The Ingredients We're Made Of

This week, I created and prepared an original recipe from one of my novels, and somewhere between googling complementary herbs, chopping vegetables, and devouring the finished dish, I realized it was never about food in the first place. The official ingredient list may be largely meat and potatoes, but in the journey from chopping block to oven to table, my recipe took on the flavors of family history. By the time I sat down, beaming with pride, the bowl on my table was seasoned with something deeper and more savory than sage, something far more fragrant than thyme.

In The Freedom Series, readers see the women of the Safe House healing from various forms of domestic abuse, and because of my mother's survival story, the Safe House program is very close to my heart. The program I wrote over a decade ago is still so uniquely holistic, it doesn't exist in the real world—but in the infinitely imaginative pages of women's fiction, it's a recipe for wisdom, belonging, and identity. Finding a home at the Safe House is more than escaping danger. Within its walls, healing family wounds, cultivating personal growth, and savoring hospitality are only part of the recipe.

Because beyond the storytelling on the surface, The Freedom Series serves readers a chance to look more closely at the generational influences that shape us, sometimes whether we want them to or not.

So often, we remember a favorite dish by the name of its main ingredient—like a cheeseburger, which is not known by its condiments, but is enriched by them all the same. I think we do that with stories, too.

We relate to the main characters. We notice their interactions. We critique their speech. Occasionally, the transformations we witness as we read go on to inform our family traditions, flavoring our lives with bits and pieces that warm our hearts and inspire our minds. Sometimes they teach us lessons about faith and family that we couldn't have learned otherwise, like a dish beautifully served at just the right moment. These main characters, in many ways, are the story; a cheeseburger, after all, must have both the cheese and the burger. But beyond the main ingredient, there's a nuance that only comes from condiments.

In a story, this richness of flavor shows up in supporting characters like Violet.

There's a scene in STILL FIGHTING FOR FREEDOM where the Safe House residents gather for a Thanksgiving potluck. For various reasons, many have no families of their own, and this is a chance for broken women to stand shoulder at a time that would otherwise be tainted with loneliness and fear. A physical therapist teaches a little boy to carve a turkey. Food is prepared largely from the produce of the program's garden. One woman offers a casserole flavored by her grandmother's influence. And while those few paragraphs offer little in terms of the recipe's contents, Violet's recipe is in many ways a nod to my own family matriarch—the grandmother who still seasons the moments of my life.

My grandmother would have marveled at me this weekend. The kid who once hunted and eliminated every piece of onion in every dish ever served stood fully grown in her kitchen, sharp knife in one hand, smelly onion in the other. She'd have been just a little smug as she watched me dicing, her faded eyes twinkling with silent mirth. She might've shaken her head as I peeled sweet potatoes, because I still peel a little too much potato away with the skin. She probably would've left the kitchen entirely when I decided not to peel the russet potato at all.

I thought of her hands as I measured herbs and seasonings, not with measuring spoons but with sight and scent and the cup of my own palm, and I wondered if this recipe might've tasted familiar to a farmer's daughter from rural Kentucky.

I could almost feel her peering over my shoulder. "Are you sure you need that much salt?" (I did.)

The wrinkles that mapped her life on her face would have shifted and rearranged as she arched an elegant brow. "That looks like a lot of broth...might be too much." (It wasn't.)

She would have snorted, quietly amused, if told her how much this little recipe means to me. She would have dismissed the sentimentalism if I said, "But it matters, because recipes don't just change and preserve food. They nourish and preserve people." And she'd have outright rolled her eyes at the idea that the ingredients of our lives influence our flavor—"Silly. It's just food!"

But I think she would have loved this dish that was quietly named in honor of everything she represented, because we really do become what we've been fed. We're all uniquely flavored by the words, the love, the grief, and the grace that make us who we are, and while my grandmother was never openly poetic, she was wise enough to know truth when she saw it.

*****

The funny thing about food is that sometimes life and death are in the preparation. And not every ingredient begins as something healthy or nourishing—some require a guided transformation before they become part of something good. Raw beans often contain dangerous compounds that must be broken down, olives are intensely bitter before time and patience make them delicious, and even a rhubarb plant has parts worth preserving and parts best left behind.

People are not so different.

