There is a specific kind of silence that exists before a breakthrough. It’s the silence of the soil before the first sprout breaks through—a quiet, heavy waiting. For a while, my pen felt like that soil: dormant, yet holding a universe of potential. But lately, there has been a shift. A rejuvenation.
In my practice, I often tell my clients that healing is not a linear path, but a spiral—we return to old places with new eyes. I am returning to my writing now, not out of the frantic “shoulds” of a career, but because I am learning to love the discipline of it again. As a Black woman and a therapist, my life is often dedicated to holding space for the narratives of others. I witness the trauma, the triumph, and the messy “in-betweens” of the human condition. It is holy work, a ministry of presence, but it requires a different kind of “due diligence” than the creative soul demands.
I find myself still wondering, What does that diligence look like for me now? It feels like a commitment to the truth that exists outside of a diagnostic manual, a surrender to the promise in Isaiah 43:19: “Behold, I am doing a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it? I will make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert.”
The Grounding and the Expounding
Writing is my peculiar grace. It is the only thing I know that can simultaneously ground me and expound me without causing harm. In the clinical world, we talk about “containment”—the ability to hold difficult emotions without being overwhelmed by them. Writing is my ultimate container. It roots me in the present moment, in the physical sensation of the word meeting the page, yet it allows my spirit to expand, to reach toward truths I didn’t know I was carrying. It is a soft place to land and a vast place to fly.
The Shadow of the Teenager
I was a writer long before I was a therapist. Long before the degrees, the licenses, and the clinical formulations, there was just Michelle and her notebook. Yet, as I sit to work on my first book, I often feel a familiar shadow. It’s that awkward, “weird” teenage version of myself. She’s still there, hovering over the keyboard, whispering doubts about whether these words are enough to merit an editor or a place on a shelf.
In therapy, we might call this “ego state” work. I have to remind that younger version of me that she doesn’t have to carry the weight of the book alone. We are doing this together now. I am the woman I needed back then, and she is the spark I need right now. We are no longer in the desert; the river is starting to flow.
The Muse of the Blog
While the book feels like a marathon, this blog—Intimately Worded—has become my muse. There is an ease here. Publishing a post feels like a deep, collective exhale. It is the training ground for my bigger dreams. And yes, I have those dreams: to be the famous, money-making author, to see my name in lights not for my clinical notes, but for the soul I pour into my prose.
I am skilled in clinical writing, yes. I can draft a treatment plan with my eyes closed, weaving logic and empathy into a professional narrative. But there is a different magic in “playing with words” just for the sake of the play. It is where my spirit breathes.
“You Are Such a Michelle”
Whenever I find myself caught in the web of my own complexity—the therapist analyzing the writer, or the writer questioning the therapist—I hear my mother’s voice. I can hear the specific tone, that familiar cadence that only a mother can have.
“You are such a Michelle.”
I repeat those words to myself like a mantra. In her tone, it isn’t a critique; it’s an acknowledgement of my essence. It’s a reminder that I am allowed to be all of it: the skilled clinician, the ambitious dreamer, the spiritual seeker, and the woman who is finally, discipline by discipline, coming home to her words.
Writing out of love is the highest form of rejuvenation. The “new thing” is here. I am grounded, I am perceived, and I am ready to see where the words take me next.
Being Brave,
Michelle
©️Intimately Worded, Michelle
Intimately Worded with Michelle 
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