A Year of Becoming:
Reflections on Identity, Love, and Coming Home to Myself
Maybe you’ve felt it too. This year felt different — intense, challenging, full of growth. Like shedding old skins again and again, month after month. 🐍🤍✨
In chinese astrology, 2025 is the year of the snake — a time of transformation and rebirth. And this symbolism resonates deeply with me. It felt like something within was calling me home. Not home to a place I had been before, but home to a version of myself I hadn’t yet met.
This year asked me to let go of layers and step into a life I never planned — but somehow always belonged to. And through the uncertainty, the change, and the beautiful chaos, I learned that sometimes the bravest thing we can do is allow ourselves to become someone new.
Just like the snake, releasing what no longer serves to reveal what’s been waiting underneath.
As we move into this transition time between the years, where the days are dark and the veil is thin, I invite you to take a moment with me. To pause, to reflect, to simply be. To ask yourself: who was I? who am I today? who am I becoming?
If you feel called, come with me. I want to take you on my personal journey through 2025 — from Bali to the Black Forest, through the process of releasing old identities and discovering what truly matters.
The Island That Taught Me to Let Go 🌺
Let's start at the beginning of this year, where I found myself on Bali, surrounded by sunshine and endless possibilities. I spent the first 3 months of the year creating, photographing, connecting. There was magic in those days — the kind that feels limitless and free. I was building something, expressing myself, meeting people, launching a new photography account on Instagram and releasing my first youtube videos
But underneath all that beauty, I felt the edges of something else. A longing for roots. For structure. For depth that goes beyond the surface shimmer of paradise.
I've learned that sometimes the most beautiful places show us what we're missing. Bali was abundant and alive, yes — but I wanted substance. I wanted to build a foundation, not just float through endless summer. I needed to know: who am I when I stop moving?
When Everything Changes at Once 🪶
By spring, life had other plans entirely.
I met someone. Or rather, we found each other again. Neither of us was looking for partnership — we were both perfectly content in our own worlds. But there it was: a shared vision, a pull we couldn't ignore, a feeling that said this is meant to unfold.
Within months, I'd moved to the Black Forest. To a life with a partner. With a child. With responsibilities and routines I'd never imagined for myself.
It was terrifying. It was overwhelming. It was nothing like the freedom I'd been living.
And yet, somehow, it felt like the most honest yes I'd ever said.
The Unraveling ✨
There's a moment I keep coming back to — June. Sitting with my hands in my hair, knowing what I was about to do. I took out my dreadlocks. Five years of growth, memory, identity wrapped in every twist and knot. And then I let them go.
I'd built so much of myself around those dreads. They were part of my image, my story, the person I showed to the world. And I realized I was holding onto them out of fear. Fear of losing what made me recognizable. Fear of not knowing who I'd be without them.
Cutting my hair felt like shedding an old skin. It was vulnerable and strange and surprisingly freeing.
I wanted to know: who am I beneath the image I've created?
That question echoed through everything else that year. Who am I in partnership? Who am I in family? Who am I when life slows down and asks me to be present instead of performing?
Building Something Real 🌿
While I was letting go of old identities, I was also creating something entirely new — a slow fashion brand, woven with intention and care.
In the summer, we traveled to Istanbul to choose fabrics. We touched linen and cotton, discussed designs, imagined how these pieces would feel on someone's skin. It was dreamlike and surreal — this vision becoming tangible, real, something you could hold.
By August, we had the first samples in our hands. And suddenly it wasn't just an idea anymore. It was soft, textured, here.
I've always believed that clothing is more than fabric — it's a language, a mirror, a way of honoring the inner world. Building this brand felt like putting that belief into form.
End of summer I launched my website and released my ebook "The Art of Dressing & Self-Expression" — giving words and form to everything I believe about style as a living language, clothing as a mirror of who we truly are. It felt like pieces of myself I'd been carrying for years were finally becoming real, tangible, something I could share.
The Hardest Lessons 🍂
I won't pretend it was easy. This year pushed me harder than any before it.
I turned 27 in August. I'm standing at the threshold of my Saturn return now. It hasn't fully arrived yet, but its energy is already here — calling me to grow, to take responsibility, to live with more honesty and intention. They say the Saturn return strips away what's false so we can rebuild from truth. And that's exactly what this year has felt like.
Letting go of my dreads. Leaving Bali. Releasing anything that was no longer serving me — even the parts I thought defined who I was.
Learning to be in partnership. To share space, to compromise, to be seen in all my imperfection. Learning to be present with a child — someone who needs patience, consistency, calm. Someone who mirrors back everything I haven't yet healed.
There were moments I wanted to run. Moments I doubted everything. Moments I felt lost in a life that didn't yet feel like mine.
But slowly, something shifted. I stopped trying to be who I was before. I stopped performing. I let myself soften, be humble, be human.
And in that softening, I found something I didn't expect: peace. ✨
What Really Matters 🌙
By the end of the year, I realized what all the chaos had been teaching me.
It's not about the image. It's not about the highlight reel or the perfect aesthetic. It's not even about always creating, always sharing, always being on.
What matters is presence. Connection. Truth. Building something real — a life, a home, a love that doesn't need to be photographed to be valid.
I pulled back from social media this year, and at first it felt like failure. But really, it was freedom. Freedom to figure out who I am when no one's watching. Freedom to let my life be quiet, imperfect, mine.
I'm learning to create from joy instead of pressure. To share from fullness instead of obligation. To let my days be soft and simple and still deeply meaningful.
Coming Home to Myself 🧚
If you'd told me a year ago that I'd be living in the Black Forest, in partnership, in family, building a brand and a life that looks nothing like what I imagined — I wouldn't have believed you.
But here I am. And I'm learning that home isn't a place. It's a feeling. It's showing up for the life you're actually living, not the one you thought you'd have.
This year taught me to let go. To trust. To become.
And maybe that's the most beautiful thing — not knowing who we'll be next, but being willing to find out.
Take a moment today: What are you ready to let go of? What version of yourself is asking to be released so something truer can emerge?
Sometimes the transformation we resist is the one that will set us free.
