The Flame That Refused to Die
On the invisible deaths we endure and our sacred choice to come back to life.
Opening Invocation
Every day you wake up, you are one step closer to death.
This is not a call to be feared, but to be felt.
Not an alarm sounding in warning, but a wake-up call to presence.
Because, if we’re being honest, many of us aren’t truly living.
We’re just… not dead yet.
We survive.
We perform.
We scroll.
We numb.
We strive.
We stay quiet.
And all the while, our essence slowly drains, like a pinprick in the balloon of our becoming, until the only reminder left is a faint echo and a shriveled shell of the life we were meant to live.
Not all of us will have the chance to lie peacefully on our deathbed, reflecting on a life fully lived.
But if you did, and if it were today, would you be at peace?
Would you feel joy?
Would there be no words left unsaid, no lingering regrets?
The Culture of Distraction
We live in a world that pretends death won’t come if we just stay busy enough.
We fill the calendar.
We chase achievement.
We medicate.
We people-please.
We post.
We defer.
We make excuses.
We try to earn.
We do everything except sit with the question: Am I truly alive in this life I’m living?
The collective spell, the illusion, whispers that we have time.
Time to heal. Time to love. Time to speak.
Time to do the things that light our inner flames.
But what if we don’t?
What if this is the day we’re remembered by?
What if tomorrow never brings that elusive permission slip to finally be free?
The Quiet Deaths of Self
For those of us who are the sensitive ones—the empaths, the peace-keepers, the over-givers—our death rarely comes all at once.
It comes in micro-moments.
They may look like:
Saying yes when your body says no.
Staying silent to keep the peace.
Dimming to stay lovable.
Tolerating mistreatment because it feels familiarAbandoning your needs to protect someone else’s comfort.
Hiding your brilliance so others don’t feel threatened.
These are the invisible, recurring funerals we hold for our own aliveness.
The ones we justify in the name of kindness, maturity, or strength.
We carry the ancestral wounds and absorb the collective grief.
We fear rocking the boat so much that we would allow ourselves to quietly drown instead.
But every soul reaches a breaking point.
There comes a sacred moment when the ache of self-abandonment
becomes louder than the fear of change.
That is the moment when our resurrection begins.
The Sacred Return to Living
True living doesn’t begin when life finally gets easier. It begins when we stop waiting for permission, and start remembering who we are beneath the layers of performance and self-abdication.
Sovereignty is resuscitation for the soul.
It says:
You are allowed to choose yourself.
You are allowed to speak even if your voice shakes.
You are allowed to leave the spaces that silence you.
You are allowed to shine without apology.
You do not have to hit rock bottom or wait for death to knock to begin living on purpose.
You can begin now.
Not as the person you were before the quiet deaths, but as the one who survived them.
The one who chose to thrive.
The one who remembered who they are at their core.
Reflection Invitations
The Inward Breath
Let these questions be a mirror, not a mandate.
Remember, there are no right answers, only honest ones.
What parts of me have I silenced to survive?
Where am I performing peace while secretly holding pain?
What am I postponing out of fear of being too much—or not enough?
What does self-respect look like in practice for me?
If today were my last, could I say I lived with integrity?
Pause with your hand over your heart.
Feel your pulse.
That rhythm means you still have time,
but not time to waste.
Closing Benediction
The Exhale of Return
You are not here to perform safety.
You are here to live, fully, wildly, truthfully.
Not someday.
Today.
Let death be your reminder, not your regret.
Let your sovereignty be your revolution.
With breath, with fire, with grace,
come back to life.
Beautiful and heartfelt! And so very true!!