I used to think goals were like rock climbing, or more specifically, like those tiny little plastic handholds in an indoor climbing gym. When I set goals, it was like choosing, with zero understanding, the shape and size of each grip, as well as their placement on a sheer cliff face. Once they were installed, …
A Little Yes Live: Goals that Nurture Your Inner Toddler
A lot of time when people talk about setting goals, they say goals make us more focused, productive, and successful. Quote honestly, I think wanting to be more productive is a TERRIBLE reason to set goals. That sounds stressful and unappetizing to me. You see, goals aren’t about doing more, being more, or becoming someone …
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Houseplants Are Zombies of the Apocalypse: The Mudroom
Last night, after I finished packing for a long trip, I decided to move all my succulents outside for the duration of our weeklong vacation. I have nine pots of various sizes on the bookshelves in our front room: one tiny barrel cacti, four plants that look like desert seaweed, and assorted echeveria in dark …
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How Courageous Persistence Can Lead to Hope: For iBelieve
Generally, clicking “Buy Now” shouldn’t make your hands shake. It shouldn’t make your stomach tie in knots or pump adrenaline through your body. You shouldn’t feel so jittery you want to run screaming from your computer. But that’s exactly how I felt the morning I sat down to purchase a web domain name for a …
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We Don’t Need Fires Lit Beneath Us: For SheLoves
The sirens sounded behind me as I rounded the corner in my beat-up Camry. It was late 1999; I was 21. It never feels good to get pulled over by the police, but when the cop told me I had an expired registration, I wanted to sink into the floor. The notice to renew was …
When You Know You’re Not an Artist
If I knew anything for certain when I was a child, it was that I was not the artist of the family—my older sister Katie was. Looking at her work, I knew I’d never be as good as her. I wouldn’t even be in the same universe as her. Anyway, I had my own ‘talents’: …
You Are Not the Problem: For AndiLit
When I was first trying to write regularly twenty years ago, I could not, for the life of me, finish anything. At the time, I was trying to write fiction. I wrote one story about a husband and wife making a hard decision over the phone. I could hear their voices in my head, imagine …
Belonging to a Broken System: For The Mudroom
One of the main reasons I stay at my church is also one of the things I dislike most about it. This is it: it’s a large institution. I go to a biggish Presbyterian church. A “Presbyterian” church is literally a church governed by “presbyters”—Greek for elders, or leaders. That’s one of the big reasons …
Jazz Hands and All the Ways I Feel Powerful: For SheLoves
Last summer, I went to a reunion of sorts. We gathered in the glistening kitchen of someone I’ve known since high school, drinking margaritas. I met all of the people there decades ago at my church, though we don’t all see each other as often any more. Still, we know each other’s histories. I asked …
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Arguing with God about the Bible
Once upon a time, I told God to start sounding more like Cheryl Strayed. You might have heard of Strayed’s most famous book, Wild, which featured Reese Witherspoon chucking a hiking boot over a cliff. Strayed is also the advice columnist Sugar, originally on The Rumpus and now a podcast from WBUR. I love Strayed’s …
Learning to Be a Runner
Last night, I told my husband I was going for a walk. I put on my athleisure shoes and set out into the darkness of our street. When I got to the corner, I paused for a moment and then—feeling a little ridiculous—I started to jog. I’m not a runner. I ran in high school …
3 Ways to Reinvigorate Your Prayer Life
I used to hate praying. Let me qualify that statement so you don’t think I’m completely beyond redemption: I’ve always thought prayer was essential for faith. At the right moments—say, praying with other people—I loved laying hands on someone and lifting up their need to God. I loved when others prayed for me. I longed …
Belief vs. Beloved
First I’m going to talk to you about the Bible and being beloved, and then I’m going to talk to you about politics. The other day I had a conversation with a new Christian in which she expressed some negative feelings about the Bible. To my surprise, her words shocked me. I thought, doesn’t she know …
The Girl Who Was Afraid of Matches
Here’s a true story: I was scared of lighting matches until I was twenty years old. Twenty years later, now many books of matches under my belt, I find this both ridiculous and completely understandable. Ridiculous because matches are necessary and not really that difficult. And understandable because in order to light a match you …
When You Don’t Get the Help You Desperately Need: for iBelieve
I wanted my first days of motherhood to affirm my faith in humanity. Instead, I found myself alienated and alone. Like many of us, I’m usually reluctant to ask for help, so before birth, I’d made a solemn promise to myself and God that I would ask for assistance, no matter how hard it was. …
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Mediocrity Is Not Actually a Problem
I recently sat down for hot beverages with a writing buddy of mine, Grace. To my surprise, she told me that she’d never felt great at writing in school, but that after she became a mother, she felt this urge to write anyway. She’s stuck with it for years now. She still struggles with that …
You Have to Choose: For AndiLit.com
If parenthood were an economy, the currency would be sleep. You’d pay mortgage with REM cycles and buy groceries with naps. You’d fund college with any child that slept through the night. And, if you were like me, an insomniac with very wakeful daughters, you’d hoard sleep like Scrooge, clutching each second like newly minted …
Beauty Has Saved Me Over and Over: For SheLoves Magazine
To my great surprise, I discovered I was a high soprano in Grade 8. I’d thought before that I was a mezzo (or middle) soprano, but your voice changes a lot as you grow. What my choir director and I had assumed was a falsetto, turned out to be where my voice had the most power. …
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On Homemade Resistance…For Ready Magazine
I got a lot of compliments on my pink pussy-hat at the Women’s March. I didn’t knit one; I don’t knit, and also: time. I thought about sewing one, but realized the night before that I didn’t have enough pink fabric. Then I looked in our hat drawer and realized I had a pink hat …
The Seeking Is Part of the Healing
Not long ago, a reader (I’ll call her K) asked if I thought she should get my new anxiety course for a friend. K thought her friend could really use it. But she worried that getting it would seem pushy, since on other occasions, the person didn’t seem open to K’s help. I told K …
When Empathy Led Me Astray: For The Mudroom
In my premarital class, our pastor had everyone take a Myers-Briggs assessment. When my husband and I both got our results, we smiled at each other: we were just one letter apart. He was an INTP (introvert, intuition, thinking, perceiving), and I was an INFP (feeling). It made sense. Similar as our temperaments are, there’s a …
Anxiety Isn’t the End of Bravery. It’s the Beginning.
Last November, I decided to create a new mini-course for my blog subscribers for the New Year. After meditating on what I’d write about, I settled on anxiety. Learning how to live well with anxiety has seriously changed my life. It’s like learning how to turn off a malfunctioning fire alarm. The siren still goes off …
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I Confess: Reading Stresses Me Out
Okay, so this is weird. Reading stresses me out. It’s weird on so many levels. One: Reading is one of my favorite things to do. Two: I was an English major. Three: I read a lot. Conclusion: Weird. Maybe saying “reading” stresses me out isn’t specific enough. So let’s dig deeper. I get stressed that …
Social Justice is Awkward: For The Mudroom
I wanna be Anne Lamott. And NOT JUST because she’s a kick-ass writer. No: I covet her social-justice-beatnik-political leftist-protesting mojo. Lamott grew up with parents heavily invested in social justice. Her father volunteered at prisons, her mother marched in protests. This crap comes naturally to her. JEALOUS. When Lamott had her own kid, one of her first acts of parenting …