Between Everywhere and Nowhere

Tag: self-discovery

  • The Unbearable Lightness of Uncertainty

    The Unbearable Lightness of Uncertainty

    What would it be like to enter this world with your life already drawn for you, inch by inch?

    Some people seem to be born into a story that has already been written. Long before they can choose anything for themselves, their place in the world is almost outlined for them: what they will become, what they will inherit, what they will be expected to achieve. Perhaps they are handed influence, privilege, or power, but perhaps the greatest privilege of all is the certainty of knowing that they are meant to become something.

    And then there are those who arrive without such a map.

    Have you ever heard of the journey of caretta carettas, or loggerhead sea turtles?

    After an incubation period of approximately sixty days, hatchlings break through their shells using a temporary egg-tooth. There is no one waiting to guide them, no path laid out for them to follow. They emerge by relying on their sensory cues, making their way out of the nest and eventually towards the open ocean, completely on their own.

    Even the timing of their emergence is shaped by uncertainty. During the day, the heat of the sand can act as a thermal inhibitor, keeping them beneath the surface. As the sand cools at night, the change in temperature signals that it is safer to emerge. They do not know what awaits them beyond the nest. They simply respond to what they can sense.

    And perhaps this is where uncertainty begins to look a little different.

    It is easy to think of uncertainty as the absence of something: the absence of a plan, a guarantee, a destination. But what if it is also the space in which we learn to navigate? What if not knowing exactly who we are going to become is not a weakness, but one of the things that keeps possibility alive?

    A caretta caretta does not emerge from the sand knowing what kind of life it will have. It has no promise of safety, no certainty of survival, no one telling it where it belongs. It has, for a moment, little more than its body, its senses, and the sand beneath it.

    And somehow, that is enough to begin.

    I see uncertainty as a form of freedom, honestly. And I only came to see it this way relatively recently.

    I have always been an ambitious person, but my ambition was mostly directed towards academic and educational pursuits. I was raised by overly affectionate parents, under a very peaceful roof, with plenty of everything I could have wanted. And yet there was one thing I always felt I could not get enough of from my parents: an answer to the question, What could I become?

    Whenever I brought up this question, the answer I received was always the same: You can be anything and everything you want, and we will support you.

    When I was younger, this lack of direction drove me crazy. I wanted to be navigated towards something. I wanted a field, a destination, a sign telling me where I belonged. In my mind, I was living in a story in which I was lacking a sense of belonging. I was all alone. I was one of those caretta carettas.

    Now, as a young adult, I am more than grateful for the uncertainty my parents gave me.

    Thanks to this uncertainty, my dreams are still vivid and fluid. I can still be anything and everything, or nothing.

    I realized that this kind of uncertainty serves as fuel: a reason to remain willing to exist, to explore, to change direction, to become someone I have not yet imagined.

    This uncertainty opened up a lifelong journey in which I carry the sweet possibility of wearing any hat—or perhaps never finding a hat that fits me at all. Anything possible or everything impossible. This is not even the issue.

    Sometimes I feel like I am inside an arthouse film whose ending has deliberately been left open.

    And perhaps uncertainty is what makes me wonder: Is that film an absolute expression of me, or am I simply part of a story that was never meant to be carefully plotted? According to whom am I the director? According to whom am I a side character? According to whom am I the starring actress?

    In the hands of uncertainty, I can create a thousand questions and give a thousand different answers. Maybe all of them are correct. Maybe all of them are wrong.

    Maybe that is precisely the point.

    Uncertainty does not simply take certainty away from us. Paradoxically, it makes us more aware of the certainties we already carry.

    For a caretta caretta, there is the shell, its sensory cues, its instinct to move towards the sea. For us, perhaps, there is something less tangible but no less real: our essence, our stance, our will.

    When there is no map, we begin to notice what we already have.

    I see the uncertainties we wish to be certainties as our little fairies, constantly nudging us to find our own path.

    Maybe this is what uncertainty ultimately gives us. Not the certainty of knowing where we are going, but the certainty of knowing that we can navigate. Not a promise of who we will become, but the freedom to discover it. 

    To stop fighting the windmills. To have no idea who you are going to be, while slowly realizing that you already carry everything you need to begin. 

    This is the unbearable lightness of uncertainty.

