Growth Also Looks Like…
Pay What You Can for 21 Days of Laughs and Light
My electric toothbrush has seen it all.
I usually look in the mirror when I’m brushing my teeth, and for a while last fall, I often cried when I stared into my own eyes.
I did my best to hold it together in front of my sons—most of the time, anyway. But the mask often cracked when I met my own gaze. Deep sobs set to the gentle hum of my sonic. Life was just that overwhelming—with medical issues, a loved one’s shock diagnosis, and countless other challenges too numerous to list.
Then one day, after months of carrying more …
I Spent Years Chasing Love Until I Finally Chose Myself
“The only people who get upset when you set boundaries are the ones who benefited from you having none.” ~Unknown
For most of my life, I lived with a quiet ache, a longing I couldn’t quite name but always felt. I wanted to be chosen. Not just liked or tolerated, but fully seen, wanted, and loved.
That longing shaped so many of my choices. I over-gave in relationships, staying in situations far longer than I should have, and shrank myself to be accepted.
I didn’t know it at the time, but I was trying to fill an emptiness that had …
The Lie of Packaged Healing and the Truth About Feeling
“Emotions are not problems to be solved. They are signals to be felt.” ~Vironika Tugaleva
We’ve been taught to package our emotions like fast food—served quick, tidy, and with a smile. Americanized feelings. Digestible. Non-threatening. Always paired with productivity.
If you’re sad, journal it. If you’re angry, regulate it. If you’re overwhelmed, fix it with a three-step plan and a green juice. And if that doesn’t work? Try again. You probably missed a step.
This is how we sell emotional healing in the West—marketed like a self-improvement product. Seven-minute abs. Seven habits. Five love languages. Follow the formula. Find the …
The Hidden Link Between Self-Rejection and Social Anxiety
“True belonging only happens when we present our authentic, imperfect selves to the world. Our sense of belonging can never be greater than our level of self-acceptance.” ~Brené Brown
Last year over lunch, my friend, Jess, confessed something to me that hit me right in my gut because I’d been there too—that exact same lie, that exact same fear.
Out of nowhere, she blurted out, “I need to cancel.”
“Cancel what?” I asked.
She burst into tears. “I RSVPed yes to Jen’s wedding months ago, but it’s this weekend, and I just… I can’t do it.”
As she sobbed, she …
The Small, Simple Acts That Shifted Me Out of Survival Mode
“True healing is not a straight line. It is a spiral. You come back to things you thought you understood and see deeper truths.” ~Barry H. Gillespie
I used to believe healing would be obvious. Like a movie montage of breakthroughs… laughter through tears, epiphanies in therapy, and early morning jogs that end with a sunrise and a changed life. But that’s not what healing looked like for me.
It looked like dragging myself out of bed with puffy eyes after staying up too late crying. It looked like brushing my teeth when everything in me whispered, “Why bother?” It …
Planning Without Panic and Learning to Live in the Now
“You can plan for a hundred years. But you don’t know what will happen the next moment.” ~Tibetan proverb
Some days it feels like a fog I can’t shake—this underlying fear that something painful or uncertain is just around the corner.
I try to be responsible. I try to prepare, make good choices, take care of things now so the future won’t unravel later. But beneath that effort is something harder to face: I feel helpless. I can’t control what’s coming, and that terrifies me.
Maybe you’ve felt this too—that tension between doing your best and still fearing it’s not …
From Burnout to Bliss: The Beauty of Therapeutic Art
“It takes courage to say yes to rest and play in a culture where exhaustion is seen as a status symbol.” ~Brené Brown
“You have burnout.” I listened to these three words in a trance, said thank you, and got off the call with the doctor.
Part of me had known.
The endless days I spent in bed staring at the ceiling with no motivation to do anything. The inability to focus on my screen. And the sudden bursts of tears when I saw yet another meeting pop up in my calendar.
I knew all of this wasn’t normal. That …
How I Broke Free from a Narcissistic Family System
“Your vision will become clear only when you can look into your own heart. Who looks outside, dreams; who looks inside, awakes.”~ Carl Jung
My mom had always been invested in real estate. I remember snacking on open house charcuterie years before we finally purchased a house to flip—the first of four. By the time I was eighteen, we’d moved five times.
I knew our family was falling apart by renovation number three.
I had spent the previous few years experiencing suicidal ideation and was now on a strict cocktail of seven or so psychiatric and neurological medications.
My brother …
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