Hey sweet girl,
Dancing through the living room,
fingers trailing along the spines of books on the bookcase,
twirling from room to room.
Mum is cleaning in the kitchen,
“Everywhere” playing through the room,
its sound twinkling as you spin.
Sister and brother are off somewhere else, playing,
and you are here —
suspended in a moment of sweet, unaware joy.
You don’t know yet
that you’ll carry this light inside you forever.

Please hear me.
Remember —
you are allowed to be silly.
You are allowed to sing.
You are allowed to be something other than “perfect.”
To imagine.
To believe in magic,
in love,
in joy.

You were never “too much.”
You simply felt
and saw
the things others chose to ignore —
the good and the bad,
the magic threaded through everything.
Life has always danced through your veins.

You should have been protected.
You should have been celebrated.
You were never meant to disappear.
You were never meant to shrink,
or to feel that every emotion
had to be silenced
or lost.

You should never have been taught
to fear
the people closest to you,
or that love was conditional —
something offered in moments of compliance,
and quietly withdrawn
the moment you stepped out of line —
a line that blurred and shifted
beneath your feet.

And so you learned
to shape yourself into something acceptable
just to be held.

But listen, sweet girl — true love is unconditional.
It’s not something you earn
by becoming smaller.
It does not ask you to dim.

And I love you.
You are beautiful,
smart,
and delightfully silly.

Don’t chase after ‘Prince Charming.’
He’s just a silly boy
hunting for a trophy to place on his broken pedestal

There is a king who will meet you as you are —
someone who sees you clearly,
who will never ask you to dim your light,
who will celebrate the heights you reach
and stand beside you as you rise.

I see you.
You are loved.
It is safe
to be exactly who you are.

Carry this moment with you
through the years.
Let the song,
the twirling,
and the light
become a peaceful place in your heart
that no one can ever take away.

We never lost ourselves.
We just had to come back —
to the song,
to the twirling,
to the light
that has always been ours.