The sad part is that I couldn’t even see the lie I was being fed. After all, I was pretty close to being china! (which begs the question, could ceramic even become china or were these identities immutable?) We were taught to compare ourselves to objects. Objects made to be used by another person and then put away until they needed to be used again.

How high? Well, according to one recent study, a lack of social connection carries health risks similar to what you see when you smoke 15 cigarettes a day. The same study found that isolation is likely twice as harmful to physical and mental health as obesity (Cost, 2021).

How much must I give them? How much could I? But the moments from those years wove themselves into an unexpected gift. Scenes where we perched on kitchen counters to talk late into the night, left encouraging notes out and meals kept warm for when one of us got home. The air in our little bathroom was full of humming and hairspray. My daughter spent her first years swimming in the love of her live-in aunts and slowly, very slowly, the size of the cost diminished when compared to the reward. We’d been given the unshakeable bedrock of each other.

Did you know that even simple goals often change us in ways we don’t see coming? It’s true! Hitting your goal regularly of drinking more water will keep you hydrated, yes, but it might also have effects you didn’t expect like clearing up your skin or making it hard to sit through history class without using the restroom! The moral is that we can’t always see all the ways a goal will change us.

Even though practicing silence can feel frightening and unnerving at first, push past that feeling. Stay with it! There is a place on the other side of that fear where the waters of peace run deep. For you, maybe it’s in the morning shower before you’ve been sucked into the rhythm of the day. Or maybe it’s somewhere out in nature where you can sit alone and just feel the sun or the wind. Wherever it is, make a point to seek out silence sometime this week and befriend it.

An activity that forces you to think about something else besides whatever is worrying you is helpful. Distraction (to an extent) is a positive way to cope with something. I’m not talking about avoiding your problems and never working things out. When you’re not taking care of problems, you’re just prolonging anxiety and issues. Distraction is NOT healthy in this way. However, sometimes, we just need to clear our heads. For example, last year I was applying to graduate school, involved in several clubs and extracurriculars, working, and a full time student. I needed ways to just relax and let the anxiety out during that time. Driving is one way to do this. It gives me the opportunity to focus on something else. When your brain is in hyperdrive, it needs a break! Distraction can help.

While there are many physical benefits to good hygiene, there’s also an impact socially. People who take care of themselves in these ways tend to be more confident and have higher self-esteem. This boosts productivity at work or school, increases positive self-talk, and puts the person in a better mood. On the other hand, those who don’t practice good hygiene tend to have lower self-esteem and have increased thoughts of anxiety and irritability. It seems as though the saying holds true: look your best, feel your best!

We all have fears we would rather not name and face. Part of being human includes learning that the only way to prevent our fears from controlling/shaping us is to face them. To sit with them. Many times facing our fears means realizing there may actually be a small piece of truth in it but with part of the picture that we haven’t seen before. 

So here’s a question: how do you know that you can trust someone enough to be vulnerable with them? The way relationships work is this: in order to be vulnerable, we do need to experience some level of trust with that person, but in order to create trust, we often need to share some level of vulnerability.

Fact: Nothing feels awful the way that doing something that betrays yourself does. I can remember in vivid detail moments from my childhood when family members would turn their focus on me, throw their arms wide, and in front of everybody say, “Come here and give me a hug!” And I did. Even if I didn’t want to. Even if everything in me was saying, “No.” I still did. As a child, I hadn’t been taught yet that there are moments where it’s far more important to disappoint another person than it is yourself. Instead, I was taught, like many of us are, not to make a scene or “disrespect” adults so I didn’t. I betrayed myself instead. It wasn’t until my teen years that I learned the importance of listening to that still, small voice inside and that there was a way to tell the truth and still be respectful.

“Well, do we want to go or not?”

I was in that moment again. That moment where what I said would determine whether my husband and I would be attending a party, community event, or charity dinner. We led fairly full lives, as most young couples do, but I tended to guard our free time like a territorial wolf. “No” was my favorite word.