    Artworks: 1Among the Waves, Ivan Konstantinovich Aivazovsky
    2Azure Grotto. Naples, Ivan Konstantinovich Aivazovsky

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  • I Used My Natal Chart…

    I Used My Natal Chart…

    …To Better Understand My Life Path

    I think anything and everything can be a means of understanding our minds, our lives, the dynamics surrounding us, and so on.

    As I mentioned before, I have been interested in astrology for some time now. Honestly, I do not take astrology as fortune-telling or a way of predicting the future. I rather see it as a way of attributing some meaning retrospectively — a different lens through which I can look at my own life.

    In order to better understand what my existence might mean to me, I decided to take my natal chart into account. Of course, none of this is science-backed or concrete. Still, there is something fascinating — even a little fluttering — about the thought that the universe, the planets, and their mathematical relationships might have left some kind of imprint at the very moment you started breathing in this world.

    It may mean something. Or it may mean nothing.

    But I find it interesting to look at it anyway.

    Honestly, my natal chart seems to have received quite a generous share of oppositions and squares — the so-called challenging aspects — rather than conjunctions, trines, and sextiles, which are generally considered more harmonious. It is often said that having more harmonious aspects may indicate that life flows more easily.

    Apparently, I was not given the smoothest possible version of the tutorial.

    Sun Square Saturn

    This is one of the most prominent aspects of my natal chart.

    While the Sun represents core identity, self-expression, authority, and, traditionally, the father, Saturn is associated with restrictions, delays, responsibility, maturity, and limitations. When they form a square, no wonder it is considered a difficult aspect.

    I have even come across a few places saying something along the lines of, “We feel very sorry when we see this aspect in a woman’s chart.” One can easily be convinced that this aspect means lower self-esteem, hardships in life, delays in self-realization, problems with authority, even difficulties involving one’s father, and so on.

    But I think there is something easily underestimated here.

    If you were born under this aspect, and if Sun Square Saturn is one of the main themes of your life, then never forget that you are a Sun Square Saturn, too.

    You develop endurance because your life requires it. You become patient because things take time. You learn to think strategically because not everything can be forced.

    And once you realize and accept that this is simply one of the ways your life tends to unfold, you stop spending so much energy asking, “Why me?”. Instead, you start moving forward consciously, knowing what you are dealing with.

    Here is the perk of a difficult aspect: not an easy life, but a stronger self. And a stronger self knows how to appreciate what it has achieved.

    You know how much effort, patience, and intention went into it. You appreciate it more consciously and more maturely, because you know exactly what it took to get there.

    And what you build may stay with you longer, simply because you were an active and conscious part of building it.

    Moon Opposition Mercury-Jupiter-Uranus-Neptune

    My Cancer Moon forms oppositions to all of the planets I mentioned above in Capricorn, with the exception of my Aquarius Uranus.

    This opposition is also considered one of the more challenging configurations, as it creates a tension between the Cancer-Capricorn axis.

    According to astrology, my life would always be somewhat of a rollercoaster between my emotional and material needs.

    And honestly, my emotional side can be in turbulence almost all the time.

    Yet, I am still grateful for the tension this aspect represents.

    First of all, I know and respect my feelings.

    I know how my body and mind tend to react to a certain feeling. I have learned to recognize my emotional surges. I am learning when to simply feel and when to step back and think.

    I have learned to get to know both my mind and my emotional side because of this turbulence.

    Maybe Saturn saved me with its trine in this case. Who knows?

    The more I read about astrology and think about life paths, the more I realize that perhaps everything we go through can somehow navigate us towards what we are supposed to do.

    From an astrological perspective, the North Node is said to give us clues about our journey in this lifetime.

    North Node in Libra in the 5th House

    The more I looked into my chart, the more I became interested in the idea of the North Node.

    Mine is in Libra, a sign associated with harmony, diplomacy, justice, partnership, and balance. It is also in the 5th house, traditionally associated with pleasure, joy, creativity, art, self-expression, and the things we do simply because they make us feel alive.

    So perhaps all the turbulence I mentioned above is also leading me somewhere very different from where I might instinctively go.

    Perhaps I am meant to learn to express myself without putting pressure on myself to be flawless.

    To deliberately choose the lightness of life. To enjoy art and music.

    To spend time with people and build meaningful bonds. To allow myself to experience pleasure without feeling that I first have to earn it.

