Not Every Word Is Meant For You

Not long ago, I was sitting across from someone I care about, listening as she tried to put words to emotions that didn’t quite make sense to her.

“I feel like I should be further along by now,” she said, her tearful eyes drifting away, searching for answers.

She didn’t say it with frustration.

She said it almost like a question… as if she was trying to check her place on a timeline. Maybe someone to say, “You’re doing OK.”

Over the past few months, I’ve had similar conversations with women walking through very different—but equally difficult—seasons of life.

When we find ourselves in emotional and painful places, it’s natural to look outside ourselves for guidance and support. It helps us see more clearly.

But no one else’s words can fully account for your timing, your story, your nervous system, your grief.

So the question becomes:

Does this help me… or does it make me feel like I’m falling behind?

A few weeks ago, I shared a story about a co-worker, Jeff, who once said to me, “You know, Lisa, people don’t like it when you wear your heart on your shirtsleeve.”

At that point in my life, it reached me in a way that was helpful.

If he had said it a month or two earlier, I likely would have ended up in the restroom sobbing.

Same words.

Different timing.

But it doesn’t always happen that way.

Sometimes words that are meant to help can feel like pressure.

Sometimes they sound like a standard we’re supposed to meet… instead of an idea we’re invited to consider.

And when that happens, it’s easy to lose sight of something important:

Those words were never meant to become the standard for your life

When we begin to see the words of others not as rules or measurements, but as lenses or invitations, something shifts.

We can pause and ask,

Does this resonate for me… right now?

And then gently release what doesn’t fit, or tuck it away for another day, when it might.

Jeff’s words worked for me in that season.

The woman at a networking event who said, “You can’t hide like that,” after my mom passed away… didn’t.

We can look outside ourselves for wisdom.

There is so much good there.

But the wisest wisdom will always be the one that comes from within—

When we allow ourselves to listen.