No worries, they don’t talk back. At least not in an audible ‘I see dead people’ kind of way.

I have always had lots of ideas. In the past, I started most of them in one way or another. This has earned me a reputation for being brave and adaptable at best and, at worst, flighty or noncommittal.
Actually, I’m not sure what most people think. Honestly, I don’t care.

Not caring what others think of my choices has been one of the main reasons I have been able to try as many things as I have. Don’t get me wrong. I care about people, and I care about how I feel about myself. I never want to hurt people or cause them to feel like I’ve treated them badly or unjustly.

I just don’t care what they think about what I’m doing.

Especially if those opinions are negative. If someone tries to give you unwanted advice, ask them which one of your bills they are paying and get back to work. Just make sure they aren’t, in fact, actually paying one of your bills.

I do, however, value wise counsel. If I decide I want to start an aquarium servicing business and I meet someone with experience, I want to hear what they have to say. However, I don’t want them to expect me to listen and then get upset with me when I don’t.​

By dipping into every idea that comes my way, I have learned a little bit about a lot of different things, but I have spread myself thin. I can’t help but wonder what would happen if I were to fully commit to one thing and stick with it.

Recognizing the issue is the first step, and I have been in strong communication with myself about this issue for several years now. Recently, I got inspired to think about my ideas in a different way. I read Elizabeth Gilbert’s book Big Magic, and she talks about ideas as if they are somewhat independent beings.

The thought is that ideas are floating around, looking for available humans to help them come to life. You can see an example of this during times when you have a great idea, and then a few months later, you see it in stores. The idea was pitching itself to you, and you passed on it. Someone else gave it a contract.

I have been looking at my ideas in this way lately and realizing I don’t have to enter into contracts with each one. This has helped me to start weeding some of them out. It hasn’t been easy. Instead of immediately jumping on an idea and going to work on it, I will think about it, wait a few days, see if it’s still hanging around, then slowly start to entertain it.

It’s like courting versus speed dating.

In the past, if an idea excited me, I would go straight into planning mode, complete with logos and branding within 48 hours. Now I am practicing getting to know the idea, spending some time seeing if it makes sense for me or if it would be better suited for someone else.

Like dating, if the idea is meant for you, it will stick around long enough for you to be sure. Just don’t make them wait too long, or the next time you open your phone to scroll Facebook, you’ll see your idea in an ad.

Just don’t get stuck.

One danger I have already encountered with this new way of thinking about ideas is the tendency toward analysis paralysis: when you think about something so much that you get stuck and can’t decide how to act on it.
To counteract this, I have started doing what I call mind dumps. I have a notebook that I have every intention of destroying one day, where I will literally write whatever nonsense is on repeat in my mind. I don’t always have answers when I finish these mind dump sessions, but I do have more peace.

Acknowledging your thoughts helps your mind feel heard and gives it space to work on more productive things. It also helps you work through the thoughts in a more organized way. You are forced to slow down a bit and think about each thought individually and in some sort of order. I have found that when I see my thoughts coming alive on paper, I can sometimes see solutions I couldn’t find while I was turning them over in my mind.

Commit.

These days, I am more careful about what I say I am committing to. Just this year alone, I have already made four business commitments, managed to keep two of those so far, and dodged two others. And it’s only April.
What’s more interesting, I am less active in this area than I have been in the past 7 or 8 years. But I am doing that on purpose.

As I get older, I realize I have limited time, and I want to maximize that time. I want to maximize my potential, not waste it thinking I want to groom dogs when I don’t even like dogs that much. I want to zero in on the ideas that are built for me and give them lives they haven’t even thought of. If ideas are orphans looking for a home, I’m the orphanage. As much as I may want to, I just can’t raise them all.

Written 4.18.19

This piece is an ode to writing. From me.

Creative Expectations - How I Sabotage Myself Creatively.

I miss writing. I miss the release of thoughts and emotions. To rest in a state of flow, to organize thoughts, and to have a conversation with someone that understands my words completely—myself. It is a great thing, and I have let it go momentarily.

I have a terrible habit of letting productivity, or the illusion of it, cloud anything I start to enjoy. If something I am doing isn’t going to lead to some sort of gain, I will tell myself there is no point.

However, is the point of creativity to be productive? Maybe for some, but for me, the productivity quotient seems to be the killer of passion, and passion is essential for me to create anything. Creating makes me feel free, connected, and alive; all things I need to thrive. If I approach any of the things I like to do to create through a lens of needing it to become something specific or having expectations about what it should be, I kill it before it even gets started.

I have two books in the works right now, one fiction and one non-fiction. When I was writing them for fun, they flowed effortlessly and made me feel alive and more balanced. As soon as I started thinking about them in terms of what they should be, or could be, I shelved them, convincing myself they are trash. Almost a hundred thousand words sitting in my files, ineffectual and stagnant because I have convinced myself that my writing should somehow be for others when all along it has always been for me.

Writing healed me when I was at my lowest, and writing helped me realize that I am capable. I felt all of those things without any feedback from outside of me at all. That’s what I need to hold on to. When others comment on my writing, it makes me feel great, but unless I am happy with myself, those words will only be temporary Band-Aids.

When I had my photography business, I received so much praise from the outside that I turned that praise into expectations, and I think I am doing the same thing with my writing. I sneakily told myself that I was only valuable as long as I was producing things that people would praise me for. I started to apply pressure on myself to perform, and the next thing I knew, I was buckling under that pressure. I felt like what I was producing was never good enough in spite of whatever everyone else told me.

I do this with my writing too. I come up with ideas about what I think others expect it to be and then convince myself it is trash and that I should be embarrassed to have shown it to anyone. My point is, when you create standards for yourself that are impossible to live up to, you will constantly feel like you are failing and not good enough. For that reason, I must create solely for me. Whether it is writing, photography, art, or business, it must be for me first, and if others benefit from it, great.

The past few months have been lull months, and nothing is hitting for me. I have tried all of my usual things and a few new things to see if I can get something to grab me, but ultimately, the universe, or my brain, is saying not right now. I am fortunate to be able to live a life that allows this sort of exploration and evaluation. Sometimes I feel like my freedom in creativity is stifling.

I don’t think there is a universal point to life, and my point, or purpose, evades me. I will feel aligned to one thing and then the next thing I know I feel completely and utterly disconnected from it. The fact that I can remember feeling joy in things keeps me going and gives me hope. I know at some point things will hit again, and when they do I will feel enraptured and consumed by them. That feeling is my drug; it is what I chase. The unfortunate truth is that when I chase it, it runs even faster. I am learning to just hang out and wait, though, and not get too attached to what is or is not going on for me creatively.

Ultimately, I find creativity essential to my wellbeing and fascinating in the way it operates. Whether it is my writing or my art, I love surprising myself. Nothing gives me more joy than creating something in a flow state and revisiting it later to wonder whether I really did that. I know that may sound crazy, but it happens to me a lot. Looking at a piece of writing or art and having no specific memory of creating it and becoming impressed with it feels magical. On the other hand, when I try to force things, I remember everything about it and am completely unmoved by whatever came of it. This may stem from the fact that I am an over-thinker, so when I stop thinking and just do, I get results I like better. Either way, less thinking and more doing for me—For ME.

