When I left for summer break, I was 5'7".

When I came back three months later, I was 6'4".

It sounds impressive when you say it like that. It wasn’t. Everything hurt. I walked onto the basketball court in a body that didn’t feel like mine yet, more like a baby giraffe on rollerskates. I literally did not know where my body ended anymore.

There was a coach who saw size and expected control. What he saw was awkward and incomplete. I had always wanted to be big like the rest of my family. Now here it was, and what I felt was failure.

That feeling stayed with me longer than the growth did.

For most of my life, I have carried a quiet fear that I am a disappointment. A low, steady suspicion that I should be further along by now.

I did not arrive when I thought I should.

I have made myself miserable trying to control the timing.

And the best thing I could have done was just to live in my own skin.

I am not fully there yet.
But this is me saying it out loud.

🎧 No Stage, Just a Chair
A podcast for people figuring it out as they go: building honest brands, real decisions, and work that feels like theirs.

Before You Listen:

• Where do you quietly feel like you should be further by now?

• What part of you have you mistaken for failure?

• Who decided what “on time” was supposed to look like?

• What would change if you stopped trying to control the timing?