t matter. Who I was doesn’t define who I am becoming.
My process has been anything but conventional. The rigid, checklist-driven approach of my left brain once dominated my life, but I’ve since learned to trust the flow of something bigger. Healing doesn’t happen in a straight line, and the most important lessons often arrive in unexpected ways. Even now, I’m daring myself to move—this time by creating a Substack.
So, what is my intention for this Substack? It’s a space where we can heal together, grow together, and walk this journey as students of the Divine. I’m no different from you—just another human navigating the messy, beautiful path back to my truest self. Here, I’ll share the odd, serendipitous moments that remind me of life’s magic, the rawness of human connection, and the channelings and healings I receive from Spirit for the readers. This is a space for wholeness, authenticity, and moving onward and upward, no matter how bumpy the road.
For me, salvation means rebuilding myself with authenticity—not as a brand, a performance, or a patchwork of societal expectations. It means living in integrity, creating from a place of truth, and taking pride in the way I show up in the world. It means embracing all of me—the messy, the complex, the unapologetically real.
The princess saves herself.