we deeply, almost desperately, want to believe: that our lives can pivot on a dime, that redemption is waiting around the corner, and that maybe — just maybe — we’re the ones holding the pen on our own plot twists. but the danger, of course, lives in everything that happens between the glossy befores and afters. the middle chapters. you know the... See more

the irony, of course, is that the old self never stays neatly filed away. they walk with us into the new chapter, uninvited but insistent. the bad habits return, the doubts tag along, the to-do list keeps growing like ivy.

this is why the fresh start effect is powerful but fragile. it works like a spark, lighting us up and igniting motivation for a moment, but unless we build rhythms to hold that spark, it fizzles.