Hey y'all, welcome back to the Quietest Kept Podcast. It's Shanti Refuge. I am a master certified mental health coach, author of the best-selling book, Quietest Kept, and your reminder that healing is hard, but staying stuck ain't cute. Now, listen, week one, we talked about what you've been carrying. Week two, we talked about the patterns you keep repeating. And this week we're going to talk about why you haven't changed it yet. And I'm going to say this with love. You're not confused. You're avoiding it. You already know. So let's cut through the noise. Let's cut through the noise. You know that relationship wasn't healthy. You know that situation drained you. You know that boundary needed to be set. And you know that conversation should have happened. But instead of you dealing with it, you just said, let them, or I'm focusing on me. I don't have time to think about that. I'm moving forward. And on the surface, that sounds really good. But underneath those words, you're still carrying it. And that is heavy. So let me tell you what avoidance really looks like. Avoidance doesn't always look like running away. Sometimes it looks like purposely staying busy all the time. Pouring into everybody else but yourself. Overworking. Scrolling the net for hours. Jumping into something new too fast. Or saying, I'm over it without ever processing it. So you know I'm gonna keep it 100 with y'all. Some of y'all aren't healing, you're just distracting yourself. Why you avoid it? Let's talk about that. Because avoidance is not laziness. Just because you're avoiding something does not mean you're lazy, it means you're protecting yourself. You avoid it because that shit hurt, it makes things real. It might require you to let go, it might force you to choose something differently next time. It might expose that you deserve better all along. And the last one, knowing that you deserve better, that is different. So different. Because now you got to sit with the fact that you stayed somewhere you had no business staying. Avoidance keeps you stuck, and nobody wants to hear that. They don't want to hear that. What you avoid starts to control you. Because you if you haven't processed it, you haven't learned from it. And if you haven't learned from it, you're gonna keep repeating it. Different situation, same lesson, until you finally sit down and heal with it. So, all right, get your graph, get your journal, go get it, go grab it, don't overthink on these prompts, just write. Number one, what truth have I been avoiding facing? What situation am I pretending doesn't affect me anymore? What am I distracting myself from right now? What would I have to change if I fully faced this truth? What am I afraid will happen if I finally deal with it? Be honest. Not the version that you tell everybody else, but the version you tell yourself at night. And here is where things change. Healing doesn't start when you feel ready. It never starts when you feel ready because you're not gonna ever feel ready. Healing starts when you get honest, because the truth, you don't need more time, you need more courage, you need the courage to sit with it, to feel it, to process it without running away from it. I want you to know, and I want you to hear this clearly: you are not weak for avoiding it. You're human. But you will stay stuck if you keep choosing comfort over clarity, and comfort will keep you in cycles that clarity would have already broken. Now, if this episode calls you out, good. That means you're paying attention. So don't stop there. Go grab one of my guided journals because this is exactly how you start processing what you've been avoiding. If you're ready to stop running from yourself, apply for my staying stuck and cute or join the Audacity of a Healing Woman. Staying Stuck Ain't Cute is one-on-one. Audacity of a Healing Woman is group. And if you need a space to be real without judgment, come and sit with us in one of my support groups that I host on Sharewell. And listen, next week, we're closing this series out with emotional release. Because after you identify it, after you face it, you gotta let it go for real this time. I love y'all. I'm rooting for your healing, but we're not running from ourselves all year. I'll see you in the next episode of the Quiet is Kept Podcast with Shanti Refuge.