Category: Love, Redefined

For so long, I thought beauty was a checklist—something fixed, something I had to measure up to. Society handed me a set of rules: thin here, flawless there, perfect smile, perfect skin. But that kind of beauty feels cold and empty. It leaves no room for realness, for the messiness and the magic of being…

What I care most about teaching my children isn’t blind obedience to rules or rigid beliefs. It’s kindness. Real, everyday kindness. The kind that shows up in how they treat a classmate who’s struggling, how they speak to someone different from them, how they treat themselves when they make a mistake. Dogma demands conformity. It…

Self-acceptance doesn’t mean settling. It means meeting yourself where you are, without shame or pressure to be anywhere else. It’s standing in the mirror—physically, emotionally, mentally—and saying, “This is me. Right now. And that’s okay.” You don’t have to pretend to be healed or whole or finished to be worthy of love or belonging. You…

I used to think I had to prove myself to belong. To earn rest, softness, joy. To be liked enough. Quiet enough. Small enough—physically and emotionally. Somewhere along the way, the world convinced me that space was something granted, not something already mine. But the truth is simple. I was born with space. I didn’t…

There’s a strange pressure in parenting to always have the answers. To be the rock, the guide, the all-knowing figure. But the truth is, I don’t have all the answers—and I’ve stopped pretending that I do. When my child asks about life, or death, or fairness, or why people hurt each other, or what happens…

I don’t parent by guesswork or guilt. I parent with intention—guided by what we know about children’s brains, bodies, and emotions, and rooted in deep care for who my child truly is. Science gives me the foundation. It tells me how kids learn through play, how their nervous systems react to stress, how connection builds…

For so long, safety may have felt like something outside of you—something you had to earn, beg for, or stumble into through the approval or presence of others. But healing begins when you realize you can be that safety for yourself. You can be the calm in your own storm. Being your own safe place…

There was a time I believed my body was the problem. Too big. Too soft. Too different from what I was told it should be. I treated it like something to fix, to battle, to hide. But when I really started listening—when I stopped trying to punish it into submission—I saw something else. I saw…

There are days when I’m running on empty. The dishes are piled high, someone’s crying, and I can’t remember the last time I sat down or took a deep breath. I feel stretched thin—like I’ve given everything and there’s still more being asked. And in those moments, the pressure to be the “perfect” parent, the…