The sun surprised us this week.
Brilliant. Unapologetic. A warm hand on the shoulder of winter.
I felt it before I thought about it.
A lift in the chest.
A soft expansion of excitement.
And then — without consulting the version of myself who knows all about “proper” behavior — I skipped into the grocery store.
Skipped.
The kind of skipping that belongs to scraped knees and grinning little faces.
The kind that has no agenda other than the expression of happiness.
I laughed at nothing. Or perhaps at everything.
When I came back out with my cart, I pushed off with one foot and rode it all the way to my car, coat flapping behind me, sunlight in my eyes.
For a moment, there was no watcher. No critic. No well-managed woman standing by with a disapproving eye.
There was only joy.
And then, as I buckled myself back into adulthood, a question rose:
Why don’t I ever see other women doing silly things like this?
When did we stop doing things for no other reason than because it feels good?
The Slow Vanishing
By the time we reach fifty, many of us have become carefully curated.
We know how to carry ourselves.
We know how to moderate our voices.
We know how to be steady, reliable, and appropriate.
We have learned restraint the way we once learned multiplication tables — through repetition.
Through constant correction by a society that insists on conformity.
Somewhere along the way, the little girl was asked to quiet herself. To not draw attention to herself.
Not always cruelly. Not always consciously.
Just… gradually.
“Don’t be silly.”
“Act your age.”
“Tone it down.”
“Be sensible.”
And because we were good girls — eager to please — we listened.
We became women who do not skip in parking lots.
The Neglected Rooms Within
In recent weeks, I’ve written about reclaiming the outer spaces we unconsciously hold for people and things long gone — partners, identities, and expectations that no longer serve the current versions of ourselves (see Taking Up Space Again and my reflection on Becoming an Empty Nester).
But there are inner rooms, too.
Rooms inside the heart.
Rooms that once echoed with imagination and delight.
Over time, those rooms can become occupied by the voices of others. The well-meaning ones. The critical ones. The ones we loved. The ones we feared disappointing.
Their words settle like furniture, and we rearrange ourselves around them.
And the little girl waits quietly in the corner, hands folded in her lap.
Not gone.
Just waiting for acknowledgement. Waiting for permission.
The Sacred Child
The inner child within us isn’t reckless. She isn’t irresponsible.
She is unfiltered. She is an unconfined being full of magic.
She is the one who feels awe without apology.
Who sings without checking the pitch.
Who basks in the sunlight instead of being indifferent to it.
She trusts delight.
As women, we’ve learned to trust self-control.
We have mastered survival.
We have built lives that hold others safely.
But somewhere in that mastery, we may have mistaken solemnity for wisdom.
We may have believed that maturity required us to trade wonder for dignity.
And yet — what if true wholeness is not the erasure of the girl, but her return?
Reclaiming the Inner Child
Reclaiming her does not require great spectacle.
It can be quiet.
A skip down the hallway when no one is home.
A twirl in the kitchen while the coffee percolates.
A whispered song to the Universe as you fold laundry.
Wearing the bright scarf you previously thought was “too much.”
Laughing freely in a safe place.
These are not childish acts.
They are acts of remembrance.
They say:
I have not abandoned myself.
I will not smooth all of my edges down into invisibility.
I will allow all parts of myself into the light.
And once we become practiced at these small acts of self-acknowledgment, might they inspire greater ones?
The road to self-love — which I reflected on more fully in My Journey to Self-Love — is paved with making space for every part of ourselves, not shunning some while allowing others the spotlight.
A Gentle Integration
The sacred years after 50 are not about becoming smaller.
They are about becoming whole.
The wise woman you have become isn’t dismissive of the little girl.
She embraces her.
The little girl within you was never lost to time.
She’s been patiently waiting for a season in which she would not be corrected.
Not be measured.
Not be told she was too loud, too bold, too much.
The girl brings bright-eyed wonder.
The woman brings calm discernment.
The girl brings boundless sparkle.
The woman brings gentle steadiness.
Together, they create something luminous.
A life that is both grounded and alive.
Sometimes that aliveness wants form — in paint, in words, in redesigned spaces, in music hummed under your breath. Creative expression becomes the natural language of a reclaimed self, something I wrote about more deeply in Creative Self-Expression.
Let Her Lead
Perhaps we don’t see other women skipping in parking lots because someone must go first.
Perhaps joy is contagious.
Perhaps the world needs more women who have done the serious work of healing and are now brave enough to be light and child-like again.
When the sun touches your face this winter — or spring, or any ordinary Tuesday — notice what stirs.
If something in you lifts…
Let it.
If laughter rises…
Let it.
If your body wants to move without choreography…
Let it.
And perhaps, as you move through your days — steady and wise and radiant — you will feel her walking beside you.
Not behind.
Not hidden.
Beside.
And the woman you are and the girl you were will no longer feel like separate beings, but like one continuous, sacred self —
still capable of wonder,
still capable of light,
still willing to skip toward the sun.
And in that quiet reunion, you may discover that joy was never something you had to buy or earn — only something you had to make space for.
