“First Compassion, Then Discernment”

You can’t save someone

who doesn’t know they’re suffering.

And if you try to pull them up,

they’ll just pull you back down -

not out of cruelty,

but out of terror.

Because your freedom

threatens everything

they built

to survive.

They don’t hate you.

They hate what your light reveals.

They hate the hunger that wakes up

when they see you living full.

Because it reminds them

they’ve been starving.

So what do you do

when the people you love

mistake your healing for betrayal?

You stop arguing.

You stop shrinking.

You stop trading your clarity

for a seat at a table

you’ve already outgrown.

You don’t shame them.

But you don’t save them either.

You rise,

quietly.

Consistently.

Radically.

And if they reach,

you let them reach.

But you don’t climb back into the dark

to prove you still care.

First compassion, then discernment.

Love them,

but don’t live inside their fear.

Name it,

but don’t carry it.

Witness,

but walk on.

Because if it’s not serving you,

then rework it.

And if it can’t be reworked,

then release it.

You are not here to be right.

You are here

to get it right.

And sometimes,

getting it right

means walking away

still loving them.