Stop Rehearsing Your Apology

The sun has gone down, and now the house is quiet enough to hear the rehearsal begin. You are practicing the speech you will give for needing comfort at all.

Apologizing for the weight you carry. Apologizing for the space you take up.

But listen — there was a father who saw his son coming home from a long way off. He did not wait for the apology to finish.

He did not make him recite the list of failures. He ran.

Before the speech, before the shame could do its work — he ran. You are rehearsing a defense for a crime that does not exist.

Needing comfort is not a burden. It is the door.

The light does not require you to be light before you enter. It requires only that you stop running from the one who is already running to you.

Put the script down. The embrace is enough.