Well illustration from the original inspiration column.
In the Hill Country, a good well is not something you take lightly. When you find one that produces, you stick with it. You build around it. You trust it. That is what I had. It worked. It provided. It made sense. Which is why leaving it felt wrong. From the outside, I imagine it looked even worse. Why walk away from something good? Why trade certainty for something unproven?
People ask those questions out loud sometimes. Other times, they just answer them for you. Motives get assigned. Intentions get rewritten. And no matter how carefully you try to explain your heart, it somehow comes out different on the other side. I tried. I really did. I explained, clarified, circled back, softened my words. But somewhere along the way, I realized something I did not want to admit.
Not everyone will understand your reasons, and not everyone is meant to. So I stepped away. What they do not tell you about digging a new well is how long it takes before you find water. At first, there is nothing. Just dry ground and effort that feels wasted. You question yourself. You replay every conversation. You wonder if maybe they were right about you.
Those are the hard days. But you keep digging. Not out of stubbornness, but out of calling. There is a difference. One is about proving something. The other is about obedience. Slowly, things begin to shift. Not all at once. Not loudly. Just enough to keep going. And over time, what once felt like loss starts to look more like planting. What felt like breaking starts to feel like becoming.
The truth is, some things have to be left behind for new life to begin. Even good things. Even things that worked. Time has a way of doing what words cannot. It softens hearts. It clears confusion. It reveals what was actually there all along. I do not regret the well I walked away from. It served its purpose. But I also do not regret the ground I stand on now.
Because sometimes the clearest sign you are where you are meant to be is not how easy it was to get there, but that you were willing to keep digging when no one else understood why.
By Matthew Willis · From the April–June 2026 issue.