Back to Myself
Stephanie — 38 “Some things just have to play out before you can see them.” I didn’t think I had a story. Or maybe it’s more accurate to say… I didn’t think I had a story that was untold. Because I talk. A lot. I process out loud. I’ve told pieces of my life in […]
The Turning Point
John-Age 75 “Every turning point in my life came down to the same choice: security or growth. Each time I chose growth, even when it was frightening, my life opened in ways I never could have imagined.” When I was asked to share my story for this project, something in me immediately said yes. But […]
The Tide of Unfinished Conversations
Finding Resolution Without the Conversation Some of the most important conversations in my life are the ones I never got to have. Not because I didn’t want them.But because the person is gone.Or unwilling.Or because when the moment came, the words simply wouldn’t come out. For a long time I believed resolution required two people […]
The Illusion of Intimacy
On Secrecy, Speech, and the Fire of Truth I grew up in a large family, one of nine children, five sisters, a house full of noise, bodies, opinions, and shared air. From the outside, that configuration reads as closeness. Abundance implies belonging. A large family carries a kind of cultural shorthand: you must be close. […]
The Magic of Santa
The Santa That Never Left: On Believing, Not-Believing, and Believing Again On Christmas, community, and the magic that outlives belief For Faith Mark, who taught us how to make magic. Born Into Community Growing up in a family of nine children was loud, hectic, chaotic—and sometimes breathtakingly magical. Being the eighth of nine meant I […]
Breaking the Spell of Hope
✨ HOPE-FREE: The Freedom I’m Still Learning to Trust I need to begin with this truth:I am not fully hope-free.Not yet.Maybe not ever, not entirely. Hope runs through my family of origin like a living vein.It’s woven into our language,interlaced through the way we cared for one another,a soft phrase used like a blessing: “I […]
✨ Awakened By Shakti
There are moments in a spiritual life when something arrives that is not simply interesting, not simply useful, not even simply beautiful. There are those moments that are true in a way that bypasses every rational checkpoint the mind tries to put in it’s place. For me, that moment happened almost 15 years ago, the […]
🦃 Thanksgiving: The Thread That Still Holds Me
Holy Chaos Thanksgiving has always been a sensory holiday for me, food, noise, warmth, hands passing plates, children running, and the unmistakable smell of turkey that somehow reached every corner of the house. Growing up in a family of nine children meant that Thanksgiving was never small, never quiet, and certainly never simple. It was […]
The Prayer Wheel
✨ My father has been gone for over ten years now. Lately, he has been visiting me in the spaces between my thoughts — in the soft ache of memory, in the warm flash of his smile, in the quiet moments when I realize I’m turning something over in my mind the same way he […]
Does this Couch Make Me Look Fat?
Does This Couch Make Me Look Fat? Growing up in a big family meant two things: there was always noise, and there was always food. We didn’t have much money, but we had an abundance — in spirit, in chaos, and definitely in portions. A serving of spaghetti in our house could feed a small […]