“Heather, I'm back where I started."

Said a client who had worked hard for 6+ months to draw boundaries.

She communicated them.

She enforced them.

She even felt good about them.

And then she got sick, felt guilty for missing a week, and fell back into her old habits.

But was she back where she started? Nope.

A big myth about personal growth is that once you "overcome" something, you should be done with it forever.

Reality check: your brain doesn't work that way.

Growth isn’t a straight path - it loops, dips, and doubles back.

You don’t just “delete” old programming and install a shiny new mindset and/or habit.

Instead, you write new code. But the old code is still there, too.

This is why, when you think you’ve mastered a new habit and something unexpected occurs to throw you off kilter… BOOM.

Old patterns creep back in.

Annoying? Yes.

A sign you’re failing? No.

It's a sign that you're a normal human. ;-)

New experiences, challenges, and phases of life are expected to trigger old habits because you haven’t worked through them in this context yet.

The goal isn’t to never struggle again. It’s to learn how to respond differently (within a new context) each time old patterns resurface.

Your takeaway, Friend?

The next time an old habit or doubt reappears, don’t panic.

You are not back at square one; You’re just ready to write new code for this new situation.

For more about how this works, listen to Episode 191 of the Life & Law Podcast >>>here.

XO,

Heather

P.S. Notice something different? I'm rebranding this newsletter to catch my brand up to what I've been doing.

This means you now get access to my Success Vault (your one-stop place for past newsletters and my most popular written resources). Check out the Success Vault below.