    And maybe, most importantly, to understand that life does not always have to be a problem that needs solving.

    But what did my chart give me to work with in order to get there, apart from all the rollercoaster rides?

    Jupiter Conjunction Mercury & My Gemini Ascendant

    When I retrospectively analyze my natal chart, I like to think that this aspect points towards one small corner of the direction suggested by my North Node.

    Jupiter conjunct Mercury is said to be associated with an interest in writing, a love of learning, curiosity, broad thinking, problem-solving, and many other things that I happen to enjoy.

    My Gemini Ascendant seems to reinforce the same theme. Gemini is associated with curiosity, communication, collecting information, making connections between ideas, and, naturally, words.

    So maybe the universe did not necessarily want me to have an easy life.

    Maybe it wanted me to exist among all the crises while feeding my brain, trying to understand who I truly am, and sharing what I think — even if what I think is not exactly rocket science.

    Perhaps this is why writing feels less like a separate activity and more like one of the ways I make sense of all of it.

    And Apparently, I Have the Potential to Be an Alchemist

    There is another interpretation of my chart that I find particularly amusing.

    When the aspects in my chart are interpreted as a whole, I am said to have the potential of an alchemist — someone who can transform difficulties into something meaningful, turning the heavier experiences of life into something valuable.

    I have to admit; I am not quite there yet. I am still in the phase of turning my life experiences into panic attacks rather than alchemy.

    Apparently, I still have some work to do.

    I am still learning how to navigate my difficult moments. I am still figuring out what certain experiences are trying to teach me, and sometimes I am simply trying to get through them.

    Maybe that is also part of the process.

    Perhaps we do not always have to become as impressive as our supposed potential suggests.

    Maybe not being the “alchemist”, our chart promises us to be just yet is also a way of flowing with life.

    Maybe we are allowed to be ordinary while becoming who we are supposed to become.

    Maybe This Is What the Chart Is For

    Life — or simply the dynamics around us — makes us face a lot of challenges.

    I do not think squares and oppositions have to be interpreted as punishments, just as I do not think trines and sextiles are guarantees of an easy life.

    Perhaps they can simply be ways of looking at the things we repeatedly encounter in ourselves.

    The point, for me, is not whether my natal chart actually predicted my life. It probably did not.

    The point is that looking at it made me notice things I had already experienced but had never put into words.

    It made me look at my difficulties from a little distance.

    It made me think about what they have taught me, what they have taken from me, and, perhaps more importantly, what they have given me.

    Perhaps, in this lifetime, we are meant to learn when to be selective like Saturn — to practice Schopenhauer’s hedgehog dilemma, finding a distance where we are close enough to form a warm circle, but far enough not to reach each other’s spines. Perhaps Saturn’s rings remind us that stability does not always mean keeping the world away, but having enough gravity to decide what becomes part of our orbit.

    Perhaps we are meant to become aware of our power like the Sun — of the fact that the same force that nourishes can also burn — and learn to shape that power through our will and reason.

    Perhaps we are meant to learn from the Moon that nurturing does not mean having no boundaries. That we can care deeply for others while still protecting the parts of ourselves that need protection.

    Perhaps we are meant to become mature enough, like Jupiter, to decide what deserves to grow.

    Because not everything we encounter needs to be expanded.

    Not every thought needs more attention, not every desire needs to become a pursuit, and not every possibility needs to become a reality.

    Maybe that is what all these symbols are ultimately pointing towards: not becoming someone who has mastered every aspect of life, but becoming someone who knows what to do with what the flow has given them.

    Maybe we are not meant to get rid of all those sharp corners in our charts, but to smooth them out until we create our own version of a harmonious flow.

    Maybe we are meant to look at our squares and oppositions as aesthetic objects, move through them, and use them as portals to a more mature version of ourselves.

    Or maybe we are simply meant to find our conjunctions and sextiles without constantly bumping into the corners of our squares and bruising ourselves along the way.

    Maybe we are allowed to decide what it all means.

    Maybe what we want is exactly what is supposed to happen.

    Or maybe even thinking that way is part of the plan.

    Who knows?

    Note: If you are interested in the symbolic and romantic meanings attached to the planets, you might also want to listen to Gustav Holst’s The Planets. It is a completely different way of imagining the planets. Another way of hearing the harmony in all of this.