8-2-22

It’s time to go to school, and I’m tired. I want to stay on the couch and watch TV, but my mom has other ideas. She is trying to put my feet in my jeans as I whine and kick them away. It is a battle of the wills. The jeans somehow end up on my body, followed by a clean shirt and shoes. In the car, my daddy wrestles me into the backseat where I proceed to kick the back of the driver’s side seat, screaming, as if he were driving me to certain death. We pull up to the school, and he tells me I better straighten up or he will drag me into the school and everyone will see I’ve been crying. I don’t care. He made good on his promise, as did I. He dragged me into the school kicking and screaming, and I didn’t care.

I am not advocating for defiance here; I was being a brat, but I am advocating for knowing where you stand and not letting the opinion of others get in your way. An extreme example, sure, but it works. As an adult, I know the difference between disobedience, defiance, and determination, and I know to what degree I can push something before tipping into the danger zone of each.

To say that I never care about the opinions of others would be a lie. I do care. I want to be liked, respected, and held in high regard. But what I do not want is to compromise myself in order to get any of those. If I have to pretend to be someone I am not, say things I don’t believe to be true, or act in a way that is not in line with my values, then I don’t want it. Be it a job, a friendship, or any number of things people strive for.

Up until well into my 30s, I had been unapologetically myself and never met any scrutiny that bothered me. I made my decisions and faced whatever consequences came of them. I don’t consider myself a mean or uncompromising person, no matter how unwilling I am to compromise my wants, needs, or values. I found it interesting that this new wave of criticism was coming my way, but more so that I was being affected by it.

I had self-published my first book that was a collection of essays inspired by a journal I kept while navigating grief and depression, and working through the dark thoughts that came with it. Sharing my vulnerable inner thoughts was scary enough as it was, but experiencing the feelings that come from public scrutiny was new to me. People made claims about my mental health and whether I was a safe person. All at once, everyone became judge and jury over my life and who they thought I was based on what I had shared on a page.

The reaction was confusing for me. I didn’t understand how they got there, and something I found even more interesting: I didn’t understand what it was making me feel. I felt ashamed of myself, grew quiet, and hid. This driving inward made me have to wrestle with thoughts and feelings I had never experienced before, after having just wrestled with others I had chosen to share openly. Hoping that by sharing, someone else might not feel so alone.

So the question became, why are they able to hurt me with this when I’ve never let them hurt me before? Who I am at my core had not changed. I was still unapologetically myself, but somehow people had found a way to make me feel like I needed to hide myself. That I should be careful about what I reveal.

I walked it back in my mind and asked myself a series of questions about what I was actually feeling. Had I said anything that would warrant the response I was getting? I didn’t think so. Did I care what these people thought of me? I didn’t think so, but it really felt like I did. What I found was that I cared that they misunderstood me. If they had read my words, interpreted them correctly, and still decided they thought I was unstable and unsafe to be around, then I don’t think I would have given it as much weight. It was the drawing of conclusions without a correct basis that bothered me. I don’t mind when people disagree with me; I mind when they misunderstand me.

Once I understood that my feelings of shame and uncertainty of self were coming from feeling misunderstood, I was able to try and think of ways I could mitigate that for myself. There is no way to control how I will be received by others. Other people will always experience my words through whatever life experience they have personally or what they are living at the time. The only thing I could do was try to figure out if there was a way I could still be my unapologetic, self-expressive self, but safely. If my core wound was coming from being misunderstood, is there a world in which I can be misunderstood and not feel attacked?

I decided that if I am communicating my truth and am doing so from the best place possible, I have no reason to be ashamed if someone takes it the wrong way. My intentions are what matter, and if someone is committed to misunderstanding me, there will never be a way to convince them otherwise.

Bringing this idea back to my collection of essays, I shared extremely vulnerable moments and thoughts with the intention of possibly making other people who are maybe feeling the same sort of things feel a little less alone. If I had held that intention in mind, when the others came out and tried to villainize and shame me, maybe I would have been able to realize that my words weren’t the problem, that I wasn’t the problem. The people spewing ugly things weren’t even the problem. Misunderstanding was the problem.

If I had known that, I could have possibly taken steps to help clear up the misunderstanding if I thought there were places where I could have, or I could have just let it go, realizing it didn’t have anything to do with me. It was wholly dependent on how the people misunderstanding me were interpreting it.

I have learned that I still don’t care what other people think about me or my choices unless they are wrong in their thinking. My bigger lesson is allowing them to stay wrong in their thinking without making their misunderstanding my problem and trying to fix it.

I look back at the little girl standing in front of the opened classroom door; hair unkempt and crying with the whole class watching. I imagine asking her, why do this to yourself? Don’t you care that they are all looking at you? She would say, ‘No, I just want to go home.’ And that would be enough. So I ask the woman who published the book, why do this to yourself? Don’t you care that they are all looking at you? I wish she had said, ‘No, I just want to share my experience.’

At 12 years old, I had a boyfriend who was also 12. I cried when he called and told me he hoped the jewelry he gave me turned me green. “Green as a damn leaf.” He said as he slammed the phone down in my ear. While this wasn’t heartbreaking, it was shocking for me as it seemed to come out of nowhere, and I had never experienced someone changing their mind about how they felt about me.

Then there was a guy whose conscience got the best of him when I asked him why a high school senior would want to date a 13-year-old. I was hoping for an answer along the lines of me being better than any other possible girl in the world, but that’s not what happened. He told me he didn’t know, sat there for a little while longer, left, and never came back. I cried and watched for his car to come back for a couple of weeks, but I wouldn’t say it broke my heart.

It wasn’t until I was 14 years old that I experienced my first real heartbreak. I think this one was different because the relationship lasted for a long time, and there were many complicated layers to it. When we met and started seeing each other, I was 13, and he was 20. We were together for nine months, and he turned 21 five months into our relationship. The plan was that we would get married when I turned 14. Five days after I turned 14, he came home one day, packed his stuff, and left. I never got an explanation for why he left, so I assumed it was because he decided he didn’t want to marry me. I carried that story for over 30 years until I finally had a conversation with him about it. I believed he left because he didn’t want to marry me; he said he left because he was given an ultimatum.

When I revisited that memory, the new details didn’t matter. Whether he chose to leave or was told to leave, it was how he left that caused the hurt. What I did find that was important was that when I went to write about the experience and took myself back to my bedroom at 14 years old right after he walked out of the door, I realized the hurt I felt that day has never been matched. I have lived a lot of life since then, so that is a very large statement. It made me curious, so I followed that thread from that moment through every heartache since that I can remember. There were plenty that hurt. Bad. But none that gutted me the way that one did. I believe that first heartbreak taught me how to guard my heart just enough so that no one can ever hurt me like that again.

My next significant relationship came about six months later. I was 14, he was 17. From the very beginning, he did things that an unguarded heart might not have tolerated. He cheated on me almost weekly, and that is not an exaggeration. He would literally run and hide from me, and only call me when he had nothing better to do. Which was usually at 3 am after all of his friends had gone home or passed out. Eventually we did end up growing closer. We were really good at entertaining ourselves and finding things to talk about. He ended up being my best friend, and I felt safe with him.

