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Posts tagged with “healing”

The Moment That Brought Me Hope When Life Felt Joyless

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“If we could see the miracle of a single flower clearly, our whole life would change.” ~Buddha

There are seasons when life feels stripped of joy, when hope seems far away, unreachable, or unreal. Seasons when you wake up already exhausted, and it feels like there’s nothing soft left in the world—no beauty, no connection, nothing to rest in. I’ve been living in that season lately.

I’m losing my vision to macular degeneration. I’m a caregiver for my ninety-six-year-old mother. I’m navigating disability, financial strain, and the feeling that the future is shrinking instead of widening. Most days, I move …

The Growth That Came from Not Saying Sorry

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“You are not responsible for other people’s emotional reactions.” ~Susan Forward

This morning, in our usual rush and routine heading to school, my son was looking for something, as per usual. I calmly asked what he was doing, and he snapped at me. That’s not uncommon.

I stayed regulated and grounded to help him regulate. But sometimes, that calm turns into overfunctioning.

Codependency has a way of sneaking in the back door. As someone who was once deeply codependent, I still fall into old habits—being the one who holds it together, who stays calm for others. And if they

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How to Be Sad on Vacation

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“Healing comes from letting there be room for all of this to happen: room for grief, for relief, for misery, for joy.” ~Pema Chodron

I recently went on vacation with my partner, Jett. I want to tell you it was kind of a disaster, but the truth is, it was just life. I had a lot of expectations placed on this trip (I have a lot of expectations, period), and I thought my issues wouldn’t follow me to Mexico.

We left the chores and the kids and the pets behind, but we still brought ourselves. We were both currently …

The Beauty in Brokenness: Why Your Scars Make You Worthy

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“The wound is the place where the Light enters you.” ~Rumi

On July 2, 2009, my life shattered with three words: “He is gone.”

I thought my friend meant my love was away on a camping trip, but no. She meant he was gone, as in forever.

My stomach knotted and my breath stopped. My body was reacting to the gravity of the truth before my mind could fully process it. The man I loved more than life itself never came back from his camping trip, and in many ways, neither did I.

My heart broke in a million …

Breaking Free from the Constant Need to Be Better

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“Enough is a decision, not a condition.” ~Unknown

The night sky above Disneyland shimmered in color as fireworks burst to life. My daughters leaned against me, sticky-fingered from melted ice cream, eyes wide with wonder. It was supposed to be the happiest place on earth.

Then Mirabel’s voice from Encanto echoed through the speakers: “I will never be good enough. Will I? No matter how hard I try.”

Something inside me broke.

Sitting cross-legged on the pavement surrounded by thousands of smiling families, I sobbed. Not a dainty, delicate tear but the kind of quiet, chest-aching cry you hope no …

Why Your Friendships Make You Feel Anxious and Overthink Everything

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“Many of our relationship struggles are not character flaws but survival strategies that once made sense.” ~Unknown

Throughout my life I’ve often been described as confident and outgoing. I can be the “life and soul” of a party and am able to strike up conversations with a wide variety of people.

But what nobody would have guessed is that I secretly struggled to navigate close friendships. I used to overthink every unanswered text, I felt I needed to please to keep friends close, and I even pushed friends away because I thought they didn’t care.

What made it worse was …

The Power of Writing for Healing: An Embodied Approach

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FREE Live 90-minute Write to Heal class and 20-page guide with prompts, recordings and more to support your healing journey. 

When I was studying writing in college, my personal essay class was my favorite. I’d already been journaling for almost a decade, so I understood the power of exploring life experiences through the written word.

Journaling wasn’t immediately helpful for me. In my younger years, I often wrote to ruminate, beat myself up, count calories, or otherwise reinforce patterns that didn’t support me. But as I worked through childhood trauma in therapy and through other approaches, my writing gradually became …

What Losing My Faith Taught Me About Being Truly Alive

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“To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment.” ~Ralph Waldo Emerson

I grew up as the fifth of seven children in a strict religious family where faith shaped everything. From an early age, I learned to follow the rules, perform to be seen, keep the peace, and be good.

My religious upbringing taught me to give my power away. The church held the answers, the authority, and even forgiveness itself. I learned to seek approval from outside sources instead of developing a relationship with my own inner truth. …

How I Found Peace When Everything Suddenly Felt Out of My Control

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“That which does not kill us makes us stronger.” ~Friedrich Nietzsche

I was twenty-five weeks pregnant when I was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes. Still working, still showing up, still dreaming of a gentle homebirth.

We had an event at work that day, and I had to walk to it. I remember feeling so out of breath that I had to stop every few steps. Walking upstairs became impossible without pausing. Something wasn’t right.

I’d also noticed I was losing weight, especially in my face. My cheeks had sunken in. Not exactly the glowing pregnancy look I’d envisioned. More “heroin …

Finding Peace When You Don’t Know What Comes Next

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“Sometimes letting things go is an act of far greater power than defending or hanging on.” ~Eckhart Tolle

For as long as I can remember, I’ve been the kind of person who plans everything.

My calendar was color-coded, my to-do lists perfectly alphabetized, and I could tell you what I’d be doing six months from now almost down to the hour.

I thought control meant safety. If I could organize my world tightly enough, maybe nothing bad would happen.

For a long time, that illusion worked. I graduated near the top of my class, got a good job, and built …

Why the Breath Is More Powerful Than Willpower in Addiction Recovery

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“If you want to conquer the anxiety of life, live in the moment, live in the breath.” ~Amit Ray

I don’t remember the moment I decided I wanted to live again. I just remember the breath that made it possible.

