Momento Mori

Dear Evolving Reader, 

Most people avoid thinking about death. Yet I've always found it to be deeply grounding. Not just on the days life is loud but in my reflective daily moments, I find myself returning to the same thought. One day, all of this will come to an end.

Consistently, it brings me back to what matters most.  It was reflecting on the phrase Memento Mori that led me somewhere unexpected... The initial stages of self mastery often lead us down the path of addition. We assume that to become more in life, we simply need to add more. Though this is an imperative part of forward progression, there is something we rarely acknowledge about becoming. Growth is often seen solely as a process of accumulation. More confidence. Deeper wisdom. Greater success. But what if becoming has far less to do with accumulation than it does with release?

Some of the most significant transformations in our lives don't begin when we gain something new. They begin when something obsolete is removed. Sometimes what needs releasing isn't physical at all. It's an identity we've outgrown, a belief that once protected us, or a story we've repeated so many times we've mistaken it for who we are. We spend much of our lives asking what we need to learn or what we need to achieve next. Rarely do we ask a much more important question: What am I still carrying that no longer belongs in the life I'm trying to create?

It is undeniable that endings make us uncomfortable. We naturally associate them with loss. We grieve relationships, careers and seasons of life that never unfolded quite as we imagined. Even when we know something has reached its natural conclusion, there is a part of us that still wants to hold on. Not because it is right for us anymore, but because it is familiar, and familiarity often disguises itself as safety. The more I reflected on Memento Mori, the more I felt it was pointing towards something entirely different. Death isn't reserved for the final chapter of our lives: it happens constantly.

Not the death of the body. But the quiet death of identities, beliefs, versions of ourselves that simply cannot accompany us into the next season. Think about the person you were five years ago. Their fears and ambitions, the things you once define you forever.  Much of it has already disappeared because that version of you fulfilled its purpose and was never mean to stay. Understandably, this is why transformation can feel so unsettling, despite how much we long to step into our highest self, fulfil our potential and create the life we desire.

Every meaningful transformation requires something to fall away first. The version of you that carried you this far may not be the version that carries you any further. There comes a point where growth is no longer about striving to become someone new, but having the courage to loosen your grip on the identities, beliefs and stories that have quietly reached the end of their purpose.

That is exactly what I explore in this week's episode. Not just the courage to move forwards but the courage to release what no longer belongs. Much of the tension we experience isn't change itself, its the space between what is ending and what is yet to begin. What if the invitation isn't to hold on tighter? What if it is simply to trust that every ending is making space for something we cannot yet see? The more I reflect on Memento Mori, the more I realise that becoming isn't measured solely by everything we've accumulated along the way. It is also measured by everything we've been willing to release.

So as you move through this week, instead of asking yourself what you need to become, try asking a different question. What version of me has already completed its purpose? Because sometimes the next chapter of our lives doesn't begin when something extraordinary arrives. It begins the moment we stop carrying what was never meant to come with us. That, to me, is the deeper invitation hidden within Memento Mori. Not simply to remember that one day we must die. But to realise that the life we've been searching for may be waiting for something within us to end first.

(Listen to the full episode here)

Until next Tuesday...

With great love,

 Summer