The Best Time to Find Yourself is When You Are Lost

 One day you wake up from the reverie and madness of your life and realize that, somewhere along the way, you lost huge parts of yourself.

You look at your reflection in the mirror. You hear yourself in conversations with those around you. You go over messages and emails you sent over time, and you struggle to recognize that person from the core that you are. Mentally, you give yourself a look over; you touch your cheeks, a touch on the neck, shoulders, tap your chest and tummy just to see if you are all there.

How did things get here? How did I get here?

Sounds familiar?

Well, this was me coming into the Moyo Tulivu Silent weekend retreat. I was both recognising and not recognising whole parts of myself as I wove into every day. Some of these internal knots and ties paralysed me, while others swept me away. Both were oddly uncomfortable because I did not feel like I was in the driver seat of my own life.

The much-needed noble silence offered a great pause—an invitation to slow down.

Being Brave, Gentle & Persistent

What does a reset look like when you choose to take these brave steps? It means going inward to see how your attachment style shows up in your relationships.

It is the hard, necessary, and sacred task of looking—with kindness and inquiry—at why it took me so long to ask someone to pay me back money they owed me.

It means examining how I immediately move into ‘fixer mode’ for the problems of loved ones, instead of sitting with them calmly in that moment and offering to listen and be present as they navigate a sore wound.

My aversion to sitting quietly through people's suffering is reassuring—it proves I am not entirely disconnected. But my penchant for taking this suffering up as my sole responsibility is an emotional and traumatic burden basket.

Through this revealing but difficult soul work, I learned that what motivated this behavior was a deep need to be wanted. I was keeping myself ‘valuable’ in a person’s life to ensure they wouldn't leave, reject, or ignore me.

The Body is a Sacred Memorial

It is a sad realization: growing up, I did not always feel safe, cared for, and wanted.

And oh, so many big feelings come up, swelling in your chest to the point you almost think you won't be able to breathe in and out enough to contain the pain. It feels like the pain of it will kill you—or worse, that you will live through the feelings of rejection again, and again, and again.

But I thank the universe that mindfulness meditation and movement offer me literal and figurative anchors. They help me navigate these tough moments of self-abandonment with a sense of curiosity. They allow me to ask what re-parenting looks like in each moment, and to seek the radical self-acceptance and equanimity needed to metabolize that trauma.

On Earning Your Sense of Belonging

Relationships and the flexing of power are almost like a live parable of these times. Power is wielded, but how do we harness it? Do we use it to purchase or transact for emotional safety, validation, or praise?

I had to ask myself: Am I over-functioning? What is the unspoken contract at play in this dynamic?

I strove to become indispensable to people's daily survival. I was subconsciously trying to secure my spot in their life. The logic of my anxious brain was simple but flawed: ‘If I am useful to you, you cannot leave me.’

Remember, dearest anxious-preoccupied comrade, you will find people who accept these gifts with or without grace. People won't be emasculated or shy; rather, they allow you to care for them.

One big way we connect and build relationships as humans is through reciprocity, and this can look like a lot of things. 

But when our perspectives are distorted by a deep sense of unworthiness and low self-esteem, they can become quite skewed. We give away, but at the cost of our well-being.

And in many ways, this was actually how we give away our power. Others and their agendas become the ‘prize’ being courted. They don't need to exert themselves to keep me engaged or interested; their presence and validation alone were the currency I craved. Without being awake to this pattern, we can go our whole lives exhausted yet feeling so isolated, so out of breath by the punishing wiles of humanity.

Just writing it is exhausting enough.

Generosity is Reciprocal not one-sided

Looking back at how we self-abandoned to turn up 200% for others, in whatever small or big ways, reveals the massive boundary blur. It signals the extent to which we are willing to support narratives, patterns, and structures that keep us striving. I completely resonate with Toko-pa Turner, who said in her book Belonging: Remembering Ourselves Home, "There is no such thing as one-sided generosity.'

It is an act of self-abandonment disguised as generosity. Wow, it hits you like a punch in the tummy.

I had to ask myself: Why does self-abandonment happen with so, so, so much ease? I learned that anxious attachment is not a flaw to fix; it is a biological survival strategy, usually learned in childhood.

• The Possible Origin: As a child, if you have caregivers who are inconsistent—sometimes warm, sometimes distracted or absent—you learn a specific lesson. You learn that ‘If I am quiet, I get ignored. If I perform, I get love.’

• The Result: My nervous system wired itself to believe that Love = Work. I felt I had to ‘earn’ it, monitor it, and chase it, or it would vanish.

This explained my Hyper-activating strategies. My system was constantly scanning for threats, like silence or short replies. To soothe this, I would ‘protest’ with closeness—double-texting, gift-giving, and checking in too often.

When they replied or accepted the gift, we got a hit of dopamine. That relief became addictive.

This self-talk has led me into contending with difficult spheres of my life. I am thankful for the grounding and centering practices—like mindfulness—that made me learn to distinguish myself from my feelings, experiences, and thoughts. I now know that while these things are connected, they are also separate. It is possible to separate myself from the story going through my head and the sensations I experience in my body, and to find an anchor that is strong enough to bring curiosity to the present moment. Mindfulness meditation and movement proved invaluable at the Retreat, and I see how transformative they could be going forward in my healing journey.

I learnt that when I feel panic rising—the ‘not hearing back from loved ones’ or ‘I need to buy/rescue/take care of a loved one something’—I recognise that my body is probably in Fight-or-Flight mode. I need to move to Rest and Digest.

Here are some tools (out of many options available) that I found useful:

As I move away from the weekend of Moyo Tulivu—it's a new month, a goodbye to the full moon—the retreat helped chart the course of my journey to wholeness. I hope to embody a spirit of being at peace with ‘what is.’

So you, like me, may ask: Is it ‘bad’ to be this way?

No. People with anxious attachment are often the most empathetic, loving, and loyal partners. That is, in fact, a superpower in a world today that is getting harder and meaner. They can read a room instantly and are deeply caring. The idea here is to be aware and alive to some of the things that mould us not to be ashamed of them. 

The antidote to my self-abandonment is what I will call ‘Earned Security.’ This, for me, means knowing I am worthy of love without having to overwork to prove myself or resort to overextending myself and overcompensating. It means believing I am enough, just standing here, empty-handed.

So in case this resonates with you why don’t you join me in saying out aloud: I am enough.

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About Moyo Tulivu

Moyo Tulivu (Swahili for "Peaceful Heart") is a sanctuary for the soul—a curated silent retreat designed to help you hit pause, disconnect from the noise, and reconnect with your inner self through mindfulness and noble silence.

Ready to find your anchor? The next Silent Weekend Retreat is scheduled for February 28th. Spaces are limited to ensure a deeply personal experience. Drop an email for more information mindfullness_maven@protonmail.com