Fire & Tide

Why this song has become the soundtrack to my own becoming.

Every so often, I come across something that meets me exactly where I am.

Sometimes it’s a book. Sometimes it’s a conversation. Sometimes it’s a walk through my garden or a quiet moment that changes the way I see the world.

And sometimes, it’s a song.

I often share the things that capture my curiosity because they’ve usually taught me something about myself. Fire and Tide by AkramUg is one of those discoveries.

I’ve listened to it more than a hundred times over the past few weeks. Not because I can’t get the melody out of my head, but because it has become an anthem for this season of my life. It gave words to experiences I’d been carrying quietly and reminded me that sometimes the things that make us feel most seen arrive in the most unexpected ways.

As I listened, I realized I wasn’t just hearing someone else’s story. I was recognizing pieces of my own.

At its heart, this song is about transformation.

It uses water and fire as symbols of two forces that shape us. Water teaches us to surrender, to adapt, and to keep moving. Fire transforms us. It burns away what no longer belongs so something stronger can emerge.

One lyric stopped me the first time I heard it:

“The woman in the water wasn’t who I was meant to find. She was only who I needed to be brave enough to leave behind.”

For so much of my life, I thought healing meant getting back to who I used to be. Now I see it differently. Every difficult season has changed me, and I no longer want to return to an earlier version of myself. I want to honor the woman those experiences have shaped.

Another line says:

“The ones who’ve known the darkness know the value of the light.”

That feels true to my own life. The hardest seasons I’ve walked through have also made me more compassionate, more curious, and more appreciative of ordinary moments. They taught me to notice beauty that I might have overlooked before. They taught me that our deepest wounds can also become the places from which we offer the most hope to others.

Perhaps the lyric that resonates most is:

“I stopped dimming down my fire just to make them feel their best.”

That doesn’t feel like rebellion to me. It feels like freedom.

There was a time when I looked outside myself for approval, belonging, or reassurance that I was enough. Over the years, I’ve learned to carry my own light. Not because life has become easier, but because I trust myself to find my way, even when the path is uncertain.

I’ve stopped waiting for other people to tell me who I am. I’ve stopped trying to become smaller so others feel more comfortable. Instead, I’m learning to stand fully in my own life with curiosity, compassion, and a quiet confidence that wasn’t there before.

I also love the imagery of the ocean.

The song reminds us that the ocean doesn’t cling to what has crossed its surface. It keeps moving with elemental grace. There is something deeply comforting about that. Life leaves its marks on all of us, but we don’t have to stay anchored to every storm we’ve survived. We can honor what shaped us without allowing it to define where we’re going.

Maybe that’s why this song has become such a companion for me.

It isn’t encouraging me to become someone new.

It’s reminding me that I’ve been shaped by both the tide and the fire.

The tide taught me to soften without losing myself.

The fire taught me to let go of the versions of me that were built from fear instead of truth.

Together, they’ve taught me to carry my own light.

Not because I’ve escaped the storms, but because I’ve discovered that the light was never waiting for me on the other side of them.

It was growing within me the whole time.

Thank you for reading. If these reflections resonate with you, I hope you'll stay awhile. I write about the intersections of story, healing, and the quiet wisdom we gather along the way. In the coming weeks, I'll also be sharing the release of my debut novel, The Map Maker, a story born from many of the same questions explored here. If you'd like to follow the journey, I'd love to have you join me.