Family legacy means we inherit ingredients left behind by previous generations. We witness their traditions, absorb their wisdom, bear the brunt of their fears and wounds. Sometimes we carry the weight of hopes and dreams they couldn't reach—or never reached for. Some of those things arrive healthy and fulfilling, while others need healing and discernment. And some ingredients, no matter how long they've been part of the recipe, were never meant to stay there.

Healing from the past may not mean rejecting everything that came before us, but it does ask us to learn the difference between honoring a chosen legacy and repeating a toxic pattern. And maybe that adaptability is what makes a recipe so magical. A cook can preserve and enhance what makes a dish special, while changing the things that no longer serve those gathered around the table.

In life, just as in the kitchen, we're shaped by what we receive, and we're responsible for what we pass on. The ingredients may have been handed to us, but the recipe is still being written.

This week, embrace the unique flavor of your life and the lessons you've learned. Linger over moments of joy, and savor the flavors that make you happy. Don't be afraid to add a little salt when life seems bland, or rewrite the whole recipe when it's no longer working the way it used to. And no matter what kind of life you're cooking up...

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Coloring With Broken Crayons

Building a writing career is harder than most people think. It's more than just making up a story, hitting "publish," and rolling in piles of money. There's a certain dedication required to create people out of nothingness, weave backstories through the fabric of imaginary time, and sculpt truth into places and worlds that don't actually exist.

It often means taking your characters through unspeakable hardship. To nurture resilience, you give them struggle. To illustrate perspective, you offer contrast. You imagine what they'll say or do, how they'll react when life is hard...and then you make it harder. Not just to see what happens, but to guide growth. And the reader sees an inspiring character finding purpose and overcoming limitations. Page by page, we follow a plotted path to personal growth and if we're lucky, we walk away at the end with hope or gratitude we didn't have before.

Because stories, after all, are teachers.

As a Christian, I believe God is the ultimate author, and sometimes I think about my life as a story. I imagine myself as a character and I wonder what God is writing next. And I think about the hidden blessings in each passing chapter—especially the lessons I've learned from living with a disability.

Chronic illness is one of the greatest challenges in my story, and to be honest, there are days when disability feels like loss. Some challenges feel insurmountable. My body hurts, my energy dips, my finances and resources don't always stretch far enough. It changes my relationships. Sometimes it changes the way I see myself. And it's so easy to measure my story by everything disability takes away, especially when the world is quick to tell us what our labels remove. But what if that label is only one part of a nuanced identity? What if, even as it prevents some things...it prepares others?

The stories that stick with us are rarely easy to read, and the characters we remember aren't the ones who never struggled. The best books give us characters facing impossible things and making the most of what they have.

I think good stories color our hearts with broken crayons. Fragile enough to snap. Harder for smaller hands to hold. Sometimes the point is shaved away or broken off. Maybe the wrapper has been shredded, and this crayon isn't as pretty as the shiny new ones. But maybe we're all just broken characters who could learn a lot from broken crayons.

They still color—because they don't stop being crayons.

I want to tell you a secret. A deeply personal, sometimes controversial, maybe even a little bit dangerous secret.

There's a part of me that's glad I'm disabled.

There. I said it. But before you roll your eyes and decide that I'm choosing to romanticize chronic illness, constant pain, unending fatigue, and humiliating financial limitations, just hear me out.

I've written a lot about finding purpose in pain and the value of keeping a positive mindset, but I think sometimes it's easy to miss what that really means. Sure, we'll talk about choosing gratitude, and I could absolutely turn this into a pretty post on trusting God in suffering—but I'm not going to. Because the truth is, disability sucks.

You know that annual check-up most people dread? Imagine doing it two or three times a year, and then multiply that by at least three doctors. Think about the reality of never feeling less than a four on that cute little pain scale in every hospital room. Or planning a day at the zoo a month in advance so you can check on the weather, the stock of medications, the mobility aids. Or the people who won't go with you because planning is a hassle...and what if something happens?

It's depressing, really. Friends stop calling when you're not as fun anymore. The mask slips one time too many, your discomfort upsets or worries someone, and they suddenly find someone easier to hang out with. Someone more spontaneous. Someone less complicated. Or maybe they don't even believe you, and every interaction is marked by the weight of proof until you withdraw from the battle. Your life shrinks. Your joy fades.