    Artwork: Vid insjön. Motiv från Balingsta, Oscar Björck

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  • All It Takes Is a Piece of Art

    All It Takes Is a Piece of Art

    I have come across La Grenouillère by Pierre-Auguste Renoir many times before. Recently, I found myself returning to it once again.

    Every time I encounter it, a different detail seems to call for my attention. Yet each encounter reveals something even more interesting: I am no longer the same person who stood before it the last time.

    The painting itself has never changed. I have.

    Sometimes, all it takes is a piece of art.

    But then again, what is a piece of art, anyway?

    Is it a classical painting hanging in a museum? A musical composition? A novel? A flower you planted in your garden? A journal filled with your own thoughts? Or perhaps even a phonk track that unexpectedly speaks to you on an ordinary afternoon?

    Maybe art is simply whatever awakens something within you.

    Whatever makes you pause for a moment, fuels your energy for the day, or quietly catches your attention and asks you to look a little closer.

    I often think that art reveals itself in far more places than we usually allow it to. Why did that particular song catch your ear? Why does that brand appeal to your taste? Why did you choose that print for your wall instead of countless others? What made you plant that particular flower?

    Those choices may seem insignificant, but they are rarely random.

    And perhaps spending time with our tastes is one of the simplest ways to get to know ourselves. Not because our preferences define us completely, but because they leave small clues behind. They reveal what draws us in, what comforts us, what we long for, and what we instinctively notice before anything else.

    In the rush of everyday life, many of these choices become automatic. We consume, choose, scroll, decorate, listen, and move on without ever asking ourselves why.

    But what if we did ask?

    What if we paid a little more attention to the things that consistently catch our eye?

    For me, looking at La Grenouillère this time felt strangely similar to opening an old journal and realizing how quietly my identity has evolved over the years.

    The first time I truly paid attention to the painting, my eyes were drawn to the crowd. I could almost hear the conversations, the movement on the bridge, the liveliness—perhaps even an unrefined rush—of people making their way home.

    This time, however, I noticed something entirely different.

    I heard the gentle movement of the water. I noticed the small boats floating peacefully.

    Instead of the noise of the crowd, I imagined the quiet humming that might have existed within each person. I could almost smell the mossy air surrounding the river. Rather than focusing on the people themselves, I found myself absorbed by the serenity holding the entire scene together.

    The painting had not changed. The story I found within it had.

    Whenever I read analyses of La Grenouillère, they often describe something entirely different from what it awakens in me. And perhaps that is exactly the point.

    I am less interested in discovering what Renoir intended than in understanding what the painting reveals about me.

    Art, to me, has never been about finding the correct interpretation. It is about witnessing the quiet dialogue between the artwork and the person standing before it.

    And this may be why some forms of art feel distant or even cold to us. Not because they lack meaning, but because they are speaking a language that is not ours. They still move someone, inspire someone, or reveal something to someone. They simply may not be speaking to us—or at least not to the version of us standing before them today.

    And this may be where many people lose their connection with art. We often assume that art must look a certain way, belong in certain places, or require a particular kind of knowledge to be appreciated. But art does not have to hang in a museum to be art.

    The issue may not be that we do not understand art. Perhaps we simply have not yet discovered the forms of it that speak to us.

    Nowadays, we constantly feel the urge to produce, to be seen, to improve ourselves, to turn every experience into something useful. We often approach the world expecting every book, conversation, trip, or hobby to teach us something immediately.

    But how often do we simply allow ourselves to experience something?

    To pause. To notice. To absorb.

    To let something exist for the simple experience of being present, of feeling alive, of meeting ourselves where we are.

    Perhaps that is why paying attention to what we call art matters. Not because art will tell us who we are, but because it often shows us where our attention naturally goes.

    Perhaps that is why art keeps finding us.

    Not because it changes. But because we do.

    To relax, to realize, to pause, to awaken our senses, to quiet the talkative fairies in our heads, to meet ourselves—sometimes, all it takes is a piece of art.

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  • What I Read, What I Become

    What I Read, What I Become

    How do you choose a book? How do you see it?

    Or perhaps a better question is this: what makes something worthy of becoming a book in the first place? Is it the story, the ideas, the language, or simply the possibility that someone else’s mind might resonate with ours?

