Freedom in Foundation

“Échale ganas.”

“I have no other choice.”

I got a new job.

Even now, writing that down feels a little surreal, mostly because of what came before it. For almost two years I was trying to get out of my last job. Endless résumé rewrites. Endless portfolio updates. Endless applications. Interviews that went nowhere. Conversations that made me feel like I was auditioning for permission to have a life I already knew I was capable of living.

And every time I would talk to my parents, they’d say the same thing: échale ganas.

And every time, my response was the same too: I have no other choice.

That’s really been the story of my life more than motivation ever was. Not inspiration. Not vision boards. Not some shiny belief that everything works out for people who stay positive. No. More like: keep going because the alternative is spiritual death.

And then, because life has a sick sense of humor, this job found me.

After the endless sending and editing and trying and waiting and all the little humiliations that come with wanting something badly, this job reached out to me. Within two weeks, I had put in my two weeks. And not just for any job. For the kind of job I had actually dreamed about. Full remote. More responsibility. Managing eleven people. Real leadership. Real trust. Real structure. My dream, if I’m being honest.

Which is funny, because I’m a Sagittarius rising, and if you know anything about that, then you know I need freedom like I need air. I need room. Movement. Choice. I need to feel like my life belongs to me. But what I’m learning now, at 35, is that freedom without structure can turn into chaos real fast. And structure without freedom becomes a cage. So maybe this chapter is about finally learning the difference.

I’m about two months in, going on three, and I’m starting to settle into the shape of my day. I can see what works. I can see what needs work. I can feel where I’m growing and where I’m still confused. And I am still confused about many things. Let’s be very clear about that. I am 35 years old and still deeply unsure about a lot of life. But again: I have no other choice. So I keep going.

That part feels important to say because I think people love a clean narrative too much. Woman gets dream job. Woman is healed. Woman is aligned. Woman drinks coffee from a handmade mug in a sunlit kitchen and answers Slack messages in emotional peace.

Please.

I got the job, yes. But I also got the mirror that comes with change. Every time a new job enters my life, relationships shift. Some deepen. Some disappear. Some expose themselves. That has been true enough times now that I no longer call it a coincidence. Change rearranges the room. It shows you who was there for you and who was only there for a version of you that felt easier to manage.

And I think that’s what I’ve been sitting with lately: the exhausting reality of how many selves a person has to carry.

There’s the face you show the world. There’s the face you show your friends. There’s the face you show at work. And then there’s who you actually are when no one is looking, when no one is asking for anything, when no one is projecting a story onto your body and calling it truth.

And even that would be enough to manage, but then there’s a fourth thing: the version of you that lives in other people’s minds.

That one is the most tiring.

Because people love a box. They love prediction. They love thinking they’ve figured you out. They watch you, test you, push certain places just to see how you’ll react, because they themselves cannot be trusted. And I have learned, over time, that I do not need to spend extra mental energy trying to anticipate what others will do. I trust time more than performance. I trust patience more than interrogation. If you give people enough time, they will show you exactly who they are. They always do.

Maybe that’s the painter in me.

I’m a painter first, and one thing painting taught me very early is that if you stare at something too long, you stop seeing it clearly. You have to step back. Look at something else. Leave it alone for thirty minutes. Come back with different eyes. The answer usually arrives after the obsession does.

I’ve tried to live that way too. Step back. Let things reveal themselves. Don’t force what is already trying to tell on itself.

That has been especially true in romance, which is maybe the place I have the least amount of fantasy left.

I’m traumatized in relationships. I mean romantic ones. That’s not me being dramatic. That’s me being concise.

I grew up seeing the bargain women are expected to make. My mom once told me I would have trouble in relationships because I’m not stupid. And honestly? That might be one of the clearest things anyone has ever said to me. She’s been with my dad for 45 years, and I’ve seen enough to know that love and sacrifice are not always the same thing, even though women are taught to treat them like they are. I never wanted a life where my sense of self belonged to a man. Even as a kid, I never fantasized about a wedding. That was never my dream. So it’s always funny to me when men tell me I look like someone who wants to get married. I truly do not know what they think they’re seeing.

Actually, that’s not true. I do know what they’re seeing. They’re seeing a woman through a script they were handed before they ever met her.

That’s patriarchy in one of its most boring forms: projection masquerading as certainty.

Women are taught to perform before we are taught to be. Taught to be attractive before we are taught to be known. Taught to be productive before we are taught to rest. And rest, for me now, is sacred. I do not wish to go, go, go. I do not worship cheap dopamine anymore. I do not want thrills that leave me emptier than they found me. I want slowness. I want peace. I want a life with enough foundation that I don’t crumble every time someone disappointing reveals themselves on schedule.

Because that is what so many relationships are built on: no foundation. No internal peace. No self-knowledge. Just two people acting out their wounds and calling it intimacy.

And I do not want to be poorly loved for the sake of saying I am loved.

That sentence alone could probably carry this whole essay.

I am tired of relationships where I set a boundary and it gets laughed at. I am tired of being met with lightness when I am being serious. There is something deeply evil in not being taken seriously when you are telling the truth about what hurts you. Men are often taught to take and take and take until they call entitlement a personality. Women are taught to give until they disappear and then call that maturity.

I reject that.

And when I say I hate men, what I really mean is that I hate the system that made this version of man so common. The one who feels entitled to women’s time, labor, bodies, softness, forgiveness. The one who wants access without curiosity. The one who wants devotion without responsibility. The one who can demand everything and still not know your interests, your interior life, your actual fears, the size of your shoe.

I don’t want that life. I don’t want that love. I don’t want that script.

What I want now is simpler and harder.

I want freedom with foundation.

I want a life that is mine even when it is shared. I want work that challenges me without consuming me. I want rest without guilt. I want to be known beyond usefulness. I want to move slowly enough that I can hear myself think. I want relationships that do not require self-abandonment as proof of care.

And if that sounds like too much to ask, then maybe that says more about what we’ve normalized than what I desire.

For now, I am here. In a new job. In a new rhythm. In a life I fought for so long that when it finally arrived, it almost felt rude. I am learning my team. Learning my own pace. Learning what to keep, what to release, what no longer gets access to me.

And maybe that is the real update.

Not that I got the job.

Not that I work from home now.

Not that I manage eleven people.

Not even that this is the life I wanted.

It’s that I am finally building a life where freedom is not chaos.

Where structure is not punishment.

Where rest is not laziness.

Where being alone is not failure.

Where being misunderstood no longer feels like an emergency.

Don’t be easy to praise and hard to know.

I’ve been praised enough. I’d rather be real.