Before long, all you have left is the struggle, and it becomes the focus of your existence. The moral of your story. The disability defines you. But what if I told you it doesn't have to? What if your power lies in choosing gratitude without denying reality, and that's the key to making sure disability doesn't define you?

Hang on, let me flip the script.

You know that annual check-up most people dread? Imagine using those moments to celebrate making it another year. Imagine recognizing the strength it takes to keep going, keep advocating, keep trying—even when no one else can see what it costs. If you do that two or three times a year with three or four different doctors, that's a whole lot of opportunities to take yourself to lunch afterward. And if little kids get a sticker for being a good patient, I feel like losing yourself in a new book when the pain scale hits six is perfectly reasonable.

Let that month-long planning session help you filter out the people who can't handle what you're going through. Check the weather, check your meds, check your mobility, and go to the zoo with someone who doesn't mind walking a little slower. Someone who pretends to love the apes as much as you do—because that bench over there looks like a great place to rest for a minute.

Don't be afraid of your support network. Tell them why you can't get out today. But then invite them over for a movie on the couch. (Bonus points if your friends are slightly older or have similar disabilities. You can fill a whole afternoon trading horror stories and coping mechanisms.)

You don't have to shrink, fade, or withdraw. Disability may take a great deal...but you don't have to give it everything. And I'm not suggesting that every disability has an obvious upside or that gratitude erases hardship. I'm just saying that sometimes the way we look at things matters.

I can't keep a nine-to-five because of my health problems. I can't just get up in the morning, drink some coffee, and soldier through the day. In fact, I do most of my writing from my bed, where I can try to keep my back happy. But that limitation bought me the freedom to be a stay-home mom. And coping with it allows me to do what I'm doing right now, writing posts I hope encourage people.

I spent too many years wishing I had a different set of crayons. Brighter energy, sharper health, prettier labels. I've watched people give up on me when I didn't have the right colors. I've compared shades of complacency and swatched patches of contentment. I've ached and prayed for sturdier wax. But if these limitations mark the experiences that shaped who I've become, what would I lose by erasing them?

The truth is, we don't always get to choose our crayons. Sometimes the only choice we're given is what picture we want to color.

*****

I think we forget that gratitude is a valid coping skill. We overlook it because it seems too simple to matter, or we discount it because we think it means pretending everything is fine. We shake our heads because sometimes it looks like denial, and sometimes it looks like surrender. For me, it's just acceptance. It's the courage to recognize when nothing is fine—and the simultaneous determination to say, "This part is still good."

If my life is a story and I am a character, I want to spend the next chapter as Indiana Jones. I want to face the booby-trap on page ten, throw a rock at it, roll under it, dance around the giant boulder, swing over the pit, and punch the dude waiting to ambush me on page thirty (me and Jesus can talk about that later).

I know I'll get to the end of the story battered and bruised. I know I'll slide into that last chapter so exhausted I can hardly even speak. But if I have to hunt the blessings in a story fraught with challenge, just imagine the picture I'll get to color with my broken crayons. I bet it'll be a library filled with a rainbow of stories, with every title a reminder to...

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When Purpose and People-Pleasing Collide

There's a scene in the Freedom Series where Christine is in her first group therapy session, and everyone is sharing bits and pieces of their stories—talking about what they've experienced, what they've allowed to continue in their lives, what drove them to change. And as Christine sits observing, she can't help thinking the group feels a little like a twelve-step meeting.

So, with that in mind...for those of you who don't know me yet...Hi. My name is Brandi, and I am a recovering people pleaser. Setting boundaries with people in my life has never been easy for me, and I've long lost count of the times a strong boundary led to rejection, abandonment, or irreparable damage in relationships I valued.

Several years ago, I read a book that changed my life. As I turned those pages, they painted a disturbing picture, where each new page solidified the image of an exhausted woman, stumbling under the burden of people pleasing and porous boundaries. A woman who never learned how to set boundaries without guilt. A woman who listened when the world told her she was selfish for protecting the time and energy needed to prioritize intentional goals. She was managing time as a busy mom, balancing motherhood and personal goals. She was desperately overwhelmed—but still pursuing dreams no one else seemed to understand.

She was me.