I did not feel safe in the emotional sense that he would not hurt me, lie to me, or cheat on me, but in the sense that no matter what happened, he would never fully leave me. I would never have to be alone, for very long, ever again. He would run off and stay gone for weeks, but he always came back.

We ended up getting married when I was 16, and he was 19. I think the cheating stopped, but the lying and running off didn’t. And that was true for the first five years of our 20-year marriage. Five years in, we had a baby, and I put my foot down. It stayed down, and when I let it up, we ended up divorced.

During all of the years of chaos between us, there were plenty of times I was so upset that I felt sick to my stomach. Sometimes it felt like something was literally twisting my insides. I would grab my stomach, bend over, and cry. I remember spending days sleeping on the floor of whatever house we were living in at the time and waking up crying because I was alone. As much as all of that hurt, it still never got as deep as the first time, back in my bedroom at 14. By the time we divorced, I had no more tears left for him, at least not for the things he could do to me. I cried because the dream I had for my family had crumbled; I cried because I watched him destroy himself, and then I cried the hardest when I saw what it was doing to our daughter.

Revisiting all of those moments, the closest I have gotten to the pain of my first heartbreak was when I would cry for my daughter. I think that is because, unbeknownst to me, the callous on my heart wasn’t meant to protect me from her. She was the only one with full access and has been ever since. Somewhere in my psyche, the instructions read that my child was safe to love. Maybe that is because my heart remembers how my love for my parents felt until they rubbed their own version of callouses too. My heart said something like, as long as I didn’t do those things to her, she would be safe. Therefore, access granted.

Now, I am wondering how much I have missed out on. How much love have I blocked or guarded against without realizing it? I have a husband now who has only ever been kind to me. He is attentive and loyal, and tells me he loves me several times a day. I feel safe with him, but still not completely, and that’s not his fault. I still carry the story that people don’t mean what they say and are likely to change their minds at any time. My first heartbreak taught me that; my first marriage reinforced it. I cry for myself when I think about how I have not been free to experience the entirety of love for over 30 years. But then I stop.

I don’t know if I have ever experienced real love that is safe and doesn’t just feel safe enough for now. I think my current husband is the only one who has given me proof over a period of time that maybe he is telling the truth, but tell my heart that. My heart is waiting for the right time and the right circumstances to prove that the right thing to do is to keep me guarded. My heart saw my hurt and promised never again. I guess that’s proof I accept love from myself.

I don’t know where this journey will lead me. I hope it leads to a version of me with a softer, less guarded heart. But that feels scary. I enjoy my marriage now, and I enjoy the love we do share. I think there are probably deeper levels I could get to if I would allow it, but honestly, I could be making that up. I have no proof that this isn’t as good as it gets. The proof that I have not had a heartache like my first does not prove I have not felt the entirety of love, but it feels like it makes sense. If I am living with a guarded heart, it would only follow that the flowing in and out of emotions that make me vulnerable to hurt are equally guarded.

When I think back to my first heartbreak, I have zero memories of what it felt like to be with that person. I can’t even remember a conversation or how we interacted at all. The hurt wrote the narrative, not the loss of love. The hurt was born out of what I experienced as betrayal and abandonment. Both of those things slammed the door on love. So I guess for me, the work now is to explore the wounds of betrayal and abandonment and decide to what extent I associate them with love. Is there a version of my life where I can imagine a world where I believe being fully open and vulnerable with my heart feels safe? What does that world feel like? What does that look like? Right now, it looks a lot like the things I’ve read in books or seen on TV, but it still feels pretty scary.

I never could sit still as a young teen. Some time around the age of twelve, I learned I could leave the house, and when I got back, no one was going to do anything about it. I would take all of the steps to make sure I didn’t get caught on the way out because that was the most important part. If they caught me on the way out, I would be stuck.

Many nights I would come back home and find I couldn’t get back in through the window I jumped out of, or the door I went out through would be locked, so I would just knock on the door until my mom got up and let me in. She wasn’t happy, but at some point I think she just gave up and accepted it for what it was. She had a runner, and nothing was going to keep me in. She tried installing alarms on the doors, and even nailed my windows shut with five-inch nails once, but I just slipped my dresser in front of my bedroom door and dug them out with scissors.

Home wasn’t the only place I ran from. Even when I stayed the night with friends, I would get restless at night and have to go. Sometimes my friends went with me, and sometimes they stayed home and waited on me to come back. I even remember leaving a friend’s house before bedtime once when I found out her parents had an alarm system I wouldn’t be able to get past.

I’ve been thinking about why I had this almost compulsive need to be able to go. It wasn’t because I was doing things that could only be done at night, because most of the time I would just ride with some friends for a little while, or go sit at someone’s house, and then go back. The best explanation I can come up with at this time is that I needed to feel like I had some control over my life. I didn’t have much supervision at home, so I don’t know what it was about going out at night versus during the day that mattered, other than I knew that if I asked for permission, the answer would be no. Being able to go against that no, or bypass it, was what drove me. My insatiable need to go started settling some when I moved away from home.

As an adult, within the span of three years, I had three major life events take place. I got remarried, I lost my father, and my daughter moved out. While the marriage was a happy event, it was still a life change, and with all life changes, there is stress. The other two events introduced two different forms of grief, both of which I expected to happen at some point, but I learned quickly you can’t ever really plan for when things happen, and what grief can do. I found myself walking without destination, tears without expectation.

My mind and body were in a state of overwhelm, and I wanted to run. I planned my exit several times, and then realized I couldn’t run from myself because the things that were overwhelming me had nothing to do with my location, and everything to do with how I was feeling. This realization was not a happy one. My coping mechanism had been revealed in real time, with adult awareness.

I don’t feel the need to jump out of windows or sneak out at night anymore, but under the right conditions I will still try to make plans or imagine running away. The quiet crunch of sticks in grass, the crisp night air, crickets and other insects chirping- they call to me, but now I know to just sit with them instead of joining them.

I don’t see anything wrong with being selfish. I think for anyone to act in any other way, they are only holding themselves back. And by default, they are holding those closest to them back also.

The word selfish has many negative connotations, and rightfully so. I believe a person can be selfish and have no regard for other people, or they can be selfish with others in mind. For example, if I am thinking of myself first, I am most likely going to do things that further my position or status in some way. I believe that the positive choices we make for ourselves often create opportunities for those closest to us. We see this in good reputations being shared by association, or in more tangible ways, like increased wealth and resources.

The healthy kind of selfish will consider how the goals affect those closest to them and adjust accordingly. But here’s the caveat: I may adjust my goals if needed, but that does not mean the goal loses its place. The goal still stays in the top position on the priority list because I must make myself most important if I am going to help those around me become their best self. The unhealthy type of selfish will not consider others and will hurt feelings, take advantage, tear down, etc., to reach their goal.

If I am consistently stubborn about bettering myself and prioritizing myself, then those around me will reap the benefits of that. If I am consistently inconsistent, they suffer with, or because of me. So to be selfless, you have to first become selfish.

I could choose to say I prioritize myself and not use the word selfish, but for me, they don’t hold the same weight. If something is a priority, it comes first, but it also feels negotiable to me. I can have a list of priorities and things may move up and down the list. I need a stronger word, so selfish fills that need. Selfish says I may have myself as a first priority, and its position is nonnegotiable. If I am selfish, I can prioritize myself, my goal, or my family without the shame of admitting that I am doing it all for myself first and their benefit is secondary.

