Freedom Is:

Being Okay With Yourself While the Rest of the World Thinks You’re an Asshole

You don’t have to be an old fart to fetch your own freedom. You just need the guts to stop fishing for validation, explaining, and justifying. I know this is old news and the message is repetitive, yet I am still incredulous that for thousands of years we continue to Over-Serve others and barter parts of our SELF all for the illusion of belonging.

In revising your own ticket, the world will call you selfish, crazy, and ungrateful. Yeah. Been there, done that. It’s tough to hold your stance. Just remember that freedom arrives on the heels of your hunkering and holding fast to what’s yours to hold.

You don’t have to wait til you’re 70 something to know freedom isn’t about looking good. It’s about wearing the outfit that somehow pulls together all the layers of your soul vibe. Sometimes you just gotta burn the bridge.

Based on the stories of my Sisters in Soul and my own, here are 10 likely countermeasures you are likely to confront as you chart your way. Pay attention to how you have either experienced these yourself, or actually deployed when someone you know put up their wall.

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1. You ghost the family drama group chat.
   They call you heartless.
   Nope—you just ran out of emotional bail money.
2. You end the picture-perfect relationship.
   Friends whisper, “She’s impossible to please.”
   They saw Instagram highlights. You lived the quiet suffocation.
3. You say “No” with a full stop.
   No explanation, no guilt, no delayed follow-up.
   And suddenly you’re the bad guy in someone else’s guilt narrative.
4. You stop explaining your trauma.
   You’re done packaging pain into digestible empathy bites.
   You’re healing, not justifying.
5. You set boundaries like a grown-ass adult.
   You’re labeled difficult. Inconvenient. “Changed.”
   Yes. Changed—thank God.
6. You rest when you’re tired, not when you’re dead.
   You trade burnout for breath. Hustle culture can’t monetize that, so it calls you lazy.
7. You make messy, raw, unpolished art.
   You’re no longer making things pretty. You’re making them real.
   That scares people. Let it.
8. You quit the job that was killing your soul.
   No 10-step backup plan. Just a gut and a spine.
   They call it reckless. You call it resurrection.
9. You fall in love with your weirdness, your wounds, your wonder.
   You stop asking for permission.
   You are the sacred space.
10. You stop apologizing for existing.
    You realize you were never too much—just in the wrong room.

Do you need to wait until you are beyond your shelf life to re-set your course? No. Be reminded always, each and every day, that to keep on growing, learn to be content to be thought foolish and stupid.— Epictetus