Homecoming: Learning to Always Return to Myself
Learning to stay open to connection because I know I'll always come back to myself
Rediscovering my forgotten home
As my lips touched the cup of coffee, our eyes met — his stare as invigorating as the roasted aroma. What was he brewing underneath that ever-so playful smile? The afternoon was an eclectic blend of endless laughter, witty banter, and insatiable curiosity, as if we were two people caffeinated off each other’s energy.
Whether moments like these were as warm as my heart or as cold as his empty cup of coffee, I’ll never know. He won’t return for that piece of himself he left behind in my inner home, like a forgotten button off his cardigan that I carried with me like trinkets on my shelves.
As I closed my eyes, this connection evaporated like steam, but his presence remained like a coffee stain. He reminded me of what it was like to be carefree again, without the pressure of caretaking in a relationship.
After years of tending to other people’s homes, I felt as if it had been years since someone had opened the tattered curtains in my own. He was the sunlight slipping past silky cobwebs and through cloudy windows veiled by years of dust — reminders of how suffocated I felt from carrying the emotional and financial weight of my last relationship. He was the warm summer wind, a gust of ideas and curious questions that rattled the wooden doors, waiting for someone who could match my intellect.
When had my mind, my forgotten shelter, become so abandoned?
I was in an endless drought, pouring all of myself into what I thought was a shared garden. I hoped our love would flourish from every drop of money, emotional effort, and time I gave. Instead, I shriveled. I withered from showering my ex with the love and support I wished I had growing up.
But my care was like a flash flood, overwhelming to receive and destructive in self-sacrifice. The shared garden we had once built together was washed away.
My homecoming
As I let the acceptance of my and my ex’s incompatibilities rush over me, the memories of my last relationship flashed and faded. Our love had once shone brightly like electrifying lightning illuminating the midnight sky. I shut the door behind me, closing my heart to the one I once loved. Bloodied and blistered, I stumbled on the journey back to myself. This was my homecoming.
As I returned home, I didn’t rush to heal my wounds in the ways others expected. I discovered roses and their thorns in my garden. I grew in ways I’d never imagined, like learning about my sexuality. I bled from digging deep, unearthing the roots of why I’d always abandon myself to save others, the way I’d longed to be saved as a child. I bled from criticism for exploring in unconventional ways soon after leaving my relationship.
But my skin thickened as I learned to accept myself for who I am — someone with an open and intuitive soul who thrives off new experiences, connection, learning, and reflection. And so I let myself grow wildly like the ivy around me. I bloomed as I became myself again.
Here I was — breathing the newfound freedom of being single, with two loving cats in my one-bedroom apartment in New York City, an emotionally fulfilling career, and supportive communities scattered across the country.
Each connection left behind fragments of itself, just like that cardigan button. My past is a collection of sparkling trinkets frozen in time, each one representing a lesson learned. Some are nearly broken beyond repair — delicate, yet full of wisdom. Though people come and go, these treasures show me what’s possible. I cherish the moments of laughter, joy, pain, and everything in between. Even when I venture beyond home, I know I’ll always find my way back, bringing new souvenirs with me.
Exploring beyond home
Little did I know that one of those future connections would challenge everything I thought I understood about maintaining my independence while falling for someone.
As I stumbled upon a late-night cafe, jet-lagged from my cross-country flight to San Francisco, I was as dead as my laptop battery until an unexpected connection plugged into my life through a shared electrical outlet. “Are you also a product designer?” he asked, pointing at my laptop.
The spark between us was so electric that he flew to New York City to visit me a few weeks later. What pulled me in like an unwavering current wasn’t just his sharp jawline, sea-green eyes, and tousled hair, but the way he’d debate AI ethics with me before spontaneously kissing me against subway walls. In a single hour, he could captivate me with a charming wink and philosophical perspectives on war, religion, and morality. He fulfilled my need for intellectual and physical chemistry, which I had been missing in past relationships.
But that level of intimacy also awakened something else — my anxiety around craving yet fearing closeness.
As my feelings for him deepened, so did my recurring fear of not being enough. I found myself simultaneously pushing him away to protect myself while worrying about being forgotten, just like I had been in childhood. How could I be abandoned if I found reasons to leave first?
But the intensity between us erupted as quickly as it began. We both knew we weren’t in the right life circumstances to be with each other, and just like that, I was alone again. This time though, the solitude pushed me somewhere new — inward.
In the quiet hours that followed, I practiced the inner child meditation my life coach had taught me. I closed my eyes and found her there — my younger self, remembering the day her family left for a trip without telling her. She had felt like a burden for existing. Forgettable.
“I’ll never forget you,” I whispered through tears, pulling her close in my mind. I reminded her how funny, caring, resilient, and passionate she was. In the past, my boyfriends would have been the ones to reassure me. But this time, there was no one else — only me, learning to mother myself through my abandonment wounds. This experience challenged me to nurture the younger version of myself, to play with her, have fun with her, and love her unconditionally.
Collecting souvenirs
The truth is, I can’t control who I fall for or the people I meet serendipitously. And hiding at home out of fear of vulnerability isn’t the answer either. There’s always something to take away from these connections, even if they are fleeting.
With him, I learned that even when circumstances aren’t right, even when the ending comes too soon — I can still hold myself through it.
Being my own source of comfort allowed me to appreciate what we shared without needing it to last forever. I focused on what the experience taught me — how much I value intellectual and emotional depth combined with magnetic physical attraction — rather than needing him to be my permanent home.
Each meaningful connection or heartache brings back wisdom that deepens my understanding of myself, making me less afraid to venture beyond my own walls.
Romantic love doesn’t have to lead to self-abandonment, just as self-love doesn’t have to mean rejecting connections as they come. Homecoming means always returning to yourself by asking: “What do you need? Can you give that to yourself? What are you learning? What do you want from this?”
The door to your inner home should always remain open — not for others to enter uninvited, but for you to return whenever you get lost in the world around you.