Today I am thinking about the places where I have let this selfish ideology, or personality trait, slip over the last decade or so. I have let myself fall into the background in some areas, on purpose, and I am noticing that choice has not helped the people close to me the way I thought it would. I put others before me, and in the process they ended up with more chaos to deal with, as did I.

A trap I think a lot of people fall into is trying to preserve as many of other people’s emotions and experiences as possible. I believe when we do this, we are accidentally neglecting almost everyone involved in the situation. To put it in cliché form, we are spread too thin. We are no longer as effective or impactful as we hope to be.

In my personal life, I have been managing a set of people with complex ties and emotions connecting each of them. In an attempt to mitigate hurt that has already happened and to shore up against hurt that was and is sure to come, I had chosen to be the “bigger person,” and it only made me feel small and ineffective in the long run.

When someone is creating chaos, and no one is calling it what it is, the people who are not creating chaos can get lost in the background. The one who is not a “problem” is forced to become the stronger one because it is assumed they don’t need help or support. This keeps the cycle going by letting the chaos maker continue in their chaos making. Further, the “strong ones” are not allowed to speak up or out about the imbalance because it would seem insensitive. I am proposing that the strong ones reclaim their power and become selfish.

My hope is that whoever reads this and sees themselves in a role that makes them feel unseen, unheard, or not thought of will find their voice sooner and put themselves, and by default their loved ones, first.

This week I have taken steps to reclaim my selfishness in one area where I had let it slip, and it feels good. It feels great, actually. For several years now, someone has been posting things online, and I have taken the position that I would not engage. I believe my decision was the right decision for a while, but things started to escalate. I decided to use my voice and push back. I responded to the public claims and did so in a way that was in line with my values and integrity. I had people reach out and say things that they didn’t realize were trying to put me back in the bigger person, good girl box. I was well aware that using my voice ran the risk of not changing anything. But regardless of the outcome, what it did was give me my voice back. I can hear my voice again. I also realized I don’t really need anyone else to hear it or to even acknowledge it, I just need to use it. I have been abandoning an essential part of myself by letting judgment, or the idea of judgment, and feeling responsible for other people’s feelings censor me.

Even though I wasn’t attached to an outcome, my voice has proven to be powerful, for myself as well as the situation. The person that had been causing so much distress has finally stopped, and I feel a sense of peace for myself and those I love. I don’t know how long the respite from this person will last, and I can’t control the ultimate outcome, but I know I stepped back into my power for myself first, and as a result, for those I love. Maybe I needed to learn a lesson, or maybe I just forgot myself when the stakes got higher. I don’t know. What I do know is I spoke up. I heard me, and for a moment, that I hope lasts for a while, I remembered who I was.

Written 7.28.26

Bzzzzzz. Nora raises up and looks over her shoulder but finds no evidence of a buzzing creature. She notices the rose buds peeking out between their leaves; they seem to wink at her. They like this weather too. She settles back into the lounger, returning to her love, the sun.

Bzzzzzz. Swinging her legs over the side of the lounger, she pops up. “Ok, now, I heard you. Where are you?” Two bumblebees zip past her, chasing each other. “There you are.” Leaning back again, she watches her new companions swirl through the air. Mating, she assumes. Spring has everything chasing life.

Nora remembers photos she’s seen of bumblebees with their fuzzy little bottoms lounging in flowers. “Oh, you guys! You’re so cute!” One of them swoops close to her head. Bzzz. She ducks. Swoosh-bzzz. It did it again. “Hey now, don’t do that. You’re scaring me.” Bzzzz. Nora’s eyebrows squeeze together as she hops up and hurries to the other side of the patio, the concrete chilling her bare feet. Turning back to make sure they haven’t chased her, a cloud passes over the sun. The cold from her feet finds its way up the length of her body. She hugs herself, searching for warmth.

Walking back toward the lounge area with slow, measured steps, Nora holds her hands up as she approaches the bees, “I’m not going to hurt you. We can be friends, but I’m going to need you to stop scaring me.” She tilts her chin down and looks up at them. One bee hovers in place and moves carefully toward Nora. “Hi,” she whispers. The bee lingers. Her toes grip the concrete, bracing for a possible sting. She tucks her hands inside of her wrap, the chill lingering from the shade. Nora shifts to the side, taking one slow step toward her seat, when the bee raises a leg. Her eyes widen. The bee is waving at her. Swoosh. It’s gone.

Nora sits on the edge of her lounge chair, knees bouncing, chin in hands, scanning the garden for the bees. The tulips lining the walkway sway in the breeze.

The sun peeks out from behind the clouds, and its warmth breaks through the chill the shade had delivered. Lying back, Nora lifts her chin, breathes in deep, and savors all the day has given her just a little while longer.

Before going inside, Nora takes the path leading to the wildflowers at the end of the garden. Spreading her arms, she balances on each stepping stone. Lifting her face to the sun, she turns in slow circles, each delicate bloom brushing against her fingertips. She imagines the bees surrounding her, lounging in the flowers. Stopping as the idea takes hold, she realizes that if they were going to be a family, she would need to document them. Nora brings her hands to her face and bends down; her elbows meet her knees. Her eyes scan the flowers for possibilities. Maybe she could give them names and learn to recognize them. Nora pops up and takes note of each flower that could serve as a lounge spot for the bees. She’s going to need more flowers.

The sun is making patterns on the wall as Nora wakes up. The orange glow has the sun’s bite in it, promising another day of warmth and ease. Nora smiles, stretches her arms overhead, and twists onto her side. Her eyes land on the window where she can see the patch of wildflowers. The bees. She flings the covers back and hops out of bed.

In the kitchen, the gurgle of the coffee pot soothes her. Taking her favorite mug from the cabinet, she pours herself a cup and settles into the chair by the window. Sipping her coffee, she admires the roses. Some have bloomed overnight.

Nora’s gaze moves to the shelves on the wall. Both smooth and warm-toned; one full of memories of a life lost, and the other empty. She feels her throat tense up and her eyes start to tighten; she shakes her head. Not today. Nothing she’s put on the empty shelf deserved the space. But now, the bees. Nora smiles over her coffee mug while the vision takes shape. Nora drank down the rest of her half-cooled coffee and rushed out back to find the bees.

The morning sun is charging up for the day. Nora shivers at the bite in the air. She is in her sleep clothes and hadn’t grabbed her robe. Shadows cover most of the garden, and the bees are nowhere in sight. Tip-toeing across the cold concrete, she notices wood shavings, or is it sawdust, at her feet as she reaches for the door. Her eyes scan the ground around the door and along the house. There are several little piles. Squatting down, she picks it up and rubs it between her fingers. Her feet are numb from the cold, so she drops the dust and heads back inside.

The mid-afternoon sun hugs the garden, encouraging life. The flowers tilt up, drinking in the rays. The blades of grass, dry now, stand a bit taller. Birds take flight. Nora, too, is pulled by the call of the sun. The excitement about the bees earlier this morning has faded some, but she wants to try to get some photos. Within minutes of nuzzling herself back into the lounge chair, she hears the familiar buzzing sound. A smile spreads across her face as she reaches for her phone.

