Category: personal growth

  • One Box at a Time

    Can you remember the last 5 self-help tips you saw on Instagram? I couldn’t. Every scroll triggers emotions without purpose. Every post we forget still drains our energy. Information that isn’t thoughtfully applied just becomes noise. Time to sort through one box at a time.

  • From Echo Chambers to Common Ground: A Journey Through Fear and Finding Connection

    Yesterday, we watched a flock of turkeys walking up and down the road, jumping, flapping, and following each other up and down the same section of road back and forth, heading nowhere. But clearly one of the turkeys thought that was a good idea, and the others followed suit. Later I observed them huddled together…

  • Breaking Down the Barriers to Love

    “I spent almost half a decade looking into the mirror and seeing someone else. Who did I see? Someone who everyone else expected me to be. People-pleasing doesn’t give your true self the opportunity to be loved—and it doesn’t give someone else the opportunity to be loved by your true self.”

  • Understanding Fawning: Breaking Cycles of Survival-Based Relationships

    Unlike fight, flight, or freeze responses that happen in the moment, fawning is different—it’s a survival pattern learned over time. Dr. Mary Catherine MacDonald explains how this trauma response develops through repeated experiences, creating adults who struggle to simply exist in relationships without constantly scanning for others’ needs. But understanding fawning is the first step…

  • When the Shell Cracks: Finding Truth Beyond Religious Performance

    Truth always finds a way to surface. Our ego tries to keep everything together, but eventually the shell cracks and what’s inside starts leaking out. If we’re brave enough to look at what seeps out instead of frantically patching the holes, we might find what we’ve been searching for all along.

  • When Authority Becomes the Enemy of Truth

    “Blind belief in authority is the greatest enemy of truth.” — Albert EinsteinThe ambulance lights cut through the darkness at the convenience store. Someone had played Russian roulette and lost. As I drove past that night, seventeen and heartbroken after my boyfriend left me for my best friend, I looked up at the empty sky…

  • Walking in Shadows: A Journey from Darkness to Light

    The toxic faith I grew up with convinced me that looking inward was dangerous—that if I dug beneath the surface, I’d discover nothing but the rot of an irredeemably sinful heart. But what happens when someone already drowning in that internal darkness looks outward and sees nothing but more of the same? When it finally…

  • Being Yourself in a World That Doesn’t Want You To

    Last night I watched the movie Sinners, and it left me thinking about the true power of our emotions. This film ranks among the best I’ve seen in a theater recently. If you enjoy vampire stories with rich storytelling, beautiful mythology, and deep historical context, you should definitely see this movie. What struck me most…