I'd like to say that by the end of that book, I became an expert at balancing relationships and goals. I'd like to say I mastered the fine art of managing expectations from others. I'd really, really like to say that I no longer feel people pleasing guilt, that protecting creative time got easier, and that living with intention has magically made my writing goals and boundaries seamless.

But I can't say any of that without lying.

Too often, saying yes to a purposeful life comes with its own problems, especially when your calling is a solitary activity. These days, our lives are filled with calls to answer and invitations to accept. We've all got dishes to clean and laundry to fold and loved ones we wish we could spend more time with.

It's why so many of us struggle with guilt around boundaries. I know I'm not the first or only person to feel the weight of emotional burnout from overcommitment. We've all dealt with feeling misunderstood by others. We've all felt resentment in relationships. And I'm not a gambler, but I'd be willing to bet that if I mention "the constant pressure to explain yourself," we all know exactly what those words mean.

The trouble is, staying focused on your purpose means you can't accept every invitation. You can't answer every phone call. You can't meet every external expectation...because if you don't show up, the work doesn't get done.

It's funny sometimes, how well God knows what I need. At the beginning of this year, I chose "No" as my focus word—and while a few people did ask questions, I was surprised by how immediate the pushback was. Some people were sad because they saw the warning as I set time boundaries to protect my writing. Some were worried because they were afraid I was isolating due to overwhelm. Some were resentful because they weren't ready to accept the "No" they knew was coming.

What I've learned this year is that I can hold those feelings with compassion and still set boundaries that protect my purpose, because those things are not mutually exclusive. We don't always like the answers we're given. That doesn't mean the answer was wrong.

There's a story in Nehemiah, where the Jewish people are rebuilding the walls of Jerusalem. The people are still recovering from the Babylonian exile, and Nehemiah is tasked with overseeing the effort to rebuild and restore the city...but the work faces resistance on all sides. There are people who wish he wasn't working so hard. People who point out how challenging it must be to build with one hand and defend with the other. There are threats of sabotage, destruction, and even death—but I think the part we can all relate to is the struggle to balance boundaries and purpose. It's discipline vs distraction, the battle between guilt and calling.

What I keep coming back to is that each individual request probably seemed perfectly reasonable in the moment. One dinner date. One meeting. One conversation. Just for a little while. What we don't realize is that for Nehemiah, every "yes" to something else likely felt like a denial of his calling. That dinner date required him to put down his tools, wash his hands, change his clothes, and hope the work was still there when he got back. That conversation might even have been one he was longing for...but it also asked him to press pause on the work that kicked him out of bed each morning and drove his effort through the heat of each day.

Nehemiah finally had to put his foot down, and in doing so, he set a biblical example of focus and purpose that's still relevant almost 2500 years later. "No," he said. "I am doing a great work and cannot come down."

He never said, "My work is greater than yours." He didn't say, "Nah, bro, I can't be bothered." He just recognized that a great work deserves priority, and sometimes that means making sacrifices.

And what I think we miss here is that this is not a lesson in workaholism. It's a lesson in stewardship, discernment, and priority. It doesn't mean never take a break, but it does mean stop apologizing for working on something that matters to you. Nehemiah 6:3 is a reminder to protect your time and your calling. To hold your boundaries. To say right there on the wall.

And I don't know what your calling is. Maybe you're giving everything you've got to raising the next generation full-time. Maybe you're giving up sleep to dig through a dissertation you're beginning to think will kill you. Maybe you wake up each morning burdened for the homeless or the addicted. Maybe you spend each heartbeat mourning with the marginalized or coaching victims through the journey from surviving to thriving.

Maybe you're like me, and pursuing your purpose in life means building a writing career, where every moment of creative discipline and consistency pave the way for storytelling to offer hope.

Either way, every meaningful "yes" requires a thousand quiet "no"s. No to distractions. No to guilt. No to the expectation that we should always be available simply because someone asked. And I think for the people pleasers among us, it's especially vital to recognize that every life is built one decision at a time, and our futures are shaped by the boundaries we hold today.

*****

I know it's easy to read something like this and see a conversation about productivity or time management—Christian or not, we all know what it's like to search for purpose or struggle to set a schedule that works. But whether your issue is boundary-setting or prioritization, I think the heart of that struggle is permission, and that's what I hope you'll take from this.