Nora notices the bees keep going back to the overhang of her house. She walks toward the house and feels grit on the bottom of her feet. That weird sawdust again. Scanning the house, she doesn’t see any evidence of where it could be coming from. In the far corner, she spots the bees. They are crawling around holes they have chewed into the wood on her house. Her eyes move from one hole to the next until she finds herself at the other end of the house near the roses. Under the holes she finds even more piles of dust.

She runs a finger through the wood dust on the windowsill. Carpenter bees, not bumblebees. How did I not see this? All of her plans crumbled like the wood pieces on her fingers. Nora’s face falls, and her shoulders drape her body in an attempt to comfort her. The shelf sits shadowed just inside the window. She shifts her eyes toward the shelf and then back at the bees. She drops her head, rubs her temples.

Nora walks back toward the lounge chair; at least she still has that. And the sun. Eyes closed, the rays caress her skin. Bzzzz. Nora, annoyed. “Go on now”, she says, shooing the bee with her hand and closing her eyes back down. A warm tear makes its way down her cheek. She flicks it away. But the bee doesn’t leave; it hovers nearby. Nora watches the bee through the tears collecting in her eyes. The bee raises a leg. Nora tilts her head and whispers, “Hi.”

All quiet, but obligation is loud. It is the sound of you should screaming in my head.

The plant, a symbol of good intentions gone wrong.

The laundry, one way I prove that I believe in tomorrow.

My husband, proof I tell myself that I am responsible for interpreting other people’s feelings.

The weight of believing I can interpret what other people are feeling or thinking, and ultimately make a meaningful difference in their experience, can be crippling. I find myself imagining their thoughts, managing scenarios in my head, and creating solutions for problems that may or may not exist. I’m not sure in which point of my life I picked up this belief.

Was it in childhood when adults proved they were unpredictable?

When they made me feel like I had some sort of influence over their emotions or life experiences?

Or was it in my adult life when I realized that if things aren’t carefully managed, they will fall apart?

My plant is definitely falling apart, too much love and then not enough I’m told.

My laundry will get done.

My husband…

My husband has never “should-ed” me. If anything he is encouraging to the point that I feel like if I listen to him I will turn into the world’s laziest person. He tells me my only job is to be happy. I don’t believe him. I believe that if I live each day only doing things that make me happy, he will collapse from the weight of carrying all of the responsibilities somewhere along the way. I believe that he will build resentment and wish he had a more observant and involved partner. So that is what I am. I watch for “signs” he needs help or that things are getting heavy, and I try to rescue. I offer help, take on tasks, and quietly start to hate my day to day all without ever asking what the sigh was about. If I assume my husband’s sigh means there is something I need to fix, I may or may not be right, but one thing it does communicate to him is that I don’t trust him. I don’t trust him to understand his own feelings or to tell me if he needs help.

I have become adept at trying to predict outcomes and other people’s feelings. So much so that I find myself signing up for things I wish I hadn’t, and as much as I hate to admit it, people pleasing. I would never identify as a people pleaser. Not in general anyway. I am not one to try and bend over backwards to help everyone who crosses my path but let me decide I care about someone and it’s game over. I, a self proclaimed selfish person, will start doing things I don’t want to, saying things I don’t mean, and abandoning the person I have fought so hard to cultivate and become.

I do this in the name of love. In the name of helping. Of fixing. I believe I can see things they can’t and I should do everything in my power to mitigate whatever I can.

I believe that in order to be loved, I need to be useful. I need to make them feel the way they want to feel, validate them, create no resistance to their reality. Their ideas are great ideas, their thoughts, groundbreaking. I build people up while I let myself fall. No one has intentionally put me here, it’s just where my obligation story says I belong.

I try hard not to let myself become a burden, or create discomfort. However, my “helping” tends to lead me into building resentment the way my laundry basket collects clothes. It quietly sends the message that I am not important and I wilt like my plant. I sigh.

Today, one of those friends sent me this memory. A message pops up on my phone that says, “This brought back some memories”. It is a video of someone singing a song I had forgotten I had pummeled into everyone around me during that time period. It transports me back to sitting in that truck with my best friends. I imagine when they go there, they feel just like I do, but there’s no way to know that.

So many times in life I don’t realize the impact moments are having on me or those around me until many years later. I never consider that my memories are also the memories of the people I formed them with. I tend to only think about my role in whatever the memory is and not think about how they experienced it.

Until today, 30 years later, I never considered if my friend liked the song, or that he associated it with me. I also can’t remember if any of them sang it with me or not. I think they did because we were fun like that, but my memory has a way of embellishing things I hope to be true.

To know that I was remembered and that people were paying attention to me back then, whether they meant to or not, made me feel good.

As I sit today, I am wondering how each of those people in the truck felt when I would take over the radio. If they didn’t like it, I never knew. If they protested, I most likely promised one more time and then just kept going. I like to imagine we were all on the same wavelength, enjoying whatever was happening. I would get lost in the wind whipping my hair into knots and singing at the top of my lungs. Maybe they were lost in that feeling too. I can’t remember, and it makes me sad that I can’t remember. I should have paid more attention.

I do remember their smiles. Each one. I also remember one time when Wayne took over the radio. He had a song he wanted to show me. I remember feeling annoyed that whichever song I had on repeat at the time was going to be interrupted, and I wonder if that’s why I remember this specific memory when others feel so hard to grasp. He hands me the tape. David Lee Murphy - Dust on the Bottle. I whine, internally or externally, I can’t be sure, but I know I did. “Just listen to it, Jaime, I want you to hear it.” He says, or something like that. It was important to him that I hear the song, that much I do remember. So I pop it in, look at Manda with the side eye, and brace myself to get through it so we can get back to my songs. Turns out I liked the song; by the second chorus I was singing along. There might be a little dust on the bottle, but don’t let it fool ya about what’s insiiiiide.

I return to this memory a lot when I think about Wayne and when we all used to ride around. I wonder why it was so important to him that I hear the song. Now, I’m thinking that maybe it didn’t have anything to do with the song or what it means, although I did spend an inordinate amount of time trying to understand why he liked it so much. I think the simplest explanation might be that he was doing what I was doing. He was sharing something he liked with his friends. It didn’t have to be any deeper than that, but tell me that.

I connect meaning to pretty much everything and especially music. Almost every song I hear calls up a feeling or memory, so I assumed everyone else does the same. In recent years I’ve learned this is not the case. But maybe Wayne was. Maybe he was trying to communicate something more, or maybe he simply liked how the song sounded. I suppose I could have asked him, but I guess it was more fun to wonder about it.

Either way, I find this memory significant because it is one of the times someone challenged me to step outside of myself and pay attention to them. Reflecting on it now, 30 years later, I wonder how much richer life could be if I would take the time to look around and see the people I care about enjoying life too. Enjoying things from their perspective, on their terms, as well as from mine. So yeah, there might be a little dust on the bottle, but it’s one of those things that gets sweeter with time.

The part I keep repeating is: Do you ever think of me when you lie, lie down in your bed, your bed of lies?

