Baby steps and struggly downward dogs
“If your legs aren’t already straight, don’t try adding this in. Don’t ever force yourself. Let your muscles and tissues grow and change over months and years.” This morning’s yoga class felt a little different. It was very slow and mild with an emphasis on finding the edge and then not pushing it. A little…
I have anxiety and that’s okay
I have anxiety. Some days I am in the zone, killing it. I am a manager and I’m good at it. I am great at sales and customer service. I am great at leading projects. I am the president of a Toastmasters club and I think I’m a good leader. I am a really good…
“Will I ever get better?” can be a dangerous question
Will I be ever be able to get over my anxiety? Will the back pain ever go away? Will I beat this addiction once and for all? Will not having a family ever stop hurting? Will I ever get past this struggle? Will I ever recover? Will I ever be healed? I think when we…
Accept your pendulum
When we humans grow, we tend to resemble pendulums. If we were too this, we become, for a time, too that. And then we may become too this again, but a little less. And so the pendulum swings. It just happens. We cannot stop abruptly in the center, perfectly balanced, on the first go-round. Growth is messy. Your pendulum may…
Before you break down
You hit a wall, so you start doing “self-care.” Quiet time, journaling, fresh air, running, couch time, cookies, lots of bed, therapy, warm baths, PTO days, sharing your sadness with a friend. . . . It becomes a top priority in your schedule because it has to, because you’re breaking down. Are you allowed to…
Authentic, but like right now
I always armed the alarm system at night. If someone beat me to it, I’d find some need to go grab something from the garage or step outside so that I could re-arm it when I came back in. Arming it took a minute, because we had to bypass a few upstairs bedroom windows so…
You’d be surprised how many of us are broken.
Hey friend, I’m asking you to take a closer look. The world asks us all to put our best foot forward. To be fun, to be chill, to be cool, to be strong, dependable, easy to get along with. Work demands our game face. We’re competing constantly. At all times on display, being assessed, critiqued,…
If I could send a message to 18-year-old me
Do you ever imagine what you’d say to younger-you if you had the chance? Life is really wonderful and beautiful and full of magic and excitement and love. But life is also weird for each one of us, sometimes a really tough kind of weird. The kind of weird that can make you feel lonely…
Say your stuff, no matter how messy
I hope you find these words from Carl Jung as inspiring as I do. They resonate so deeply with me. This is so big. Say your stuff, the stuff that that means the world to you, that you need to say, that you feel deep down, that you have to get off your chest, that…
A year later (compassion: we all have some crappy things we need people to understand)
Yesterday I felt really upset and sad that I got a concussion last year. A year–seems like this should be done now, right? When I had my first concussion, everything felt pretty normal again a few months later. This time, it’s been almost a year, and I don’t feel like myself. I think the last…
Anxiety Doesn’t Feel Like Anxiety
For a while last year, especially after a head injury, I started feeling like my whole world was falling apart. Like everything was fragile and everything was dangerous. I felt terrible doubts and fears about so many things I’ve trusted and depended on for years. At first I really thought something was terribly wrong–like my…
Sad People
“Eeyore, the old grey Donkey, stood by the side of the stream, and looked at himself in the water.’Pathetic,’ he said. ‘That’s what it is. Pathetic.’He turned and walked slowly down the stream for twenty yards, splashed across it, and walked slowly back on the other side. Then he looked at himself in the water…
Good Advice For When You’re Worried
When you’re tired and worried, sleep. When you’re hungry and worried, eat. When you’re bored and worried, have some fun. When you’re overworked and worried, go home. When you’ve got a headache and you’re worried, find some pain relief. When you’re lonely and worried, talk to someone. One of the best pieces of advice I…
Not Saying It
It feels like it will hurt LESS to NOT say what we want, than to SAY what we want and not get it. But that’s just not true. NOT saying it hurts WORST. To never express it, to smother yourself, to give up without a chance. That is the loneliest and the saddest, in the…
I hope that you will be gentle with yourself
Imagine you’re holding the hand of a little child, seeing tears brim in their eyes. Frustrated. Embarrassed. Not good enough. How delicately will you hold that child’s heart in your hands? What will you say? How gentle will you be with their sensitive little heart? This child needs love and support. You would be gentle…
Happy Thanksgiving 2019!
Happy Thanksgiving 2019! Last year I wrote that I thought that year was the oddest year of my life. I was wrong. This year. 100%. Odd isn’t bad, though. I have a lot to be thankful for. There’s all the usual, but there are some things I’m especially, newly thankful for this year. An odd…
Real People
Every person is a real person. Meaning they’ve got the inspiring, smiley parts and the sad, scary parts. The person you’re really close to, the person you’ve never met, and even the person you really look up to as a sort of superhuman. And even yourself. It’s good to just think about this every once…
Hang in there.
If you’re depressed and you stay depressed, you’ll look back at the end of your life and have good memories and bad memories. If you’re broke and you stay broke, you’ll look back at the end of your life and have good memories and bad memories. If you’re lonely and you stay lonely, you’ll look…
It is okay to be you
Remember that it is okay to be you. Take breaks regularly from making judgments about yourself. It’s exhausting. And you’re probably wrong about yourself half the time anyway. You are loved. Who you should be isn’t loved. You are. You are enough.
The not good enough thing
I haven’t met a person that really, deep down, is always confident that they’re good enough. Nobody thinks they’re doing enough. And nobody thinks they’re doing it well enough. And nobody thinks all their efforts are good enough for them to be loved, let alone good enough for them to not be exposed as a…
That thing that excites you
This strange thing happens when I hear the sound of rushing water or the crashing of waves and find myself in the presence of beautiful, powerful, patient, carefree water. My soul feels astonishingly okay. It doesn’t mean I have to move to San Diego (*hey universe, this is a hint here*), but it does mean…
Being a person
“You don’t pass or fail at being a person.” Neil Gaiman It’s true. Nothing to add. Except maybe this one other little tear-jerker moment from Avengers: Endgame. “Everyone fails at who they’re supposed to be, Thor. The measure of a person, of a hero, is how well they succeed at being who they are.” Thor’s…
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