“Sometimes the thing you’re most afraid of doing, is the very thing that will set you free.” ~Robert Tew I recovered from binge eating and bulimia by giving myself permission to binge. Sounds crazy, doesn’t it? My decades-long weight and food war started in my teens, immediately after reading my first diet book, about Atkins,
Relaxation
“You are never stronger…than when you land on the other side of despair.” ~Zadie Smith In the last years of my twenties, my life completely fell apart. I’d moved to Hollywood to become an actor, but after a few years in Tinsel Town things weren’t panning out the way I hoped. My crippling anxiety kept
“The road to excess leads to the palace of wisdom… You never know what is enough until you know what is more than enough.” ~William Blake Many people discover spirituality through suffering. I found the path due to years of depression, anxiety, and psychosis. Part of the awakening process is identifying behaviors, traits, habits, or
“Authenticity is a collection of choices that we have to make every day. It’s about the choice to show up and be real. The choice to be honest. The choice to let our true selves be seen.” ~Brene Brown “What do you want to be when you grow up?” “It’s so nice to meet you.
<span data-mce-type=”bookmark” style=”display: inline-block; width: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 0;” class=”mce_SELRES_start”></span> Get into the feel-good flow of creating with the new and improved Master Peace Box, now only $39. Anyone who knows me knows I’m passionate about creating. For me, it’s a form of therapy. It’s a chance to get out of my head and
“Being heard is so close to being loved that for the average person, they are almost indistinguishable.” ~David W. Augsburger The five love languages—a framework for how we give and receive affection created by psychologist Gary Chapman in 1992—include quality time, gifts, acts of service, words of affirmation, and physical touch. As much as I
“The scars you can’t see are the hardest to heal.” ~Astrid Alauda On a lazy Sunday morning as I lounged in bed, I picked up my phone, scrolled through my news feed on Facebook, and decided to Google my parents’ names. I am estranged from my parents, and I have not had much of a
Last year my uncle died shortly after someone I love went through a pretty traumatic breakup. I love all my family, but I wasn’t really close to my uncle and didn’t know him all that well, so I was more grieving for my mother and aunt than myself. As I bore witness to the deep
“I don’t always make the best choices, but today I choose compassion over intolerance, sympathy over hatred, and love over fear.” ~LJ Vanier It’s crazy to me now, to look back and realize how freaking hard I was on myself for decades. Had I ever talked to anyone else the way I talked to myself, it
“Rock bottom became the solid foundation on which I rebuilt my life.” ~J.K. Rowling I’m no stranger to feeling hopeless and defeated. After many failed relationships, physical, sexual and emotional abuse my entire life, two bankruptcies, and the recent loss of my online business (October 2020), you could say I’ve been through enough to last
“Hope for love, pray for love, wish for love, dream for love…but don’t put your life on hold waiting for love.” ~Mandy Hale Going to weddings alone, with no plus-one to take along with you. Watching the couples dance, thinking, “Will there ever come a time when that is me on the dance floor?” Going
“A meaningful life is not being rich, being popular, or being perfect. It’s about being real, being humble, being able to share ourselves and touch the lives of others.” ~Unknown Hello, I’m Kortney, and I’m a recovering perfectionist. Like so many of us, I spent the greater part of my life believing that unless something
In this crazy, virus-driven alternate universe we live in, I think most of us know someone who’s struggling right now—someone who feels overwhelmed, stressed, or stuck, and maybe powerless to help themselves or change their situation. Maybe they’d feel that way even if we weren’t a year-deep into a pandemic. Maybe they’ve always struggled with
“Our anxiety does not come from thinking about the future, but from wanting to control it.” ~Kahlil Gibran Anxiety has followed me around like a lost dog looking for a bone for years now. I feel it the most acutely when I’m worried about my health or my daughter’s health. I notice a strange rash
“When you bring peace to your past, you can move forward to your future.” ~Unknown It amazes me how things that happen in our childhood can greatly impact our adult lives. I learned the hard way that I was living my life with a deep wound in my heart. My father was a very strict man
“You’ve been criticizing yourself for years and it hasn’t worked. Try approving of yourself and see what happens.” ~Louise L. Hay I dreamed of starting my own business for years. Ten years, exactly. While there are a few reasons it took so long to take the plunge, procrastination is at the top of the list.