Rituals are a fantastic way to help us mark time that we would otherwise brush quickly past. It makes sense. We all tend to get caught up in the flow of things, our to do lists, in responding to all the emails, texts, and messages. A ritual is like a sticky note for life. It says, “Remember this!” It could be the hot drink in the morning that helps ease you into the day or the firm but kind handshake you give when meeting someone for the first time professionally.

I’ve somehow found a few good recipes in the past couple years, and I’m telling you, now, two loaves don’t last more than 36 hours in my house. Sometimes I can be a little reluctant to start baking, but once I do, I’m completely in the zone and am loving it. I put some music on and have the food to focus on instead of whatever I’m worried or stressed out about.  Baking is a great way to release stress and relax in a productive way. Sometimes trying to relax through something like watching TV doesn’t feel great. People like to rest in other ways that feel productive but stressless at the same time, and baking can be one of those ways. 

If there is one message I think the current culture has downloaded into all of our brains, it’s probably this: Don’t be ordinary. Ordinary doesn’t get as many likes. It doesn’t put you on reality TV shows. It will probably never lead to celebrity or fame. It’s like a twist on the completely natural human desire to be seen… except on steroids. This is the desire to be seen by thousands. Millions. And the weird thing is that it’s closer to our fingertips than ever because, well, social media.

Two months ago I wrote a letter. I wrote it exactly as I would have from my deathbed... except that I wasn't on my deathbed and that was the entire point. Movies really love to dramatize those end-of-life-bucket-list-final-hurrah moments but the truth is that if I really was on my deathbed I'd probably be so exhausted and busy with the work of ACTUALLY dying that writing such a letter would be ten times harder, if not impossible. So, better to do it now.

There is nothing wrong with being productive, but it is good to refocus your daily life on what will truly be worthwhile when you reflect on how your time was spent. The days that will stand out will be the ones where you invested in others. Most of us would rather see photos of ourselves with our family or friends reminding us of treasured memories instead of a framed to-do list all neatly checked off. Of course there will always be more work to be done, but it is good to leave room for what really matters most.

I’m a total nerd. Geek. Weirdo. Whatever you want to call me. I’ve always loved fantasy movies, books, anime shows, etc. Let me age myself by saying that I was in elementary school when Pokemon debuted. It was a huge deal. Besides the show, everyone was collecting and trading Pokemon cards, too. Even at our age, fights broke out over this game. Pokemon trading was banned from my elementary school. Parents were called when cards were traded during recess on the sly. It was like the black market - seven-year-olds sneaking prized Charizard cards to one another under their winter coats, while hiding on the playground slide.

One of the most important things about learning to set goals is how to tell when one crosses the line from healthy to unhealthy. How can you tell one from the other? One of the biggest signs of an unhealthy goal is that you believe your happiness of value is dependent on it. It’s an illusion that getting that grade, beating that record, or dating that certain person will bring you the happiness you haven’t been able to find anywhere else. Another sign of an unhealthy goal is that you hide or don’t want others to know about how you are actually working toward it. As Brené Brown says in her book, “Daring Greatly”, “It’s not what you do, it’s why you do it that makes the difference. Are my choices leading to my wholeheartedness or do they leave me feeling empty and searching?”

For several months, I was getting enough sleep. I was within the 7-9 hours recommended to adults, but I was still exhausted. I was up in the mornings, let’s say by 8am (college student) and finally in bed around 12am. Sounds ok right? Nope. Those 16 hours were filled to the brim with classes, my job, extra-curricular activities, homework, etc. My schedule was so crammed, I couldn’t think about anything else. Mentally, I was so tired.

One thing Sparky would do, that I hear is actually pretty uncommon for cats, is notice when I was upset. Whenever I was crying, he would leave his catnap spot and run over to me, rubbing against me, trying to get me to pet him. At the time, I was annoyed. “Really Sparky? I’m the one that’s upset, and you’re trying to get me to make you feel better?” Little did I know that petting your furry friend is actually a great way to cope with whatever is going on. Sparky was more intuitive and smart than I was at that moment.