After ten years of apprenticeship with a shamanic teacher, I walked away. This is the story of devotion, awakening, and the tender reckoning that comes when a guide becomes human in your eyes—and you’re called to become your own. In this deeply personal essay, I explore what it means to outgrow a teacher, grieve a spiritual bond, and return to self-trust. It’s about reverence and release, about finding your footing when the pedestal gives way, and realizing that every true initiation leads you back to your own inner authority. Along the way, I speak of the Andean cosmovision, my nature father on the mountain, and the Sun—who once called me Solarita in a dream. If you’ve ever lost faith in a mentor or felt the ache of spiritual disillusionment, this story is for you.

Before I moved to Philadelphia, my sense of self depended entirely on who surrounded me. When no one was there, I felt myself vanish, becoming disembodied and boundless. The combination of skyscrapers and people changed that. The sheer magnitude of the city—with its omnipresent crowds, ubiquitous glass, and nonstop movement—gave me proof of existence. Even alone in a coffee shop or reading on a park bench, I could feel my edges. I existed because everything around me vibrated with life.

It all begins with an idea.When two soulmates walk into a building from opposite ends, they can’t help but find each other. Not ten years, not ten thousand miles can keep them apart. Especially not if, the first time they met, their lessons together weren’t complete.

One February 2nd — Groundhog Day — I woke to a text on my work phone. I wonder if you remember my birthday is in March. I fumbled for my glasses, my pulse quickening. The area code was his. Could it really be him — my “one who got away” and the man I had wished for a decade would find me again?

I’m swishing warm salt water through my teeth as I type. My gums ache, and my jaw feels like it has been clenching a pen.

It started almost two years ago with a strange habit called tongue thrusting. I thought it was stress. The tip of my tongue searched for textures in the back of my teeth the way my fingers once worked prayer beads when I needed comfort without words. It was unconscious—and weird.

Unsurprisingly, when I looked into the metaphysical cause, it pointed to unspoken words, silences piling up where sentences should be. By then, my whole jaw had joined the silent Quaker’s Meeting.