    I have come to believe that the books we choose reveal where we stand at a particular stage of our lives.

    Most of the time, I gravitate towards books that challenge me—books that introduce unfamiliar ways of thinking and quietly stretch the limits of my understanding. Yet there are periods when I feel isolated, when I crave belonging more than intellectual stimulation. During those times, I find myself reaching for books that everyone else seems to be reading. Not because they are necessarily better, but because reading them allows me to participate in a shared conversation. Even a brief conversation in front of a bookshelf can satisfy that deeply human desire to belong, if only for a little while, to the same imagined world.

    Which brings me to another question.

    How should one read a book?

    I have taken courses on reading and literary analysis. I have written academic papers and learned countless methods for approaching a text. They all have their value. However, perhaps I had become a little spoiled by knowing those rules that I eventually felt the need to place them quietly in the background. I wanted to discover my own way of reading rather than constantly measuring myself against established criteria.

    During the years when I was choosing my university major, several people encouraged me to study literature instead of translation studies. I always found myself resisting that advice. It was never because I lacked respect for literature—quite the opposite. I was simply more fascinated by the destination than by the journey. I was interested in the work that finally emerged rather than in every step that had led the writer there.

    What fascinated me was never how a book came into existence, but what happened after it reached the reader. Because from that moment on, the journey no longer belonged solely to the writer. It belonged to me.

    Reading became a way of observing not only the book, but also myself. The books I returned to, the ideas I resisted, the characters I admired or quietly disagreed with—all of them became subtle ways of understanding who I was becoming. Books have always felt like some of the safest companions in that process.

    This approach may be wrong. It may be right. Or it may even be disrespectful.

    Or it may even be exactly what many writers secretly hope for.

    I have never read a book primarily to study its author. I read it for the universe it opens before me and for the candle it manages to light somewhere in my mind. Only after wandering through that universe that I begin to wonder about the person who created it—not the other way around. I have always enjoyed the ultimate stance of “art for people’s sake”.

    Reading, for me, has never been passive. Every book eventually becomes a conversation.

    Sometimes I imagine a different setting that feels more convincing to me. Sometimes I reshape the characters’ appearances according to my own imagination. If a detail is essential to the story, I do not erase it; I simply let my imagination bend around it until it finds room for both the author’s intention and my own.

    Is that a betrayal of the book? Or is that precisely what literature is meant to awaken?

    When we stand before a bookshelf, what are we really choosing?

    Another culture or the comfort of our own?

    A challenge to our assumptions or the reassurance of familiar expectations?

    Do we read to learn, to escape, to belong, to witness another life, or simply to rest inside a quieter universe for a while?

    Do we choose books in their original language because we want to hear the author’s own voice? Or do we look first at the translator or the publishing house because we trust the way they carry one world into another?

    Most of us probably never stop to ask ourselves these questions. Our choices often feel instinctive. Yet perhaps those instincts are far from random.

    Perhaps what happens in our minds when we reach for a book reveals more about us than we realize.

    Like a detective studying scattered clues, what if we examined our reading habits with the same curiosity? Could our reading habits become a mirror?

    Reading has never felt like a manual to me. It has always felt like an expedition. And I have come to believe that, on this journey, the only reliable guide is the reader themselves.

    You may lose yourself between the lines. You may feel distant from an idea. You may not understand every word. You may read with your imagination more than with your eyes. You may become frustrated, delighted, or find yourself unable to decide what to think at all.

    None of these are signs that you are reading incorrectly.

    They are signs that, somewhere along the way, the book has begun to touch something uniquely yours.

    Perhaps that is what “how to read a book” has always meant to me.

    Not finding the most efficient method. Not reading according to academic expectations.

    Not proving how intellectually capable we are. But discovering what kind of reader we naturally become.

    The way we read is rarely accidental. It reflects not only who we are, but sometimes who we long to become. The worlds we repeatedly return to may be the ones we quietly seek in our own lives. The stories that comfort us may reveal the shelter we need. Even the books we cannot bring ourselves to finish may tell us something about ourselves. Sometimes, a book simply becomes a temporary refuge in a universe we may never inhabit beyond the page.

    The books that stay with us are rarely the ones we have read “correctly.” They are the ones that reveal something about ourselves—what captures our attention, what unsettles us, what sparks our imagination, and what quietly lights another candle in our minds.

