Deep inside the forest, an old tree
bends around an awkward knot in her trunk.
She does not wonder why she failed to grow
straight and smooth like the other trees.
She just keeps reaching toward the sun.
New branches emerge
from places that once looked broken.
Small green leaves appear without explanation.
At her roots,
a narrow stream winds around fallen branches,
heavy stones, and pieces of earth
that have slipped into her path.
But, the stream does not accuse herself of losing ground.
She simply moves toward the next opening.
The long way is her way.
Near the water’s edge,
a small wildflower leans so far to one side
that her petals nearly brush the ground.
She does not pull herself upright
to look more like the flowers in the meadow.
She turns her perfectly crooked stem
toward the little bit of light that reaches her—
and she blooms there.
Somewhere nearby,
a caterpillar rests inside the darkness of her cocoon.
She does not stare at the butterflies overhead
and worry that she is behind; that her path is wrong.
She does not demand that her wings appear before they are ready.
Something within her already knows.
Her timing is flawless.
The forest is filled with uneven edges,
twisted branches, trembling leaves, unusual colors,
and paths that turn for no apparent reason.
But nothing in nature mistakes different for not enough.
Everything is becoming exactly as it is becoming.
Perfectly on time.
And I wonder—
What does Life know about me that I have forgotten?
What does she see when she looks at the places
I have called strange, anxious, awkward,
or too much?
Maybe Life has never mistaken my path
for something going wrong.
Maybe while I was busy measuring myself
against every calm and confident person,
wondering why my path was different,
Life was kneeling beside me, holding a much wider view.
Oh, sweet girl.
You are seeing through distorted lenses right now.
Come closer and borrow my eyes.
Look again.
That awkward knot in the tree is beautiful.
That trembling leaf is exquisite.
That dark cocoon is spectacular.
And you—
exactly as you are,
exactly as you were,
exactly as you are becoming—
have always been more lovely than you can imagine.
No mistakes.
Nothing broken.
Nothing behind schedule.
Just this perfect, beautiful expression of Life.
~Missy Maiorano, 2026
This past weekend, as I strolled through San Diego with Pete, Megan, and Martin, my adorable little mind decided to play one of its favorite little tricks. In the midst of a blissful, sunny afternoon, it began playing an old, compelling movie called, “Little Missy’s Weird Nervous System.”
The movie wasn’t one particular memory. It was more like a collection of little scenes that kept drifting in and out—different ages, different places, but always the same sweet little girl trying so hard to understand herself. A little girl wishing everything felt easier inside. It was a movie that has played a hundred times over the years.
The main character—Little Missy—arrives on the scene with her stomach aches and her strange fevers before piano recitals and baton twirling competitions. She feels anxious without even knowing the word anxious. She watches her amazing parents move through the world with what looks to her like total confidence and ease. She watches the other little kids try new things and raise their hands in class as if they have no idea what fear even feels like.
Why did that sweet Little Missy somehow get a completely different kind of nervous system? Why didn’t she get that miraculous genetic cocktail of ease, relaxation, and deep feeling of safety that her parents had?
Her body reacted loudly to things that didn’t seem to faze other people at all. She worried about things that other people found silly or ridiculous. She felt everything so profoundly on the inside, almost as if she had no skin or protective covering.
And because Little Missy had a normal, human mind, she began forming what felt like a rock-solid identity built entirely around this peculiar nervous system.
I’m the one who is different.
And then, I’m the one who is different became I’m the one who is not as good. I’m the one who is broken.
It’s fascinating how quickly those little identities form themselves.
They’re like little pieces of paper with the words “Not Good Enough” written in black ink. The paper wraps itself around the deeper, more stable identity of wholeness, worth, abundance, and love.
The newly formed paper identity is thin and wispy, but to a Little Missy with an anxious nervous system, it feels as deep and immoveable as the Grand Canyon. She believes it’s who she is, all the way to her core.
But this past weekend, when that old movie decided to play right in the middle of one of my most glorious days in sunny California, I saw something new and wonderfully fresh.
I realized that I have been innocently remembering the story of Little Missy through Little Missy’s eyes rather than through the eyes I have now.
I have been remembering an innocent misperception all this time. And I have been carrying this misperception of my childhood as if it was the truth.
All those times I remembered the stomach aches, I could only see a child who couldn’t handle the normal things of life. When I remembered the strange fevers, I could only see a failed nervous system that overreacted to the dumbest things. When I remembered how uncomfortable Little Missy felt inside her own skin, I could only see evidence of an awkward and incapable little girl.
