Unclenched
Where I soften into a quieter stance and learn the real shape of ease.
I’ve been paying attention to the way I take up space in a room—to the way my shoulders soften when I don’t have to overexplain myself. It’s a familiar easing, one that comes when I’m among people who have known me across time, and who remain gently curious about how I am really doing.
Recently, after spending a week with family over the New Year’s break, I noticed how quickly my body relaxed into the company of familiar rhythms, the unspoken pace of a family vacation in Cebu, my hometown. It surprised me how little effort it took. My body seemed to know before I did.
This year, we celebrated my parents’ 50th wedding anniversary, so the holiday vacation was quite full. The days were full but unhurried. Errands folded into long conversations, laughter spilling over meals that stretched well past their end. Time felt less like something to manage and more like something to inhabit. There was no pressure to arrive anywhere else. We let the days carry us.
There were no heavy legacy conversations about what needs constant attention at the university we steward. No ongoing sense of crisis to manage. And even when we did spend time discussing a few matters that required care, something felt different—at least for me. I’m used to staying alert, anticipating what might need tending. But this time, even when conversations turned to matters that usually pull me into a familiar vigilance, I noticed a quieter stance in myself. Less bracing. More listening.
From that quieter place, I began to sense a subtle shift—less urgency, more room. More room to share thoughts and perspectives, and to recognize how much we’ve wrestled with together as a family. That shared endurance, I realized, has slowly brought us to a clearer sense of where we each stand now. The roles we play. The experiences we’ve lived through and carried. All of it contributing to a narrative that continues to weave our lives together, quietly shaping who we are becoming.
That shift made itself known in ordinary ways. We ate slowly, laughed easily, and let stories wander where they needed to go. Mostly recalling funny anecdotes from the past, and rediscovering how meaningful they can be when they remain rooted in the present. Nothing remarkable, and yet somehow, everything essential.
I wonder if some of this ease has to do with being close to the land where I was born. Being back in Cebu this time, for reasons rooted in celebration and relationship rather than obligation, stirred something familiar in my body: a sense of being held by a place that knew me before I learned how to perform. I once heard it said that when the body returns to its place of origin, something inside it remembers how to belong, as if the land itself speaks a language the body never forgot.
It’s been a long time since I’ve let myself feel that kind of ease. I used to think healing required discipline or resolve. Lately, I’m learning that openness—the kind that keeps the fists unclenched and stays available to what is—may already be enough.
I’ve learned how to stay present by editing myself. It feels safer when the distance between my inner world and someone else’s understanding is too wide. But that safety comes at a cost. Writing used to be where I didn’t have to translate myself. I could tell the truth as it rose, trusting that clarity would follow. Somewhere along the way, that freedom narrowed. Expression became complicated. Filtered through perceptions I didn’t know how to carry or release. I’m only now beginning to acknowledge how much that interruption mattered and how it slowly distanced me from recognizing what belonged to my story, and finding my way back to it.
This year, I want to stay close to the places that soften me. I’m learning to let my voice return without force. To trust that presence is already a form of courage. To write from where I am, rather than where I think I should be. To let my voice find its way back without translation. To trust that the story I am still living deserves my full presence, even as it continues to unfold. To meet it with my whole self—unclenched, unfinished, unfolding, and under grace.
Perhaps this is my most honest expression of faith: to show up as I am, and to trust that this, too, is a brave way forward.
