“The Life I Thought I Wanted Isn’t the One I Want Anymore”
“I used to be so sure of what I wanted. I had a plan, a vision, a version of myself I was building toward. But somewhere along the way, it stopped feeling right. I look at that life now—the one I worked so hard to create—and I don’t want it anymore. And I don’t know what I do want. I feel unmoored, like I don’t know who I am without that dream.”
Dear Elena,
There’s something so quietly brave in what you’ve just said. Not because you’ve figured it all out, but because you’re willing to admit that the dream no longer fits—and that kind of honesty takes a particular kind of courage. The kind that doesn’t come with applause. The kind that often looks, from the outside, like failure or flakiness, but from the inside feels like standing barefoot on the edge of something unknown, heart pounding, soul awake.
You’re not alone in feeling unmoored. That sensation—of once knowing exactly where you were headed, only to wake up one day and feel completely disoriented by the map—is far more common than most people let on. Especially for those of us who were taught to choose early, to strive early, to define ourselves by a clear, linear trajectory. When that path begins to dissolve or no longer feels like home, the disorientation that follows can be profound.
We’re often told to “dream big,” but what we’re not told is that dreams can expire. That visions we once built our lives around can outgrow us—or we outgrow them. That clarity isn’t permanent. And when that shift happens, it can feel like a betrayal of your past self. Like you’re dishonoring all the time, energy, identity, and love you poured into the version of life you’re now quietly stepping away from.
But letting go of an old dream is not failure. It’s growth. The kind that doesn’t always look like forward momentum. The kind that feels like wandering, or shedding, or grieving. You’re not just losing a plan. You’re losing a framework—one that once held your sense of purpose, identity, even worth.
That grief is real. It deserves time and space.
And so does the not-knowing. I want to say that again, more slowly: the not-knowing is not a problem to fix. It is a season to honor. You don’t have to know what you want yet. You don’t have to immediately replace the old dream with a shinier, more exciting one. There is integrity in simply being honest that the old life no longer holds you—and giving yourself permission to sit in that truth without rushing to rebuild.
Often, the impulse to find a new purpose quickly is not about hope, but about fear. The fear of drifting. The fear of disappointing people. The fear of becoming invisible without a clear narrative. But identity doesn’t thrive under pressure. It re-forms quietly. In the background. While you walk through your days listening, noticing, softening.
This space you’re in—this middle—is where real transformation begins. Not because it’s glamorous or Instagrammable, but because it’s where your life gets recalibrated to something more honest. More internally aligned. Less about what the world told you success was supposed to look like, and more about what makes you feel like you’re actually living.
And even now, even in this fog, there are signs. Glimmers. Gut pulls. Emotions that rise without warning. That moment when you cry at something unexpected. That book you can’t stop thinking about. That quiet envy you feel when you see someone living a life that stirs something deep in you. Those aren’t distractions. They’re signals. Small, unfinished truths.
You don’t have to make them into a plan yet. You just have to notice them. Let them be real. Let yourself be real.
This isn’t the end of your story. It’s a chapter shift. And no, you can’t skip ahead. But you can pause. You can listen. You can trust that losing direction is often how we begin to hear our own voice again.
Sometimes the clearest sign that you’re growing is that the old life no longer fits.
Keep going. Even if it’s slow.
–RJ
You’re allowed to question everything now. That’s how something new begins.