“Not everything that can be counted counts, and not everything that counts can be counted.” ~William Bruce Cameron My gardener and I were talking the other day—his English broken, my Spanish worse—but we found a way to connect. He told me about his eight-year-old son, a bright, joyful kid who loves baseball. The boy wants to play. His mother…
“Style is a way to say who you are without having to speak.” ~Rachel Zoe I didn’t set out to find myself. I just looked in the mirror one day and thought, “Wait, when did I stop looking like me?” It was after a breakup—the kind that leaves you foggy, emotionally threadbare, trying to make sense of where you…
“You don’t have to force the flow—sometimes your only job is to soften and let go.” ~Unknown For most of my life, I was obsessed with getting everything right. Planning. Controlling. Anticipating every outcome so I wouldn’t be caught off guard. I saw life as a kind of puzzle: if I just made the right moves in the right…
“If today gets difficult, remember the smell of coffee, the way sunlight bounces off a window, the sound of your favorite person’s laugh, the feeling when a song you love comes on, the color of the sky at dusk, and that we are here to take care of each other.” ~Nanea Hoffman The beach breeze brushed against my skin….
“Living in the moment is learning how to live between the big moments. It is learning how to make the most of the in-betweens and having the audacity to make those moments just as exciting.” ~Morgan Harper Nichols There’s a peculiar grief that doesn’t often get named. It lives in the moments when you’re neither here nor there. When…
“You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face.” ~Eleanor Roosevelt There’s a quiet moment before the spotlight hits when everything in your body wants to run. Your hands tremble. Your voice tightens. Your breath shortens, even though the room is still. You love what you do—you’ve trained,…
“Make it a great day that ends with a smile in your heart.” Growing up, I always heard my father speak variations of these words. They’ve always sort of been ingrained in my head, but now more than ever are forever planted. He lived by them. He breathed them. And in doing so, he instilled them in me so…
“Rituals are the formulas by which harmony is restored.” ~Terry Tempest Williams Life doesn’t come with an instruction manual. One day, it’s a relationship you thought would last. Another, it’s a career path that suddenly dissolves. A health scare. A financial setback. Aging parents. A terrifying diagnosis. A global pandemic. If you’re lucky, you haven’t experienced all these—yet. But…
“To love someone deeply is to learn the art of holding on and letting go—sometimes at the very same time.” ~Unknown Nothing has softened me—or challenged me—like caring for my ninety-six-year-old mother as she slowly withdraws from the world. I thought I was strong, but this is a different kind of strength—one rooted in surrender, not control. She once…
“Success isn’t about what you do; it’s about who you are. Just existing—waking up, breathing, being present—is enough.” ~Unknown On my third trip to the emergency room, I lay in a hospital bed, ten weeks pregnant and nine kilograms lighter. I had just vomited for the forty-seventh time that day. My body felt empty, but the nausea never stopped….
