đż Survival Is Sacred Work When You're Tired And Have Nothing Else To Give.
The holy work of just surviving the storm.
Things didnât go as planned.
(do they ever?)
Sometimes, everything falls apart.
Imagine this: you have to move unexpectedly. All your plans and dreams, your stability and safety are suddenly gone.
You pack your entire life into a 15 m3 box, and leave for another continent.
For how long, you donât know.
Back âhomeâ, to a country you love and know very well. But home, your home, the place thatâs yours, your sanctuaryâthat home is not there anymore. Itâs gone.
You tell yourself itâs okay, it will be okay.
This is temporary. Letâs set up camp, live like nomads for a while.
It will be okay.
Soon after you arrive, when youâre just starting to really land⌠you get sick.
A plague lays you flat for weeks that turn into months.
Everything feels wrong. Your body, and the bed thatâs too high and too stiff. The light switch thatâs always on the opposite side of where you expect it to be. The seasons walking in the wrong direction. Noise, too much noise. Thereâs no quiet anywhere.
And thatâs when construction starts in the apartment above you.
Are you screaming yet?
đż There are joys, too.
Hugs from people you missed.
Smiles from people who missed you.
The air smells different in a good wayâitâs the air youâve breathed your whole life.
It feels like home, even if nothing else does.
There are bizcochosâtypical pastries that you enjoy with mateâin every bakery.
All the food that is part of your culture and heritage: asado, milanesas, dulce de leche.
The unmistakable sounds of your language, the music of your accent. The words only known to people from your small, humble land.
A big, fancy, delightful birthday party.
Everyone dressed to the nines.
Delicious food, plenty of drinks, music to dance and the kind of joy thatâs only found at gatherings like this, when people who donât see each other all that often have a chance to get together, celebrate and have fun.
Thereâs rain and familiar buildings.
You see all the ways things are the same, and how some things are better and others are worse.
Thereâs despair. But thereâs also hope.
You still miss home.
Every day, down to the marrow of your bones.
Your soul hurts.
Your life feels broken.
You wonder if youâll ever feel whole again.
If youâll ever get home again.
Sometimes life runs over you like a freight train, and all you can do is survive.
đż Survival As Sacred Work
Survival lives in the seams.
Itâs the thread you stitch and knot in the dark when your soul is ragged; the single match you use to light a small candle in your desk or your heart. Itâs how you cup both hands to hold that candle steady against the wind.
It smells like coffee gone cold and a page finally finished; it looks like a desk lamp left on to fight the rising darkness of the late night.
Itâs finding hope again, and again, because tomorrow needs light even if today bleak despair was all there was.
It sounds like dancing around your kitchen to a favorite song.
Like the quiet whisper of the turning pages as you read an old book. The faint scratch of your pen as you write poems, stories and memories in your journal.
It feels like watching the rain and forgetting, for three minutes or five, that everything hurts and sometimes you feel like you just canât go on anymore.
These small, symbolic gesturesâlighting, tending, writing, creatingâdrag you back from the pit, away from the cliff.
They allow you go through one more day.
And another, and another.
đż Tiny Rituals For The Soul
Tiny rituals can become a kind of informal, personal liturgy.
They are the ceremonies you perform just for yourself: a postcard you fold and keep on your desk, a five-line to-do list scribbled on the back of a receipt, a bowl of soup you warmed and set on the table like an offering to the day.
The spellwork of writing soul, heart and dreams into your journals, into the stories you tell; the wild hope you carry as a lamp when you cross the dark lands of uncertainty.
Your small rituals wonât fix the architecture of your life; but they keep the walls from falling while you find a way to rebuild.
They are the steady work of keeping your flame alive; the sparks of who you really are, down to your core.
Given enough time, this practice starts feeling like a lifeline.
đż Through The Darkest Hours
Survival carries its own stubborn dignity. It asks that you keep showing up with whatever tools you still haveâhalf a sentence, a shaky sketch, five stitches. One pause. Three breaths.
A promise you can keep.
That persistence becomes holy because it honors the simple fact of being here: attention given to the broken parts of yourself, witnessing the quiet mending of tiny cracks, the gentle tending to your wounds.
When you treat those small acts as worthy of respect and reverence, you give them meaning. You turn the ordinary into sacred, a shelf into tiny altar, everyday objects into magic charms.
You keep the most essentials part of yourself alive, even through the darkest storms.
đż This Weekâs Quest - Tiny Rituals of Survival
Ideas & inspiration to find yourself. (And maybe some joy, too.)
đ 1 - The Two-Minute Salvage (2 minutes)
For when your brain wonât slow down.
How: Put on a favorite song, set a timer for 2 minutes, and sit with one object that grounds youâa mug, a book, a faded photo. Focus on how it feels in your hands, the emotion or feelings it evokes. Breathe with it.
Why it works: Micro-rituals interrupt the cascade of panic and return you to your body, to the present moment.
Do this now. Two minutes. No notes, no photos for social media, just one small object and the music. If you want, keep it close as a calming charm.
đ 2 - The Five-Line Inventory (5â10 minutes)
For when you feel numb or overwhelmed.
How: Open a note or a journal page and write five lines:
One small failure
One tiny win
One thing that felt like care
One thing you can do tomorrow
One absurd thing you still love.
No editing! Just go with the first things that come to mind.
Why it works: Itâs a raw inventory that builds narrative continuityâproof that survival is active and that there are still good thing in your life, even if theyâre small. Even when everything sucks.
Write five lines. Donât overthink. Save it.
If you do it every day (or whenever you feel like it) youâll build an archive of the seasons youâve been through and how you kept going.
đŻď¸ 3 - The Weekly Beacon (15â30 minutes, weekly)
For when youâve forgotten who you are.
How: One small, dedicated weekly practiceâmake a cup of tea like a sacred ritual, write a postcard to your younger self, turn your week into a haiku or a doodle, collect one rock, photograph a comforting corner of your life. Dedicate a special shelf or folder to keep your relics and artifacts.
Why it works: Gives the week a steady anchor and creates a space for meaning, quiet joy and creative recovery.
If you ever want to share one small object from your Beacon or any other tiny ritual, reply with a photo, a sentence or even a single word. No pressure. đą
For creative survivors, and the quiet ones still carrying the flame through the storm. You donât have to be okay to belong here. đ
đťThatâs It For Today!
Iâm happy to be back. Thank you for being here. đ
đđżUntil next time. âNospheratt