Peace Was Too Quiet for Me at First

Early recovery didn’t feel like peace. It felt like static.

I’d wake up to silence and think something was wrong. I’d sit in my living room, fully sober, fully still—and feel like I was crawling out of my skin. For years, I lived on high alert. Chaos was my soundtrack. Drama was my oxygen. Even pain, at least, made sense.

But peace? Peace was unnerving.

I didn’t know how to breathe when nothing was broken. I didn’t know how to relax when nobody was mad at me. I didn’t know who I was without something to fix or someone to apologize to.

That’s the part nobody prepares you for: how uncomfortable it is when things finally stop being uncomfortable.

When I first got sober, I told myself I was ready for stillness. I said I craved peace. But the truth was, I craved the idea of peace—I just didn’t know how to sit in it.

For a long time, I confused boredom with failure. If I wasn’t fighting something, chasing something, or cleaning up a mess, I thought I must be doing it wrong.

But slowly—so slowly—I started to understand what was really happening.

I wasn’t bored. 
I was safe. 
I wasn’t stuck. 
I was still. 
And that stillness wasn’t empty. It was full of presence.

Now, when I wake up to quiet, I don’t panic. I thank God.

Because peace isn’t loud. It doesn’t announce itself. 
It just sits with you, patient and kind, until you’re ready to stop flinching.