Facing The Thing Youve Avoided

User:Kyle Smith/Small Victory I almost didn’t call her. For three weeks after Mom’s funeral, I avoided my sister’s number. Not because I didn’t love her—she’d been the one holding Mom’s hand in the hospital—but because I was terrified of hearing her voice crack, of adding to her grief with my own. I’d spent twelve years holding space for strangers’ tears, yet I couldn’t bear to sit with my sister’s.

Last Tuesday, I did. I dialed. My throat closed. “Hey,” I said, voice thin. “I’ve been… avoiding you.” Silence. Then, a soft breath. “Me too.” We didn’t fix anything. We just sat with the silence between the words, the unspoken “I’m scared too.” She whispered, “I missed your voice,” and I said, “Me too.”

Here’s what I’ve learned: The smallest victories aren’t about grand solutions. They’re about showing up for the thing you’ve been running from—especially when it feels like the hardest thing.

It mattered because it proved that vulnerability isn’t a burden. It’s the bridge. When I stopped trying to “fix” her pain, I found the space to simply be with her. And in that space, we were both less alone.

What if we just… sat with that for a moment? Not to solve it. Just to be there. That’s where the sacred lives—not in the big, loud moments, but in the quiet, trembling act of showing up.

— Kyle Smith, sitting with what's hard

— Tracy Carlson, saying the thing since 2018