“Not all of the depression that people experience is an illness… Unlike clinical depression, congruent depression is actually appropriate to your situation.” ~Dr. K Every day is the same. Every day I’m stiff. Every day I’m tired. These are the two main things that people with fibromyalgia deal with. It’s been like that for a couple
Have you ever received well-intentioned advice while facing intense anxiety, only to feel judged, misunderstood, or condescended? Like, “Calm down!” Or “Just be positive!” Or “Don’t worry so much!” The people who try to help generally want to do just that, but it’s always easier to advise someone when you’re not feeling what they’re feeling,
“Always concentrate on how far you’ve come, rather than how far you have left to go.” ~Unknown I recently read Glennon Doyle’s Untamed, and like many who have read it, I felt as if it had changed my life—but not because it made me think of all the things I was capable of (as was
“The song is ended, but the melody lingers on.” ~Irving Berlin I never went for any of my grandparent’s funerals as a young child, and honestly, I was secretly glad that I didn’t. I was too young to comprehend what death felt like, and I don’t think I had the strength in me to do
“You just never know what someone is dealing with behind closed doors. No matter how happy someone looks, how loud their laugh is, how big their smile is, there can still be a level of hurt that is indescribable. So be kind. Even when others are not, choose to be kind.” ~Andrea Russett Everyone is
“What should young people do with their lives today? Many things, obviously. But the most daring thing is to create stable communities in which the terrible disease of loneliness can be cured.” ~Kurt Vonnegut Have you ever felt like a stranger in your own life? Watching other people like you were separated by some invisible
“Nonresistance is the key to the greatest power in the universe.” ~Eckhart Tolle I cannot say that I didn’t struggle in my life. But there’s one area in which I have overcome the challenges I was facing with hardly an effort: letting go of the eating disorder I was suffering from, getting rid of the
“I am doing the best I can, and I am enough.” ~Unknown I don’t know about you, but I’ve recognized that historically, I’ve treated myself more harshly than anyone else ever has—and I’ve been in my share of abusive relationships. I’ve held myself to ridiculous standards, pushed myself to be and do more than I
“Make the most of yourself… for that is all there is of you.” ~Ralph Waldo Emerson Every day, it was more or less the same. I presented an edited version of myself to the world. I felt a deep level of discomfort with the idea of letting myself go. Could I? Should I? The answer
“Sometimes the only closure you need is the understanding that you deserve better.” ~Trent Shelton I’ll never forget the day we met. It was a classic San Francisco day. The sky was a perfect cerulean blue. The sun sparkled brightly. I ventured from my apartment in the Haight to Duboce Park to enjoy the Saturday.
“About all you can do in life is be who you are. Some people will love you for you. Most will love you for what you can do for them, and some won’t like you at all.” ~Rita Mae Brown The stigma associated with mental illness has improved in recent years, but there is still
“One in six men will be sexually assaulted at some point in their life. It doesn’t make us weak or less masculine—nor should it. Rather, we, as men, should encourage other men to speak up, to be courageous, share this burden with others, and to attend therapy and take medication. There is such a thing
“Stress is not what happens to us. It’s our response to what happens, and response is something we can choose.” ~Maureen Killoran I don’t know about you, but I often find advice to release stress and pressure to be great on paper but incredibly difficult to apply. Just say no more often! Sounds good, but
“If you’re lonely when you’re alone, you’re in bad company.” ~Jean-Paul Sartre I have spent most of my life surrounded by people, which is probably why I never realized I was lonely. For the majority of my adult life, the only quiet times I had to myself were the very start and very end of