Muse: Accountability

I haven’t been very thoughtful about my past this week — and that’s exactly why I need to sit here and write. Accountability has always been one of my biggest struggles. I can show up for everyone else, but when it comes to showing up for myself, I slip. Maybe you know that feeling too — when you realize time has gone by and you haven’t done the thing you said you would.

My mind’s been all over the place lately. Not with memories, but with food talk — the kind that won’t shut off once it starts. I’ve gained 13 pounds, and even though I don’t feel bad physically and I actually look healthy, that number still gets in my head. It’s wild how much space a number can take up.

I wish I could say I’ve moved past that kind of thinking, but I haven’t. It still hits the same nerve — the one that tells me I’m not trying hard enough or doing enough. It’s an old habit I can’t seem to shake.

And then there’s the other thing weighing on me. A friend from my baking community has cancer. She’s one of those people who brings light everywhere she goes, and she showed up in my life right when I needed a friend the most. I don’t have many of those — real friends I see in person. Most days it’s just me, my husband, my daughter, and the grandkids. I’m grateful for them, but sometimes it’s still quiet in a way that gets to me. So yeah, I’m hurting for her. And maybe I’m also just feeling that empty space a little more right now.

Accountability, for me, isn’t just about sticking to goals or staying productive. It’s about being honest about where I’m at — even when I don’t like it. Some weeks it looks messy. Some weeks it looks like this. But I’m here, writing it down, trying to face it instead of hiding from it.

Because maybe that’s all accountability really is — showing up anyway.