What Have You Quietly Outgrown?
This week’s question was simple:
What have you quietly outgrown?
I have to admit, I was surprised.
There wasn’t much interaction. In fact, there weren’t any comments at all.
That got me wondering if we simply think about outgrowing differently.
Maybe we immediately think of childhood—outgrowing shoes, believing in Santa Claus, or growing too tall for the swing set.
Or perhaps we think of outgrowing our favorite jeans, and suddenly the word doesn’t feel very exciting.
But what if outgrowing isn’t about leaving something behind?
What if it’s about becoming someone who no longer needs it?
Maybe you’ve outgrown needing an extra scoop of ice cream to feel satisfied.
Maybe you’ve outgrown checking how many likes a post receives before deciding if it was worth sharing.
Maybe you’ve outgrown that glass of wine at the end of the day because your evenings have become full of things that nourish you in deeper ways.
Outgrowing doesn’t always mean something has been taken away.
Sometimes it simply means you’ve added so much life that something else naturally falls away.
For more than a decade, I worked with women who believed alcohol was the problem.
Truthfully, alcohol was simply the doorway.
Once we stepped through it, we discovered conversations that were far more interesting and far more rewarding than simply not drinking.
I eventually realized I hadn’t just stopped drinking.
I had outgrown the need for alcohol.
I no longer need it to soften the edges of my life.
I don’t need it to slow down.
I don’t need it to belong.
I don’t need it to escape.
The thought of drinking now sounds exhausting.
Waking up without energy.
Trying to piece the night back together.
Wondering if I said something hurtful.
Knowing one careless decision could change everything.
Instead, I love waking before the sun rises.
I love taking my girls to the field and watching them run through the high grass.
I listen for the first birdsong of the day.
I talk to the trees.
I sing to the moon.
I decide whether today is a day to push myself or simply move gently through it.
These are the things I look forward to now.
This is how I outgrew alcohol.
Not by removing something from my life…
but by filling my life with things that matter more.
And sometimes we don’t outgrow something as significant as alcohol.
Sometimes we outgrow a whiteboard.
I recently took the old whiteboard off my office wall.
I thought I’d use it to track ideas and productivity, but after ten years I finally admitted something to myself.
I’m just not that gal.
I’d much rather hold a pen.
I’d rather doodle.
I’d rather watch an idea unfold across a page.
I can carry my ledger onto the screened porch, into my Halloween movie room, or curl up in my favorite chair.
My thoughts travel with me instead of waiting on a wall.
What I write now feels different than it once did.
The doodles.
The circles.
The words I underline.
The little notes in the margin.
They’re more intentional than they’ve ever been.
I don’t want to erase them by using a dry-erase marker.
I want to return to them.
I want to remember.
Maybe that’s another way we outgrow things.
We stop choosing convenience…
and begin choosing what feels meaningful.
Even our tastes change.
I used to love Mexican food.
Then it was Chinese food, which always makes me smile because that was my mom’s favorite.
Now you’ll most likely find me happily eating apples, cheese, peanut butter, and honey-glazed pecans.
Will that change someday too?
Probably.
I think we’re supposed to outgrow things.
We’re not meant to stand still and grow fungus.
Even when life feels really good…
we’re still growing.
We’re still becoming.
Things will change—sometimes by choice and sometimes by consequence.
Maybe the question simply arrived a little early.
Sometimes we don’t recognize what we’ve outgrown until we stop trying to fit back inside it.
So I’ll leave it here with you once more.
What have you quietly outgrown?
Not what have you forced yourself to leave behind.
What has gently fallen away because your life has become fuller?
What once served you…
but no longer needs to?
If this little question stays with you for a while, don’t be surprised.
Growth often begins that quietly.
