Who I Became in the Boiling Water

I’ve been back in Australia for two months now, and it’s still hard to put into words how I feel. The most confronting question I get asked is simple:

How was it? What did you do?

I never really know how to answer. I think people are waiting for something extravagant — a perfectly packaged explanation, something impressive. But the truth is quieter than that.

I went away to heal. To be at peace. To be alone. To find myself. And I did.

It’s strange now, having conversations about my time away.

Opening myself up. Talking about my healing journey — what I did, how I felt, who I am, who I’m becoming. And maybe most importantly, how I learned to cope with my past.

I’m still learning. Still healing.

But somewhere along the way,

I started saying something I never thought I could: I’m grateful for my past and everything I went through — because without it, I wouldn’t be who I am today. And from saying that, a story stayed with me.

The egg, the carrot, and the coffee bean.

I know it sounds a little ridiculous. Bear with me. The story goes like this.

A woman is overwhelmed by life. Everything feels heavy. Unfair. Too much.

Instead of offering advice, her mother brings her into the kitchen.

Three pots of water. All boiling.

Into the first pot, she drops carrots.

Into the second, an egg.

Into the third, coffee beans.

They sit in the same water. The same heat. The same intensity.

When they’re removed, the change is undeniable.

The carrots, once firm and strong, have softened.

The egg, once fragile, has hardened inside its shell.

And the coffee beans —

they’ve transformed the water itself.

And if you really think about it, isn’t that what life does to us?

We all enter hardship differently. Some of us go in strong and capable, only to come out the other side exhausted — softened by everything we had to endure. Some of us begin sensitive and open, but after enough loss, we leave more guarded. Closed off. Protecting what’s left.

And then — more rarely — there are those moments where we don’t just endure the boiling point.

We change it. Not by pretending the heat isn’t there. Not by becoming numb. But by allowing ourselves to soften, to dissolve, to reshape what surrounds us.

So ask yourself:

Who have you become?

Have you let life drain you of your strength?

Have you hardened in places you once felt deeply?

Or have you begun — quietly — to transform what tried to break you?

I think I’ve been all three at different points in my life. I used to be soft. Sensitive. Open. Trusting.

Until homelessness came knocking at my door.

Until my family fell apart.

Until the weight of being a financial burden settled in. I broke.

And I let the world turn me cold. I trusted no one. I showed nothing. Walls up. No emotion.

I didn’t even cry.

Then came heartbreak — and damn, that did a number on me. It broke me down in a different way.

For so long after, I became soft and weak. Everything hurt.

I was so broken I would go to anyone for help. I trusted people who led me down the wrong path. I lost myself in other people’s guidance. I became fragile.

And then, slowly, something shifted. Now, I’m able to endure pain and struggle without letting it shape me. Without letting it turn me cold. Without letting it break me.

It’s not that life has become easier.

Even five years later, I’m still facing many of the same hardships. But instead of being manipulated by the boiling water, I’m changing it. And the fact that I can even say that — that alone brings me peace.

It’s hard sometimes to see how much we’ve changed. It’s like seeing someone every day. You don’t notice them growing. Changing. Ageing.

But then you don’t see them for years, and suddenly it’s obvious how different they are. We struggle to see that within ourselves. We analyse. We criticise. We live inside our own heads.

So we miss the quiet evolution, happening right in front of us.

That’s why I love looking back at my old journals. They show me who I was then and who I’ve become now. I wrote as though the world was out to get me. As though I hated life. And truthfully — I did.

One of the biggest changes I see now is in how I travel, and how I spend time alone.

Three years ago, I was solo travelling around Italy for a month. It was when I first left Australia — my wounds were fresh. Open.

I enjoyed parts of it, but I don’t remember much. I didn’t truly experience it.

I was emotionless. On autopilot.

Wake up.

Get through the day.

Go to bed.

I didn’t feel what travel is meant to give you. Not until last year. For my twenty-fourth birthday, I decided to take myself on a solo trip to Portugal. And to this day, I remember walking around with a smile on my face — every single day. I felt joy just being on my own. Lying by the pool. Taking myself out to dinner. Wandering streets. Immersing myself in the culture.

That trip didn’t fix me. It showed me how much I had already healed.

And from that point on, every solo trip, every event, every small, ordinary moment has felt fuller than the last.

So I guess what I’m trying to say is this:

Sometimes we are carrots.

Sometimes we are eggs.

And sometimes — when the timing is right and healing has room to breathe — we become the coffee bean.

The lesson was never about choosing strength over softness. Or resilience over feeling.

It’s about awareness. And maybe that’s why it still hurts when people hear my story and say, “Oh, but you’re so strong.” Because it was never about strength.

It was about noticing who I was becoming in the heat — and choosing not to lose myself there.

The water will always boil.

Life doesn’t really give us a choice in that.

But who we become in it?

That part is still ours.

Much love,

Karina Jade xx