I feel like that is a relatable line because that is one of the first questions I ask when I try to understand why someone lied to me. I wonder if they think about it, if they care.

They probably don’t, or they wouldn’t have done it to begin with.

I wonder if people get used to lying. I wonder if they ever consider the people they lie to at all.

Maybe lies start out being about little things that don’t really matter, maybe exaggerations, or something to try and impress others.
Maybe people don’t call them out on these lies because they either don’t notice, or don’t care enough to say anything. I know for myself, I usually just file it away as information.

Let them have their twist on reality.

But over time, these small lies that don’t seem to affect anyone or anything may be doing something more sinister in the background.

I imagine they are teaching the person how it feels to lie. How to not worry about how the lie may affect others. Because if it did, someone would have said something by now. Surely.

Maybe they are teaching that the consequences for lying probably won’t come, or if they do, they won’t be that bad.

That the reward is worth the risk. Until one day the risk doesn’t even register anymore. And there’s the real tragedy.

What if the lies are teaching the person how to not care about others?
What if the lies are robbing them of a part of their humanity?

Do you ever think of me when you lie?
Maybe you do. Maybe that thought just doesn’t matter enough.

I share my bedroom with two of my birds: a 36-year-old Amazon parrot and a 3-year-old green cheek conure. Romeo, the Amazon, watches intently for any signs that I may be awake. Billy, the conure, will sleep as long as I do, but if my eyes open, somehow his do too.

No one is making any sounds, and I appreciate the consideration. I peek at Romeo, careful not to move my head. He is perched in the spot where he can see me best and is scratching himself on the neck. He will allow a bit of movement from me, but once he’s sure I’m awake, he locks in. His foot slowly lowers, and his body goes stiff with anticipation. He’s no longer self-soothing; he’s waiting. I try to drift back off, but in his mind, I’ve started my day, and for some reason, I’m still just lying here.

First comes the little “ahhhh”s every couple of minutes, and then finally “hello?” He has the cutest voice, and I am thankful it’s not a squawk like the macaws or a scream like the cockatoo, but I still don’t love being pulled back out when I was drifting back to sleep.

At the first hello, my husband also wakes up and looks around, further convincing our feathered roommate that the flock is indeed rising for the day.

For the next little bit, I try to stay as still as possible to grab a bit more sleep, but something as small as a hand moving reignites his passion. “Hello?”

I love that he feels like we are a family, and that he waits patiently and is somewhat considerate each morning. I also love that he can use words to communicate. What I don’t love is that he can’t tell that small movements do not mean the day is starting.

This makes me think about all of the places where I may misread signals in my life. Are there places where I assume I know what is going on or what is coming next, and act without getting further evidence?

I’ll have to think about that and let you know. For now, I have a “hello” to attend to.

I close my eyes and try to remember. I piece what I can back together. I was running. Running so fast, so free. There was no effort, and when I pushed harder, it got easier. I ran everywhere. Across town and back, to the next town and back. Free. Agile. My body had no limits.

Every morning when I wake up, I feel like I’ve just come back from some other place. I don’t mean this in a mystical or spiritual sense, but my dream life is so rich that when I first wake up, I forget I wasn’t actually gone.

For a moment, I forget I have never run like that a day in my life.
For a moment, I want to go run.
But that’s as far as it goes.

Dreams teach me about thoughts or feelings I may or may not realize I have. About how I move through life, or where I may be heading. I have learned my personal symbolism, and most of the time, I can figure out what it is I am trying to tell myself.

The best teacher lives inside of me, but I find every reason to look elsewhere. Sometimes, I recognize my inner wisdom, but most of the time I choose to ask someone else.

Whether I vocalize the questions or not, I run around asking them. I run to social media for validation. I run to distractions for escape. I run to religious beliefs for hope. I run to anyone who will listen for reassurance. I run to work for money that I believe will give me peace, at last.

I’m tired of running, but run I do.

I want to run free like I did in my dream. Effortless movement, forward momentum that doesn’t feel dangerous, getting where I want to go as fast as I want to get there. Freedom and joy rushing through and around my body as I push forward through the wind.

I know what I have to do, yet I don’t do it.
I roll over and grab my phone.

Written 7.4.26

• When I walk into a room, I no longer wonder if they like me. I ask myself if I like them.

I got really good at this, and it was so freeing. I found myself going more places, doing more things, and enjoying myself more. I was no longer under an imaginary microscope being dissected and judged for my every move.

I also learned that if I’m not enjoying something, just stop.

• Just because I’ve been doing something a long time, doesn’t mean I have to do it for a lifetime.

Or the lifetime of whatever it is.

For instance, if I’m reading a book and I find I’m not that into it anymore but feel obligated to finish, I just put the book down. Nobody cares, and I shouldn’t either.

A personal downfall to all of this is that I have anxiety. Anxiety predisposes me to gear up for the worst-case scenario. It makes it hard for me to imagine that I might enjoy something, so then I decide I won’t before I even try.

Because, you know, put the book down.

If someone makes a compelling case and I can imagine myself liking it, then we’re all good, but most invitations don’t come with a detailed description complete with exit strategies.

Either way, I’ve found a freedom that allows me to do karaoke by myself or dance at a party without being drunk, and THAT makes me feel good.

Written 7.29.21

I posted a photo of myself with a line from my current novel as the caption last night. Within hours, it had 8,221 views. At first, I felt encouraged. I thought my words resonated, and people were enjoying my writing. But then I noticed…

All of the reactions were from men. I looked at the analytics, and 92% of the 8,221 were men. I then compared it to some of my other posts that had a similar number of views.

My writing posts usually have the same photo each time, with text over it; the title and an excerpt from the writing piece I am posting.

Here are the numbers:

59,614 views, 94% women

12,399 views, 92% women

10,439 views, 87% women

6,109 views, 86% women

4,475 views, 80% women

This trend is also consistent with my bird videos.

My followers who are interested in my words and my birds are mostly women.

The photo I chose to represent the lines from my novel did not serve my intention. I was looking for people who care about my words. It appears that my words got lost because of the photo.

The photo is nothing special. I chose one that I felt best represented the line, “Today the mirror feels kind and lends a hand in helping her out of bed.”

No makeup, fading hair color, retainers in, but still…7,563 of the 8,221 viewers were men. Compared to every other post I’ve shared, something about the image changed who stopped to look.

I set out to share something I’d written. Instead, I was reminded how easily a woman’s image can become louder than her voice.

It reminds me of the lines from my poem: Women Before Me

“Was it the first heart broken, the first tearing apart?

When your body became a spectacle, and you learned to play its part?”

Is that when I learned my power, or when I started to lose it?

Fire stings my chest.
Stomach gripping.
Head swimming.

Does she feel it too?
Or is that just what I’m hoping?

I live in delusion.
Beautiful stories in my head.

Love me, please, love me.
Say I love you again.

Picking up scraps, piecing them together.
A tricky little puzzle
keeps switching the edges.

This fits, that doesn’t. Just kidding, keep going.
Exhaustion sets in
but with love, there’s no stopping.

When the edges smooth out
my heart whispers,
that’s promise.

I think she feels it too, my love.
My daughter.

My heart soars with meaning.
Arms stretched open wide.

I am loved.
I have family.
Lies. Lies. Lies.