Three weeks earlier, I had been lying in a hospital bed, my liver failing at the age of thirty-six after years of drinking. I knew I wouldn’t survive another relapse; yet the day I was released, I went straight to the liquor store. Unsurprisingly, I ended up back in rehab—completely exhausted, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually. I wasn’t looking for …

The Truth About Healing I Didn’t Learn in Med School

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“The wound is the place where the Light enters you.” ~Rumi

I’ve spent most of my adult life helping people heal.

I’m a podiatrist, a foot and ankle surgeon, and I’ve seen pain in many forms. Torn ligaments. Crushed bones. Wounds that just won’t close. But if I’m being honest, the deepest wounds I’ve encountered weren’t the ones I treated in my clinic. They were the invisible ones, the ones that patients carried silently, and the ones I had unknowingly been carrying myself.

I used to think healing was straightforward. Diagnose. Treat. Follow up. Recover.

That made sense to me. …

Grieving the Parents You Needed but Never Had

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“We can’t receive from others what they were never taught to give.” ~Unknown

When I was younger, I believed that love meant being understood. I thought my parents would be there for me, emotionally and mentally. But love, I’ve learned, isn’t always expressed in the ways we need, and not everyone has the tools to give what they never received.

As an adult, I’ve learned something both liberating and heartbreaking: Parents can only give what they have.

I used to get frustrated that my parents couldn’t really understand my mental health struggles. The realization didn’t hit me suddenly. It …

Why Narcissistic Abuse Doesn’t Define You and How I Found the Love I Deserve

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“When it hurts to move on, just remember the pain you felt hanging on.” ~Unknown

There was a time when I thought my heart would never heal.

I’d been lied to, betrayed, and broken by a man I thought I loved. A man who turned out to be nothing more than a beautifully packaged nightmare.

If you’ve ever been hurt by a narcissist, you know that the pain cuts deeper than most people can imagine. You know the way it seeps into your bones, the way it makes you question your worth and replay every moment, wondering if you could …

3 Surprising Causes of Burnout That Most People Miss

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“Love yourself first and everything else falls into line.” ~Lucille Ball

The first time I experienced burnout, I was twenty-six.

I was at the height of my career in London, doing it all, and yet I somehow found myself back at my parents’ house, sobbing in my mom’s car, after signing myself off from work, not having a clue how I landed there.

Burnout isn’t just about being tired from overexertion. It’s when we reach physical, mental, and emotional exhaustion after pushing ourselves past our capacity for too long.

When we finally stop, often against our will, all the confusing …

When You’re Tired of Fixing Yourself: How to Stop Treating Healing Like a Full-Time Job

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“True self-love is not about becoming someone better; it’s about softening into the truth of who you already are.” ~Yung Pueblo

One morning, I sat at my kitchen table with my journal open, a cup of green tea steaming beside me, and a stack of self-help books spread out like an emergency toolkit.

The sunlight was spilling across the counter, but I didn’t notice. My eyes kept darting between the dog-eared pages of a book called Becoming Your Best Self and the neatly written to-do list in my journal.

Meditation.
Gratitude journaling.
Affirmations.
Ten thousand steps.
Hydration tracker.
“Inner child …

How to Calm Anxiety That’s Rooted in Childhood Wounds

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“Anxiety is a response to a nervous system that learned early on it had to protect itself.” ~Dr. Hilary Jacobs Hendel

Anxiety shaped much of my life—how I showed up, how I held myself back, and how I connected with others. For years, I didn’t even know what it was. I just knew the pounding heart, the tight chest, the trembling hands. I knew the shame that followed every “failure,” big or small, and the fear I would never be enough.

For a long time, I thought I was the problem. But anxiety isn’t a moral failing. It’s a part …

Healing Without Reconciling with My Mother and Learning to Love Myself

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“Owning our story and loving ourselves through that process is the bravest thing that we’ll ever do.” ~Brené Brown

Several years ago, I wrote a heartfelt letter to my estranged mother, articulating my deep feelings about her perceived lack of empathy and care. My intention in writing the letter wasn’t to ignite conflict; it was to sincerely share my perspective.

Rather than lashing out with blame, I expressed my profound sadness about feeling parentless and the struggle of raising myself without parental love and guidance, something I desperately needed at times.

I bared my soul, detailing the emotional turmoil …

When the Person You Love Is Disappearing into Addiction

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“Boundaries are the distance at which I can love you and myself at the same time.” ~Prentis Hemphill

I thought I had seen the worst of it. I thought I knew what it meant to watch someone you love disappear into addiction. My mother taught me that lesson long before I was old enough to truly understand it.

Growing up, I saw her sink deep into heroin. I learned to read the signs before she even spoke. I knew when she was high. I knew when she was lying. I knew when she was gone, even when she was …

The Hardest Person to Be Honest with Is Yourself

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“You cannot heal what you refuse to confront.” ~Yasmin Mogahed

At sixteen, I walked out of my mother’s house with track marks and a half-packed bag. No big fight. No slammed door. Just the silent resignation of someone who couldn’t look his mother in the eye anymore. I wasn’t leaving home—I was bailing on it. On everything.

I didn’t know the word “addiction.” Well, I knew it; I just didn’t understand it. I didn’t know that the flu I kept getting was withdrawal. I thought I was just weak. A loser. A burnout who couldn’t even use the …