The Alchemy of Return

#The #Alchemy #of #Return

I don’t know what happened this morning. I don’t know which portal opened, which spirit whispered, or which ancestral sword I finally picked up—but something in me has shifted. Calm doesn’t even feel like the right word. It's deeper. It’s that ominous stillness before the warrior rises. It’s the knowing of the alchemist right before the transmutation. It’s the villain who smiles before she burns down the old world that once tried to cage her.

Because today, I feel like I could conquer the world—without rushing, without forcing, just flowing, just knowing. The procrastination that held me hostage for months? Gone. Just… gone. Like it packed its own bags and slipped out of the back door once it recognized I wasn’t playing small anymore.

For a year, I struggled. I couldn't move. I couldn't build. I couldn’t even access the fire I knew was within me. And the moment I walk away from that environment—from those shadows, from that energy that was stifling my expansion—everything just clicked. Clarity returned. Focus returned. Calmness wrapped its arm around me like an old friend who always knew I'd find my way back.

It’s 9:02 AM, and I’ve already knocked out half my day like it was nothing. You know what that tells me? Your energy is your essence. Your atmosphere is your spell. And if you’re an empath, a mystic, a creative, a channel—whatever they call people like us—your environment can either activate you or bury you alive.

And sometimes, leaving an environment means leaving everything behind. Everyone, too. Even the ones you loved. Even the ones you thought would walk into the next chapter with you. You can’t look back. You can’t call. You can’t check on them. Because once you see the truth—you realize most people aren’t moving. They’re not growing. They’re not speaking. They’re just unloading their pain onto you, using your spirit as a dumping ground for their unspoken truth.

You don’t even realize how heavy it was until you're not carrying it anymore. How much you were absorbing, translating, holding, and never expressing—because it wasn’t even yours. You were the clean river they poured pollutants into, and then wondered why you couldn’t breathe.

And then it hits you: your skin starts crawling. Like, Wow. I let that person into my space? I dated that energy? I slept next to that frequency? What spell was I under? What version of myself did I have to be to tolerate that? Environment clouds your senses. It distorts your intuition. It rewrites your boundaries. And that’s the danger of staying too long somewhere your spirit has already left.

But now? Now I know better. Now I know that the moment my energy shifts in a space, I am gone. I’m not waiting a year this time. I’m not giving my soul away in silence again. That lesson is tattooed on my bones. The villain in me will not apologize for walking away in silence, locking the door behind me, and protecting my peace like it’s my birthright.

And it is.

Just wow.

#Raquel #Mckenzie