Beautiful, hateful.
Lies.
I know.

But I sink, sink, sink.
Wrapped in comfort.
They let go.

I won’t do it again.
I lie.
I can’t help it.

This love is too strong.
My resolve.
Melted.

This love, my love, was never mine to contain.
It grew within my body,
birthed into life
my love, my pain.

Fire leaves my chest.
My stomach, it loosens.

Does she feel it too?
Or was that only a delusion?

Written 6.26.26

Women before me. Where is your wisdom?

Woven in, carried through, on the wind of our daughters.

The stride of your steps, the sweep of your shoulders.
I see you in me, and in each her before us.

Lives lived unwitnessed but undeniably felt. Did you feel all this too?
The weight, no help.

Women before me, how did it work?
When things got too heavy, when your heart only hurt?

Did you cry all alone? Did you scream in your pillow?
Could you see through the dark? Was there even a window?

Did you dare life to meet you, or did you build yourself armor?
Where is your wisdom, where is the wind of your daughters?

Was it the first heart broken, the first tearing apart?
When your body became a spectacle and you learned to play its part?

Was it when you first lost your breath, then your desire to breathe?
When the hand of life pressed down on your head, ’til you fell to your knees?

The babies that stopped breathing, the daughters that strayed.
How did you do it? What made you so brave?

Did you know where home was? Did you ever really have one?
Or did you live every day happy that you finally found one?

You didn’t leave your words, but your life wrought the lessons.
Wisdom woven in our blood, each daughter in possession.

Every late night you cried, every ache that you felt, we all feel it too and like you, we know how to melt.
Melt until morning, melt until the end. Melt, harden, melt, and then do it again.

Preface to the Women’s Wisdom series. My Grandmother Had A Blue Couch

Read Next: Delusions of a Mother

My grandmother had a blue couch. A little deeper than baby blue. It was velvet, or something like it. I can’t be sure because no one was allowed to touch it. Unless it was Christmas, and even then, you'd better be really careful sitting on it.

I thought about that blue couch this week. I thought about what my grandmother said to me not long before dementia finished taking her mind.

She said, “I should have let people sit on the couch.”

I didn’t quite catch what she was trying to tell me. I didn’t know if we were having a mixed moment where the present and past were colliding or if she was fully aware of what she was saying. The words seemed to come from nowhere, so I asked what she meant.

“That couch, I should have let people sit on it.”

I follow her finger to the blue couch that was sitting “up yonder”.

“I worried so much about people messing up that couch that we never got to sit on it.”

We both stared at the couch. She was right, she did. And the couch, at least a couple of decades old, looked brand new.

My grandmother was very particular about her home. She would meet you at the door and wipe your feet with a wet paper towel before you could set a foot inside. She was so meticulous about cleanliness that she installed pure white carpet, and it stayed that way.

I believe the need to control and protect her space was born out of the experiences she refused to talk about.

The memory of her talking about the couch has stayed with me for a few reasons.

My grandmother and I spent a lot of time together, but I don’t have many memories of hearing her thoughts. She had opinions on this or that, but I knew nothing about her inner world. Her reflective, internal thoughts.

As I go through different phases or seasons of life, I often wonder what she would have done or had to say about things. It bothers me that I don’t really know. I can’t even imagine a scenario and think, “yes, this is what Grandma would tell me to do”.

My grandmother guarded her life like she guarded that couch and her white carpet. For her, the past was the past, and she left it there. She left it there so well that if you dared to ask about it, her anger would make you wish you hadn’t. Was the weight too heavy to acknowledge? Did she learn it’s not safe to let it out? I’ll never know her reasons, but they were hers.

Maybe, in a way, she realized that protecting the couch was an outward display of how she protected her heart.

I feel a sense of awe and quiet admiration when I think about the things she endured and carried through life. Emotional weight pressing on small shoulders you would never guess could carry the world. And I wonder if she ever let anyone in.

I wish she had let me sit on the couch. Not for me, but for her.

Women’s Wisdom Series: Women Before Me

When people suggested I might be depressed, I suspected there was some truth to it, but for me, it was harder to see. My depression was intertwined with my anxiety, and I couldn’t tell the two apart. They also liked to instigate each other.

I thought it was normal to understand what it feels like to want to die.

I thought everyone had considered ending their life at one point or another.

I thought everyone was just getting through their days, but they were just doing it better than me or lying to me.

The idea that people wanted to get up and experience a day, an event, or just life in general seemed like a platitude of sorts. Like something you’re supposed to say, and everyone just goes along with.

We see life through the lens of our own perspective, and unfortunately for some, that lens can get skewed. Because I couldn’t imagine an existence where I would want to act in the ways I saw others acting, I couldn’t see that they were genuinely having a different experience than I was.

Nothing would make me angrier than hearing someone call someone who had ended their life selfish. How cruel. How self-righteous. How could they not see that their pain was bigger than everything?

Because they have never felt that kind of pain.

The person who ended their life couldn’t believe anyone actually cared because we are all just pretending, right? And so what if someone did care? What did someone caring ever help?

If for nothing else, I will thank my depression for teaching me this. Empathy for those battling themselves. Fighting a fight they don’t even realize they are in and might be able to win.

If. They. Just. Keep. Going.

Easy words. Monumental ask.

My depression was sneaky. It came and went, but every day, there was a lingering sense of just getting through the day. Just waiting to go to bed. Each day took effort. That effort sometimes looked like smiling and laughing, so everyone else felt comfortable. Or posting happy photos and videos to prove I was happy and thriving too. That’s what we do, isn’t it? We try to conform, to fit in. No one likes someone who admits life isn’t fun and feels like an obligation.

Yet I kept trying. The fact that I wanted to keep trying was enough for me to keep trying. It might be more meaningful and tug at heartstrings if I said it was my family or some noble cause that kept me going, but that would be a lie.

I couldn’t accept that I mattered to anyone enough that my absence would feel worse than my presence.

On the other side of depression, I have found the ability to accept love. To accept that my absence would hurt those I love and not relieve them. My heart breaks at the idea of leaving them. At the idea of my husband not having me to call each time he changes location or can’t decide which snack to buy. Or my daughter needing her mother, but there’s no mother there. I can’t believe I thought leaving my people would be a good thing. But I did.

I feel like if I had read this while I was depressed, I probably would have rolled my eyes. Hope was not something I knew how to feel. Happiness was an illusion.

But if you read this and you can relate, your stuff may be different than mine was, but it is no less real. Your feelings are real, and in this moment, they feel true. But our minds can be liars. The mind tries to work for us, and somewhere along the way, it got the message that these thoughts and feelings are what are most beneficial to us.

You can smile again. A real smile. Not the fake kind that makes others comfortable.

You can laugh again. Real laughs.

You can find joy in the mundane.

You can love and be loved.

You can cry and not feel consumed by it.

Written 8.27.25

From the 1950’s, when women were chewing laxatives after each meal to 2026, when every other woman is taking a shot of one kind or the other, it is all in the pursuit of skinny.

I grew up in the 80s and 90s when Fen-Phen and heroin chic were the things. I had friends as young as 14 years old taking those pills. All in the pursuit of skinny.

