Today I Choose to be Self determining – How to be Self determining

I spent decades being successful. Good money, nice life, all the checkboxes ticked. Chief Compliance Officer by day, responsible adult by night. My stick figures looked like they belonged in the Special Olympics, and I was fine with that. I wasn’t artistic. I wasn’t a writer. I was practical, sensible, the one who kept everyone else’s trains running on time.

Then at 60, everything shifted.

It started with a Dutch Pour painting video that popped up in my feed. Acrylic paint flowing across canvas, creating these gorgeous organic patterns without any artistic skill required. My chiropractor had been encouraging me to try something creative for stress relief. That night, I bought supplies. Trepidatiously mixed my first colors, tilted the canvas, and watched magic happen. The results were actually beautiful. Not “beautiful for a beginner” but genuinely, hang-on-your-wall beautiful.

Something cracked open in that moment. If I could create art at 60, what else was possible?

That crack became a canyon when I started Enlightenzz. After decades of wearing masks, being what everyone needed me to be, I began writing my truth. Not the polished Sunday morning version, but the Tuesday afternoon reality. The hot flashes in Target. The panic on mountain roads. The grief that arrives uninvited at kitchen tables.

Becoming isn’t comfortable. My chest tightened every time I hit “publish.” My shoulders crept toward my ears when I shared a vulnerable story. That voice in my head, the one that spent 50 years perfecting its critical commentary, had a field day. “Who do you think you are? Nobody wants to read this. Stick to spreadsheets.”

But here’s what I’m learning about becoming: it’s not a destination. It’s this constant unfolding, this daily choice to grow toward light even when the soil feels uncertain. Some days I feel like a “real” creator. Other days I’m convinced I’m playing dress-up in someone else’s life.

The Messy Middle of Transformation

Becoming requires grieving who you were. I had to mourn the woman who had all the answers, who kept herself small and safe. There’s comfort in staying the same, even when that sameness is slowly suffocating you. Change means admitting that maybe you got it wrong, that maybe you spent decades optimizing for the wrong metrics.

The physical sensations of becoming are real. When I write something particularly vulnerable, my jaw clenches so tight I have to consciously release it. When I experiment with a new painting technique, my hands shake slightly. Not from fear exactly, but from the electricity of expansion, like my body is rewiring itself in real-time.

Some mornings I wake up and don’t recognize myself. Not in a bad way, but in a “who is this woman creating things?” way. The woman who now has paint permanently embedded under her fingernails. Who has a website sharing her messiest truths with strangers. Who cares more about alignment than achievement.

The Unexpected Physics of Growth

Becoming has its own physics. You can’t rush it any more than you can rush a butterfly from its chrysalis. Push too hard and you damage the wings. But you also can’t stop it once it starts. That first painting, that first honest blog post, they’re like dropping a pebble in still water. The ripples keep expanding whether you want them to or not.

I notice becoming in small moments. The way I introduce myself has changed. I used to led with my title, my accomplishments, my professional identity. Now? “I’m a writer and artist exploring what it means to be human at 61.” The first time those words came out of my mouth, I wanted to swallow them back. Now they feel like coming home.

The resistance still shows up. Last week, I stared at a blank canvas for an hour, paralyzed by the possibility of ruining it. As if there’s a shortage of canvases in the world. As if becoming requires perfection rather than permission to experiment.

What Nobody Tells You About Late-Life Transformation

Becoming at 61 is different than becoming at 30. At 30, you think you have infinite time to course-correct. At 61, you know the toilet paper roll is spinning faster (as my doctor so eloquently put it). This creates urgency but also freedom. What’s the worst that could happen? I fail at art? I write something nobody reads? I’ve survived worse.

The unexpected gift is that becoming gets easier with age. Those opinions I used to tie myself to? They matter less when you’ve lived enough life to know that everyone’s too worried about their own stuff to care much about yours. The fear of judgment that kept me small for decades? It’s been replaced by curiosity about what else might be possible.

Some days I create garbage. Paintings that look like a toddler’s tantrum. Blog posts that meander without meaning. But that’s part of becoming too: accepting the failed experiments as necessary data, not personal indictments.

The Daily Practice of Emergence

Becoming requires daily choices. Every morning with my coffee, I face the question: Will I create today or just consume? Will I risk vulnerability or stay safe? Will I honor this emerging version of myself or retreat to familiar patterns?

The answer isn’t always yes to growth. Sometimes becoming means resting, integrating, allowing the new neural pathways to solidify. Sometimes it means sitting with the discomfort of not knowing who you’re becoming, only that you’re no longer who you were.

I’m learning that becoming isn’t about becoming someone else. It’s about excavating who was always there, buried under decades of shoulds and musts and professional appropriateness. The woman who finds joy in watching paint flow across canvas. Who writes about the real stuff even when her hands shake. Who’s choosing curiosity over certainty.

The Ongoing Revolution

Now when people ask what I do, I tell them I’m becoming. It’s a verb, not a destination. I’m becoming more creative, more honest, more aligned with whatever wants to emerge. Some days that looks like finishing a painting. Other days it looks like deleting three paragraphs of bullshit and starting over with truth.

The beautiful terror of becoming is that you can’t unknow what you know. Once you’ve tasted creation, once you’ve felt the electricity of alignment, going back to sleep isn’t an option. You’re ruined for the old life, even when the new one hasn’t fully formed.

I don’t know who I’m becoming. That’s the point. If I knew, it wouldn’t be becoming. It would be strategic planning, and I’ve done enough of that for one lifetime. All I know is that she paints. She writes. She shares her mess alongside her wisdom. She’s learning that flourishing has nothing to do with income and everything to do with feeling alive.

Maybe that’s enough. Maybe becoming is just saying yes to whatever wants to emerge, even when your inner critic is having a field day. Maybe it’s choosing expansion over safety, creation over consumption, truth over masks.

Today I choose to be becoming. Not because I have it figured out, but because the alternative, staying the same, is no longer acceptable. The canvas is waiting. The blank page beckons. And this woman, whoever she’s becoming, is finally ready to show up.

Even if her stick figures still look ridiculous.