I was carrying the memory of Little Missy’s misunderstanding as if it was TRUTH.
Somewhere along the way, Little Missy had mistaken different for not enough. She had—through her innocent little lenses—mistaken different for broken.
She did not yet know that SEEMS LIKE and FEELS LIKE are not the same as reality. She couldn’t have possibly understood that they are our perception of reality through a narrow lens pretending to be the truth.
Little Missy felt broken because she had not gained her clear lenses yet. She was wearing the lenses of her youth. She didn’t realize yet that something so much greater and wiser was right there with her, holding her with steady, safe, strong hands.
She hadn’t met me yet.
And for the first time this past weekend, I began to realize that I have the power now to revisit Little Missy and let her borrow my lenses. I have the incredible gift of being able to rewrite that misinterpreted version of history—that misidentification with a lie.
So this past weekend, when that movie began to play of poor Little Missy, something wonderful WHOOSHED through my body with the lightness of a firefly. And the feeling of it was something like, “Missy, go to that little one and help her see a deeper truth. Show her the reality of her childhood through clear and loving lenses.”
So, in my imagination, I walked into the movie and sat down beside that adorable little girl. I didn’t explain anything. I didn’t tell her all the amazing things she would grow up to become. I just sat close enough for our shoulders to touch.
And I looked at her through the lenses I have now.
I saw a little girl whose body was astonishingly awake. Everything in life came all the way into her little system—the excitement, the fear, the beauty, the uncertainty, the music, the faces in the audience, and the possibility of getting something wrong. Her body felt the whole room. It registered every shift. Every slight movement of wind. Every barely perceptible change in tone of voice or facial expression.
I saw how hard she was trying to understand sensations that felt enormous inside such a small body. I saw the innocent way she looked around at other children and assumed their insides felt calmer than hers. I saw how quickly she concluded that their ease and relaxation meant that they had received something she had not been given.
But through my lenses, I could see her without those conclusions wrapped around her.
I could see that her tenderness belonged to her just as naturally as the knot belongs to the tree. Her winding path was her perfect path. Her trembling leaves did not make her any less rooted. She was a perfect, beautiful expression of Life long before any part of her sensitive little system became useful to anyone else.
Her worth filled every inch of her before she became a teacher, a coach, a mother, a wife, or a friend. Before she helped another person understand the language of their own body. Before she learned how to notice the smallest change in someone’s voice or recognize the two-percent opening hidden inside a terrifying story.
Before all of that, she was already whole.
She simply could not see it from where she was standing.
As I sat beside her, I imagined letting her look through my eyes for a moment. I wanted her to see the little girl I could see now—the one with the enormous heart and the wildly alive body. The one who noticed everything. The one who felt so much because feeling deeply was simply part of the way Life moved through her.
And then, just as quickly, my present-day mind arrived with its anguish and anger:
But why?!
Why did this sweet little girl have to feel so much anxiety? Why did so much energy have to race through her body? Why did ordinary moments sometimes feel like enormous, high-stakes events?
Surely there could have been an easier path. Surely all that tenderness could have arrived with at least forty percent fewer stomach aches.
Of course my mind asks those questions.
It loves her, too.
My adorable mind sees a little girl it wishes it could protect, and it wants an explanation. It wants a reason that will make every difficult moment add up neatly. It wants to go back through time, locate the exact source of the misunderstanding, and correct it before Little Missy ever begins to believe that she is broken.
Thankfully, answers and explanations never arrive to satisfy that mind.
But something SO MUCH BETTER does:
A simple invitation to soften, to love, to hold and be held.
A message written in a warm breeze:
Go to her. Sit beside her.
Let her see through your lenses.
Help her see how OK she always was. How whole, complete, and perfect she was.
What if all of it belonged to her path? What if all of it was perfect?
Tell her “I’ve got you.”
And the funny thing is—I do not know exactly who the I is in this message written in the warm breeze.
Maybe it is the woman I am now who can speak to her younger self. Maybe it is Life speaking through both of us. Maybe it is Love. Maybe it is God.
Or, maybe, there was never any real separation between any of those.
Me, Little Missy, Love, God….Just one seamless movement of Life.
So, I take Little Missy’s hand in mine. And, as I whisper the words to that sweet little girl, I can feel something much larger whispering the same words to me:
I’ve got you.
I gotchu.
While I am holding her, I am also being held.
We sit together for just a little while longer.
A little girl finally looking through a wider pair of lenses.
A grown woman finally seeing who had been there all along.
And the same quiet words moving between us—
I gotchu.
You’ve always been held in perfect safety and love.