My mother grew up in the 60s and 70s when crash diets and amphetamines were all the rage. Under the influence of my grandmother, a product of the 50s, she was fed laxatives as a child. All in pursuit of skinny.

Females are twice as likely to develop an eating disorder as males.

Whether someone develops an eating disorder or not, the societal pressure for skinny has always found its way to the forefront. As females, we are taught from a very young age that our bodies are something to be viewed. Something that exists for someone else’s pleasure. That is a lie.

Personally, I had my own struggles and ideas about body image I had to work to undo, and sometimes still do. Because my mother struggled and felt the pressures from her own mother, luckily for me, she chose not to pass that on to me. She was always very deliberate in telling me I was not fat and did not need to be on a diet, despite my 12-year-old insistence that I was. Unfortunately, even though she tried to teach me not to worry so much about body image or dieting, I fell in line. The sad fact is, she didn’t have to make me believe I was fat and should be skinny. Society did that.

I know I’m not saying anything new here. We all know it’s a problem, yet we all still participate in one way or another.

I have entered a new phase of life where I am being kinder to myself because I realize that, as I am getting older, skinny never mattered. What mattered was HEALTHY. I have been overweight, underweight, and some were in the middle. I have the stubbornness and willpower to do it without any help from the plethora of solutions available, but I got real with myself recently. I asked myself who I was doing any of it for? And has any of it mattered to a point that it changed my life significantly?

Yes and no. The largest benefit came from going from overweight to a healthy weight. Not according to charts, according to how I felt. I felt my best when movement became easier, and my insides weren’t struggling to digest all of the crap I was putting in them. After that, it just became an arbitrary number on the scale or a smaller clothing size to aspire to. Because, you know, skinny.

I did the skinny thing for a while. A long while. It wasn’t bad to be skinny, but the return on my time and effort in the pursuit of skinny did not add up to it being worth it.

Now I ask myself, how do I feel? Sure, I still want to “look good,” but it’s not the top priority anymore. I have also found that when I feel good, I tend to also look good. It’s all subjective, of course, what looks good. But what really brought it home for me was asking myself some questions.

Even though my mother struggled with her weight, did I ever look at her and wish she looked different? No. Have I ever loved anyone in my life less because of their weight? No. Does wearing a size zero feel any better than wearing a size 4? No. However, I will admit the hardwiring of worrying about sizes still creeps in. But if you were to change all size 4 tags to size zero, I would be happy as a clam, and that’s how I know it doesn’t really matter.

These realizations help me to keep the skinny script in check. I plan to live the rest of my life in pursuit of health. I want to feel good when I move, feel good when I eat, and most of all, enjoy my life in this body without worrying if I am taking up too much space or if I look good according to whatever society is claiming is beautiful right now.

I believe beauty is joy that others can see and feel.

Show me someone of any size, any weight, who is joyful and convince me they aren’t beautiful. You can’t do it.

Sources:

https://www.nationaleatingdisorders.org/statistics/

Come closer. Just kidding.

Mixed signals are one of the main issues I hear people talk about in relationships. One person will do something hoping for a certain interaction, only to be met with what feels like rejection. That perceived rejection then causes the other person to react based on their internal story.

We all have stories we tell ourselves, and the natural next step is to try to prove or disprove those stories.

If someone learned that getting close to others often led to those people leaving or fading away, they might be less likely to try to get close to others in the future. Or they may do the opposite and try to get close to everyone they encounter, hoping to disprove the story they have told themselves: that there is something about them that makes people leave.

Either way, they are trying to prove themselves right or prove themselves wrong.

The key here is that none of it has anything to do with the person they are trying to prove or disprove their story with.

It is about making meaning out of their circumstances, and trying to make their inner stories line up.

Over the years, I have told myself numerous different stories about myself and about others. It is how we make sense of the world around us.

The stories we create about others are usually connected to the stories we tell about ourselves. It all comes back to us.

We are living life writing a whole book about ourselves. Every other person is a character in our book, and since we are the main character, we write their part in relation to ourselves.

If we can learn to understand that everyone is doing the same thing, writing their own story, then maybe we can better understand where we fit into their story and clear up some misunderstandings.

This became especially clear to me when my daughter transitioned from a teenager to an adult.

One of the most difficult parenting phases for me so far has been when my daughter transitioned from a teen to an adult. I have many thoughts about why an arbitrary number, all of a sudden, makes someone an adult and therefore, in the eyes of the law, capable of making life-altering decisions. Someone, somewhere in time, decided that in our country, when your child reaches this certain age, they go from someone that you are responsible for to someone responsible for themselves. Literally overnight.

As parents, we know this is going to happen, but we don’t believe it. Not really. Not until your baby is walking out the door and you can’t stop them. Not until you switch from participant in decision-making to spectator. Sometimes this spectator role feels a whole lot like watching everything you love walk headfirst into an oncoming train, and you can do absolutely nothing to stop it.

When you spend almost two decades advising and controlling consequences to some extent, this shift is jarring to say the least. For me personally, it has taken almost five years to adjust, and I’m still adjusting. I don’t know about other parents because no one talks to me about it. I’m sure it depends on the person and their particular set of ideas, challenges, and stories they have written about themselves in the parent chapter of their lives.

But regardless of the story the parent is writing, the child has also been writing a story since birth. When those two stories become less intertwined, the parent’s writing team has to scramble to make sure the plot makes sense. Or in my case, to try to keep the storyline intact.

I had not only written a story about myself, but I had also already plotted her story to some extent.

While this internal struggle was going on, it should come as no surprise that it was also an external struggle, between myself and my daughter. She was fighting for her independence, and I was fighting to keep her close.

I was never one of those parents who was committed to a certain plot (career path, life plan, etc.) I have always encouraged ideas, but I did have ideas about the path I thought she would take. I expected her to be an academic or involved in politics of some sort. Not because I wanted her to be, but because when I paid attention to her traits and interests as a child, that’s what they looked like they were pointing toward. So I cultivated experiences to help nurture that path. I was also open to shifts in interest. If one day she was interested in becoming a detective, we explored detectives.

My point is that while I had ideas about the direction her life may take, I was not set in it. I was very much open to editing that part of the story.

The part of the story I didn’t want to edit was the part where I was super involved in every little thing she had going on or was doing. The part where I was the advisor and the way maker. The part where I swooped in and made things happen, or helped her find the resources.

That was not what she wanted in her story. She craved independence and needed to know she could do it without me. That was completely contradictory to my story, where she needed me and didn’t want to do it without me. So we clashed. Two intelligent women, head to head, each as strong as the other. It was not easy, nor was it pretty. It is still a learning experience every day as a mother of an adult. Especially an adult that is as strong-willed and intelligent as she is. She is by far the only person currently in my life who can match me intellectually. And I love that. I love that we have that to build on. We don’t always agree; most times we don’t. She says I’m not progressive enough, and I think she’s a little too brave sometimes, but in the end, we respect each other, and over time, we are learning our roles in this new phase.

I am finding joy in seeing her not need me. It took me a very long time to get to this place, but it is arriving. I still have my days where I have to rein myself in and realize my part in her story is whatever she decides it gets to be, but I am hopeful that soon, our storylines will inch closer and closer.

Can you think of any stories you have written for yourself or others that may be affecting your relationships?