    Knowing how you read a book, in the end, is another way of knowing who you are—or perhaps who you are becoming.

    Because reading has never been merely about understanding books.

    It is about slowly, quietly, and honestly learning to understand ourselves through them.

    Artwork: A Girl in a Pink Dress Reading, Wenzel Tornøe

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  • Maybe We Were Meant to Be Strangers

    Maybe We Were Meant to Be Strangers

    Sometimes all it takes is a single word.

    Not a conversation. Not a life-changing event. Just a word that catches your eye and quietly settles somewhere in your mind.

    That was exactly what happened when I first saw the cover of Strangers by Belle Burden.

    The word stayed with me for days.

    Strangers.

    Such a simple word, yet deeply unsettling.

    It made me think about relationships—not only romantic ones, but all the meaningful connections we build throughout our lives.

    Love and relationships have long inspired art, literature, philosophy, and no small amount of emotional turmoil—along with more than a few conversations in therapists’ offices. We talk endlessly about butterflies in our stomachs, the lightness of happiness, the feeling of trust, the excitement of discovering another human being, and the comfort of feeling understood.

    But what exists on the other side of the coin?

    What causes the deepest disappointment? What prevents some people from fully embracing romance, even when they long for it?

    I sometimes think it is the fear of becoming strangers one day.

    Not heartbreak itself. Not rejection.

    But the possibility that someone who once knew your thoughts, habits, fears, dreams, and vulnerabilities may eventually become someone you no longer know at all.

    No one enters a relationship expecting it to end.

    No one gets married planning for divorce.

    No one opens their heart hoping to close it again someday.

    Yet there is something curious about the way we approach relationships. We acknowledge that life is finite, but we often struggle to accept that relationships are finite too.

    Being alive is the clearest reminder that everything we experience is temporary. Relationships are not exempt from that reality.

    Perhaps this is where idealization enters the story.

    When we fall in love, we rarely see reality alone. We see possibilities, projections, expectations, and stories we have already written in our minds. Sometimes we idealize the other person. Sometimes we idealize ourselves. We create a scenario and unconsciously expect reality to follow the script.

    Maybe this is why we often imagine ourselves living in a romantic Hollywood film.

    We envision meaningful conversations, grand gestures, lifelong companionship, and a happy ending patiently waiting at the end of the story.

    Then one day, we find ourselves in a desperate Russian novel, wondering where all the romance went.

    How do we end up there?

    Often, it is not the relationship itself that takes us there, but the gap between reality and our idealization of it.

    The more attached we become to the fantasy, the more disappointed we feel when reality introduces itself.

    At some point, we may find ourselves chasing the ghost of our own idealization rather than getting to know the person as they truly are.

    Maybe the problem is not that relationships end, but that we expect them to fulfill a story we have already written in our minds.

    Perhaps we need to learn how to recognize the ghost of our own idealization before we mistake it for reality.

    Perhaps the hardest part of recognizing our idealizations is admitting that they rarely begin with other people.

    For a long time, I believed that if someone crossed my path, there had to be something extraordinary about them. I placed people on pedestals they had never asked to stand on and expected them to live up to a potential that often existed only in my imagination.

    What I failed to realize was that I treated myself the same way.

    I had become a demanding and unforgiving partner to myself—a quiet dictator of my own expectations.

    I expected constant growth, certainty, and purpose. I mapped out a route for my life and assumed that the people who entered it would naturally fit the story I had written.

    But neither they nor I were meant to be extraordinary all the time.

    Perhaps one of the most humbling lessons of adulthood is accepting our own ordinariness—not as a limitation, but as a shared human experience.

    Because when we allow ourselves to be imperfect, we become more capable of seeing others as they truly are: not as potential, not as projections, but as people.

    Sometimes, the headache is not the relationship itself.

    Sometimes, it is the impossible expectations we place on ourselves—and, inevitably, on others.

    And once we let go of those expectations, a different question emerges.

    I remember a friend once saying to me, “For just one day, let’s not learn anything. Let’s not split the atom. Let’s simply stare at the wall for a while.”

    Then they asked me a question that stayed with me long after the conversation ended:

    “Why is that so difficult for you?”

    At the time, I did not have an answer.

