Home.

For as long as I can remember, my dreams have been heavy with the same recurring nightmare. I move into an old house that’s too big— a terrifying maze of rooms, secret doors, endless adjoining spaces, gaping living rooms, an Escher entanglement of staircases. Most notably, it is piled high with other people’s things. Sometimes I am crawling through the inner workings of the walls, sometimes sifting through heaps of objects in horror. Occasionally the house is flooding from the bottom up as I trail up endless swirls of stairs desperate to escape. Whatever the theme, the feeling is always the same—a haunting, relentless overwhelm.

One day, I realize the simple truth—these houses reflect my internal world. They are the baggage I carry, the way I make my home in others’ stuff and become lost in what is not mine. I get so mired in the details I never step back to notice that none of it was mine to pick up in the first place. It feels laughably obvious.

And for once, I commit to building my own home instead of living in someone else’s.

In waking life, I dive into my internal world, and it is full of pain. These past four years have been a reckoning—learning to trust, love, and listen to myself the way I’ve so longed for from someone else. I have gutted myself, emotionally and physically—a complete remodel, a demolition, the enormity of it only clear once I was already too deep to turn back. I am constantly exhausted. I wake up tired in my bones and no amount of sleep is ever enough, as I muck through the heaviness I amassed as some sort of deranged dowry.

Last night, a new version of the dream came. I am in a big house, but this one feels different, softer. It is full of things, but this time they are organized and clean, and I can feel fresh air in the hallways. There are relics of times past—a wall nook for an old phone, a built-in port for a vacuum—echoes of ancient times that are also endearing, like the sweet scars of childhood bumps and bruises. One corner of the house holds a collection of the girls’ little sparkling birthday headbands that Nic saved, sprinkles of glitter stars and birthday numerals flopping over their worn bands. Normally I’m not sentimental; I’m often overwhelmed by clutter, but these tethers to our collective past warm my heart. I feel at peace in this home, settled. And even in the depths of my sleep, I can feel the ghost of all the dreams before this one, the contrast of that lost and haunting longing. I feel such gratitude to be here, to be home, finally.

I am walking through some floor of the house, when there’s a sudden surge of people. Deeply surprised, I insist they leave, despite their protestations. Panic rises as I push them toward the door, but more and more people are pouring in. They are having a party in my sweet little sanctuary, and it’s then that I realize:

I left the front door open.

I wake up with that horror. And yet this time, unlike my usual nightmare, I recognize something new. I have built a home in myself. I have my own crevices and corners, my own memories and mementos. I know who I am, how I feel, what I need. At this point, the question is only how faithfully I listen, how close I stay to the pulse of my own knowing. And this dream shows me clearly: I need to close the front door.

I feel this truth every day. In my relationship with social media. In people’s opinions about my choices. In the constant stream of advice and input. I told my love the other day: this year is teaching me, intently and relentlessly, about my boundaries, and the only person ever truly violating them is me.

I look at my phone too late, answer emails and texts too quickly, make myself too available, spiral through the horror of the news, offer up the intimate details of my life as if I want feedback when I don’t. One night recently, instead of turning off my phone at 7 as I had been doing, I go on a deep dive on Instagram. I scroll women and communities adjacent to my own. I judge, I compare, and underneath it all is the fear that the way I live is wrong. And if I am wrong, then I cannot exist. I sleep fitfully.

I am leaving the front door wide open, and the sanctuary I’ve worked so hard to build becomes overrun by the chaos of the outside world. It is a choice. But this time there’s no radical overhaul required, no gutting, no revolution. I just need to close the front door. Close the door.

Keep what is mine. Drop what is not. Keep what’s good, drop what doesn’t. Close the door.

The morning after this dream, we’re walking to school and Bonnie tells me she has a tool in her brain. The tool, she says, allows her to keep her good dreams, throw away her bad ones, and even replay the ones she really likes. “It keeps my brain happy, mama,” she says, adding that she worked really hard to build it.

And I feel this. I feel it in my bones, how Bonnie sort of floats and laughs through life. She says she likes climbing trees, listening to music, dancing, and “bow and arrowing.” She likes to have a laugh, flicker through a chapter book, or lounge on the couch. She doesn’t hold a grudge, she wakes up slow but happy most days, she eats only when she’s hungry and sleeps when she’s tired. I truly believe it’s because she built a tool in her brain to keep what’s good and throw away the rest.

My tool is a closed door. It’s the absence of an invitation. An acknowledgment that so much swirls around me, but I will preserve space for what is only mine. It’s quiet. It’s letting go of all the heaviness, all the things I stored for so long. It is a polite refusal to participate in the onslaught of opinions, information, and input all around me.

It is relishing my inner sanctuary. I have worked so hard to build it, and now it is time to rest in the peace and magic and calm of my own inner world. To drop in and read a book, sip some tea by the light of a salt lamp, cuddle in my cozy blankets, exhale, relax. I have my space, I have my tool, I can keep what is mine and drop the rest.

At last, I am finally home.