The Women I Want to Become

Day 190 – June 1, 2026

I’ve spent a surprising amount of my life becoming women I’ve never met. Not literally. Although given the last few years, honestly, who knows anymore. I mean the women who exist in pieces. The women I borrow from. The women I admire. The women who leave fingerprints on your life without ever knowing they did.

A sentence from one woman. A confidence from another. A style choice. A perspective. A boundary. A laugh. A way of moving through the world.

I collect them. Always have. And lately I’ve been thinking about how becoming yourself isn’t really a solo project. We’re all mosaics. We’re all made of pieces. A little bit of our mothers. A little bit of our friends. A little bit of the writers we love. The women who inspired us. The women who challenged us. The women who showed us what was possible. The women who showed us what was unacceptable.

All of it stays. And I love that.

Because there’s something beautiful about realizing identity isn’t found. It’s assembled. Carefully. Slowly. Over years. Like decorating a house you plan to live in forever. You keep the things that fit. You remove the things that don’t. You discover your taste. You stop apologizing for it.

And eventually one day you look around and realize, “Oh. There I am. Not perfect. Not finished. But unmistakably me.” I think that’s one of my favorite parts of getting older. The narrowing. Not in possibility. In authenticity.

You stop trying on every version of yourself. You stop auditioning. You stop asking rooms to vote. You start trusting your own eye. Your own instincts. Your own taste. Your own life.

That’s freedom. Or at least it feels like it.

Roger has never struggled with identity. He wakes up every morning absolutely certain he’s Roger. No existential crisis. No rebranding. No personal growth podcast. Just unwavering commitment to being exactly who he is.

It’s honestly infuriating. And impressive. But mostly impressive.

Chaos in one hand. Grace in the other.

And me, still collecting pieces of the women who inspire me while becoming someone entirely my own.