I am ashamed of how practical I have become

Dear Delyara, I used to dream more freely. I used to feel more movement in myself. More appetite. More risk. More hunger for a life that felt distinctly mine. Now so much of my energy goes into keeping things running that ambition feels like a luxury item I look at through glass but no longer fully believe I can afford. That shames me. Not because practical life has no dignity. It does. Because I can feel that some part of me has gone from alive to efficient, and I do not know how to forgive that in myself without also lying about how much I miss the older fiercer version. I don’t want to become someone who survives beautifully and lives timidly. Some days, that feels dangerously close to what is happening.