    I had become so focused on growth, progress, and meaning that I had forgotten something simple: not every moment needs to become insight, and not every experience needs to turn into a lesson.

    Sometimes, a single sentence is enough.

    Sometimes, people arrive not to redirect the entire course of our lives, but simply to remind us to stop resisting its flow.

    For so long, I tried to plan the speed and direction of every wave.

    What I needed to learn instead was how to stop fighting the current.

    As I grow older, I find myself thinking less about whether relationships last forever and more about why people enter each other’s lives in the first place.

    I believe that everyone crosses paths with us for a reason.

    Some people help us heal.

    Some challenge us.

    Some expose our insecurities.

    Some teach us trust.

    Others teach us boundaries.

    Some remind us of our strengths.

    And some arrive only to teach us how to say goodbye.

    One way or another, I believe that people encounter each other to heal, challenge, polish, or discover parts of themselves that might otherwise remain hidden.

    Perhaps this is why I no longer see every relationship through the lens of permanence.

    Not every meaningful relationship is meant to end with “happily ever after.”

    Some relationships are meant to end.

    Some are meant to transform.

    Some are meant to leave us with a lesson we could not have learned otherwise.

    A relationship does not have to last forever to be meaningful. It does not have to resemble a fairy tale—or a fairy tale gone wrong.

    Perhaps it simply unfolds the way it was meant to for that particular chapter of our lives.

    Or perhaps it was never about the fairy tale at all.

    Perhaps it was about who we became because of it.

    Healing sometimes comes after learning to let go. Life is not linear, and neither are relationships.

    There are seasons of closeness and distance, certainty and confusion, connection and separation.

    Some relationships end because they were never meant to continue. Others end because they have already fulfilled their purpose.

    This may sound uncomfortable, but I do not believe that a relationship ending in separation automatically makes it a failure.

    Likewise, a relationship ending in marriage does not automatically make it a success.

    Success is not always staying.

    Sometimes success is learning.

    Sometimes success is growing.

    Sometimes success is accepting what is beyond our control.

    A relationship can leave two people wiser, more self-aware, and more compassionate than they were before. If that happens, was it truly a failure?

    I do not think so.

    There is another thought that often comes to my mind.

    None of us is truly irreplaceable.

    At first glance, this may sound cold.

    But I do not mean that people are disposable or insignificant.

    What I mean is that love loses much of its meaning the moment it becomes a necessity rather than a choice.

    If two people stay together only because they have no alternative, there is little beauty in that.

    What gives a relationship value is choice.

    Every day, among countless possibilities, two people continue choosing one another.

    Not because they must. Not because they are trapped. Not because they cannot survive alone.

    But because they believe that learning, growing, healing, laughing, struggling, and experiencing life together is a journey worth sharing.

    Perhaps love is not about finding someone who can never be replaced.

    Perhaps it is about choosing each other again and again—not because life conveniently carries you in the same direction, but because despite the unexpected turns, changing circumstances, disappointments, and transformations that life inevitably brings, you still find meaning in walking together.

    After all, neither of you will remain exactly who you are today.

    And perhaps this is also why becoming strangers is not the tragedy we often imagine it to be.

    Becoming strangers does not erase what once existed.

    It does not erase the conversations, the growth, the lessons, the memories, or the version of yourself that emerged because that person was once part of your life.

    Some people stay. Some leave. Some become strangers.

    But all of them contribute something to the story of who we become.

    So, if there is anything I have learned, it is this:

    Do not be too hard on yourself.

    Allow yourself to feel happiness, anger, disappointment, gratitude, regret, hope, and heartbreak when they come.

    Digest the experience rather than rushing to label it a success or a failure.

    Get to know yourself before trying to understand someone else.

    Learn what kind of people you attract, what kind of people you are attracted to, and what patterns keep repeating themselves throughout your life.

    There are answers hidden inside those patterns.

    And whenever possible, look through the lens of healthy realism rather than idealization.

    Because in the end, life is not a collection of permanent possessions.

    It is a collection of experiences.

    And relationships, regardless of how long they last, remain some of the most meaningful experiences we will ever have.

    Perhaps that is why I no longer see them as successes or failures.

    Only experiences.

    Some shorter.

    Some longer.

    All meaningful in their own way.

    Perhaps that is enough.

    Artwork: At the Mirror, Gerda Wegener

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