When people say "come back to yourself," you picture a journey.
You picture having to change cities, or relationships, or careers. Having to do something big to reach the place they promised. And until that happens, you stay where you are, waiting.
But home isn't somewhere else. Home is in any moment when you stop rushing and let yourself be where you are.
It's a gesture, not a place
Coming back to yourself is pausing in front of the mirror for one extra second. It's giving your breath room to finish before you start the next one. It's letting your hand, when it wraps around a coffee cup, be your hand.
These things are so small that you walk past them a thousand times a day without noticing. And what pulls you away from yourself isn't the absence of some big change. It's the dizzying number of these small moments when you, without realising it, aren't there.
The good news
You don't need to go away in order to come back.
You don't have to get divorced, you don't have to move cities, you don't have to commit to five years of therapy. You can start right now, this minute.
Put down your phone. Look at where you are. Breathe in, slowly, once.
Notice: you're already back.
Home was always here. It was only you who was far away.