I’ve been thinking a lot about the stories we tell ourselves.
How they settle into the mind, how they root themselves so deeply that they start to feel like truth. And for as long as I can remember, the story I’ve told myself about St. Louis has been… complicated.
It’s heavy in a way I never really wanted to examine.
A blend of sad old memories, old versions of me, and a lingering sense of “I don’t belong here,” even when my feet were firmly planted on this soil.
But lately, I’ve been asking myself a harder question:
what if the city never changed; what if I did?
So, I decided to try something new - a small, personal experiment in neuroplasticity.
A conscious attempt to see this place not through the eyes of who I used to be, but through the curiosity of who I’m becoming.
It’s funny how easily we let our past color our present.
How a familiar street can trigger an old emotion faster than we can breathe through it.
How we can live somewhere for years but never truly see it because we’re looking through the wrong filter.
So here I am… choosing a different filter.
Choosing to look up instead of look away.
Choosing to notice the way the morning light hits certain neighborhoods I never gave a chance.
Choosing to step into community instead of assuming I’m not invited.
This isn’t about falling in love with St. Louis.
It’s about giving myself permission to experience it without the shadow of yesterday.
I’m learning that healing isn’t always loud or dramatic.
Sometimes it’s quiet.
Sometimes it looks like driving the same streets with a softer heart.
Sometimes it feels like accepting that beauty can exist in places you never thought to look.
And maybe this experiment lasts a month.
Maybe longer.
Maybe it simply teaches me something about myself and not the city at all.
But I know this:
I don’t want to keep living anywhere -not even in my own mind- through an outdated lens.
I want to rediscover and not retreat.
I want to be present while I’m here.
And I want to honor the version of me that’s finally ready to release the old story and write a new one.
St. Louis may not have changed.
But I’m starting to.
-Kayla
