The revelation from my parents had changed everything. After that night, nothing felt the same. The mountains, the trip, the laughter- it should have been relaxing, but my mind never rested. Their words echoed endlessly: the barrier would collapse on my twenty-third birthday. It was no longer a distant prophecy. It was near.
As the final day of our trip arrived, exhaustion weighed heavy on me. A full week without proper sleep had broken me down. Every time I closed my eyes, nightmares slithered in, tearing me awake before I could find rest. My body ached, my spirit trembled, and though my family buzzed with excitement for my upcoming birthday, I carried dread in my chest like a stone.
I tried everything. Reiki sessions, self-healing, breathing, affirmations. Nothing worked. A deep pulsating sensation lived in the pit of my stomach, like something alive and restless inside me. It was undeniable. The prediction had been right. My energies were no longer sleeping. They were pushing, pressing, demanding to rise.
When we returned home, I should have collapsed into sleep, but fear kept me awake. My room felt different that evening. Curtains shut tight, shadows cloaked the space. I tossed my bag onto the bed and stretched my sore body. Then it came.
A creak.
"Who's there?" I shouted, my voice breaking.
My heartbeat thundered in my chest. The silence was heavier than the sound. Then, without warning, light burst from my palms.
I gasped. A glowing orb of light hovered above my hand, trembling with my fear. The more my panic surged, the bigger it grew. Soon the entire room blazed, lit by my own trembling energy.
Suddenly, voices erupted around me.
"SURPRISE!"
My friends stood there, balloons and cake in hand, shouting in chorus.
I clutched my chest, breathing hard.
"You nearly scared me to death!"
They laughed, thrilled to be with me, asking about my trip, begging for stories. If only I could tell them the truth. Instead, I smiled, nodded, let their chatter fill the silence. They flipped through my photos, disappointed by my absence in so many. In every picture, I seemed distant, lost in thought, like a ghost among them. They asked if something was wrong, and I shook my head, words locked in my throat.
After an hour of forced laughter, they left. The room grew quiet again. Their visit hadn't been pointless, they had cleaned, arranged, left cake behind. But the moment the door closed, the dread returned stronger. My birthday loomed, minutes racing like seconds. Normally I would count the days with excitement. Now I wished I could stop time altogether.
The night before my birthday, I sat alone in my room, reflecting on the girl I had been and the woman I was becoming. Acceptance of fate was one thing, but the reality of it still felt like a storm pressing against my skin. My eyelids grew heavy, and before I knew it, I slipped into sleep.
When I woke, I wasn't in bed. I was on the floor. My head spun as I looked at the clock on my phone.
11:59 p.m.
My stomach dropped.
It was time.
I stumbled to my feet, searching for my parents. To my shock, they were asleep. Always, every year, they had stayed awake until midnight to wish me happy birthday. Never had they gone to bed before the clock struck twelve. But tonight, they slept soundly, as if some unseen force had drawn them away from me.
Strange.
Disappointment mingled with fear. Then my phone rang, piercing the silence like a blade. The ringtone sounded unnatural, sharp, terrifying. My hands shook as I reached for it. I expected a friend's name to flash, but instead the number was unknown, blank, foreign.
I pressed answer with trembling fingers.
"Hello?"My voice cracked.
Nothing.
Only silence on the other end.
And then....
A voice in my head.
"Close your eyes."
My breath caught, but I obeyed. The world vanished. And then I saw it.
Not my physical body, but my energetic body. My chakras glowed before me in brilliant colors, aligned along my spine up to my crown. Yet each one was locked, sealed tight, darkened. My eyes fell to the base chakra at the end of my spine. A massive block of black energy sat there, dense and heavy, trapping everything beneath it.
Ohh!
This was it. The barrier. The very thing that had kept my powers sealed.
A shimmer of red light emerged from within me, slamming against the black mass. Sparks flew, the darkness trembling but holding its ground. The red glow intensified, brighter, hotter, until the block began to crack. Ashes fell away in streams of smoke.
Suddenly, the red light stopped moving.
Why?
It gathered itself tighter, preparing, coiling like a predator ready to strike.
And then it exploded forward.
With one violent surge, the barrier shattered into dust. The ashes dissolved into nothing, leaving only the red glow pulsing strong and alive.
The light shifted. Red turned to gold, slithering upward with a snake-like motion, curling, twisting, weaving. I felt it pierce through my base chakra, igniting it.
A flare of red burst outward, and the chakra began to spin. Clockwise. Alive.
I gasped in awe.
This wasn't a dream. It wasn't a vision. It was happening.
Dust poured out of the spinning chakra, decades of blockages, heavy negativity, all spilling free. My body shuddered as I felt them leave. I was lighter, freer.
Then came the voice again, calm and familiar.
"It will take time to open all seven chakras. With each cleansing, change will come."
I opened my eyes, gasping. My room was still there, but a faint red glow radiated from my lower body. The proof shimmered before me, I had witnessed a great shift. The seal was broken.
I looked around, heart pounding. My feet rooted into the earth more deeply than ever before. I could feel the ground, feel its pulse, feel its energy flowing through me.
Wow.
For the first time in weeks, anxiety slipped away. A calm excitement spread in its place. The journey had only begun. This was the first step. Six more awaited me, and with each one, I would be reborn again and again.