Discovering your calling isn't always the hardest part of living it out. Sometimes the real challenge is continuing to pursue it, even when the people around us don't understand why we're not as available as we used to be. But if God has given you a wall to build, you can't climb down every time someone whistles for attention...and you don't owe any explanations for intentionally choosing how you live your life.

Whatever your individual purpose may be, protecting that purpose isn't selfish. It's intentional. And while some people will eventually understand, there will be others who don't. Or won't. Or can't. Some people will miss the all-access version of you that was always available. Some will mistake your priorities for rejection.

Just know, there will be others who celebrate your growth and admire your sense of purpose. Instead of calling you down from the wall, they'll meet you during your break, fill that time with laughter, and then—respectfully—leave you to your work. Those are the ones who understand that either way, the wall needs building. They'll understand that it matters. They'll know you should never have to apologize for boundaries that protect intentional purpose.

And maybe sometimes, they'll even remind you that when purpose can't make resistance disappear, it can still steady our hands. Because some days, it's that purpose that keeps us going. Some days, it's the root of determination that helps us...

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Between the Lines: Reading the Reader

As an author who is a Christian but not a Christian author, I've been thinking lately about why stories matter and what fiction reveals about us as readers. The only true sex scene in the Freedom Series is both graphic and traumatic. It exposes the inner world of a woman who is victimized and terrified, drawing the reader into what it means to have hope and intimacy stolen in the name of control. But purpose matters too, and the story wouldn't be the same without the power of those moments. They are the ash from which a phoenix is born.

All of my novels have at least one on-page sex scene, and I've met readers at every level of comfort with that. Some are disappointed because my stories aren't "spicy" enough. Others are scandalized to learn that my books are "spicy" at all. What's amazing is how two people can read the exact same book and walk away with completely different impressions. Where one avoids or ignores what they see as explicit content, another seeks deliberate understanding of trauma, shame, courage, and vulnerability.

Neither reader is incorrect, but what we notice most is driven by experience and perception—and I think sometimes we forget that it's not always about the sex in the story. Sometimes it's about the story happening between the lines, in the marginal space where every scene is a brushstroke on a portrait. We forget that fiction isn't just telling us what happened; it's inviting us to understand.

And I think maybe that's why fiction matters. Because the stories that shape us are always more than just a story.

I've been a reader most of my life, and the emotional impact of fiction on my personal development is a major part of why I do what I do. I still vividly remember the first romance novel I ever read, not just for the sexuality of a nineties bodice-ripper, but for the way that story introduced me to new ways of thinking, new people I wouldn't have met, and new understanding of how stories teach us.

That book welcomed me into a large, close-knit family. It showed me a culture I didn't yet know, and it held my hand as it walked me for the first time through the literary magic of unfortunate misunderstanding. A man with a terrible reputation thinks he's kidnapping a girl he knows. It's hardly more than a prank—but everything changes for everyone involved when he realizes he's got the wrong girl. Throw in a pirate uncle, a public scandal, and a couple of Regency-era ballgowns and...well.

Was there sex in it? Sure. Was that the point? Not at all. But that story showed me the power of storytelling. We have so few letters in the alphabet—but we mix and mold them in infinite ways, and the words we form shape the hearts of the people who read them.

This week, I read a book that's sticking with me more than I expected it to. It's the second in a series, and I was excited to see a story I loved continue to develop through the eyes of different characters...until the abundance of on-page action started to seem annoyingly gratuitous. I almost closed the book and set it aside, but somewhere along the way, I stopped asking why there was so much sex, and started asking why the heroine was so incapable of accepting kindness without it.

The more I read, the more I saw the depth of the story. And the more depth I saw, the more deeply I recognized the necessity of those scenes. They weren't interruptions in the story. They revealed the emotional foundation the rest of the story stood on.

I think we've all been through hard things. We all know someone whose love language is sarcasm because for them, sincerity is an open door to pain. We all know someone familiar with trauma. Most of us know what it feels like to mistake isolation for safety.

And apart from the sex, that's what the book was about. A woman so defensive she borders on hateful, and a man who looks hard enough to see through it. A woman playing the vixen because she thinks that's all she has to offer...and a man who allows it for a while, because it's the only way to show her the truth. Every scene mattered. Every physical moment carried non-physical context.

"Why does kindness make her so uncomfortable?"

"How can she accept physical intimacy while rejecting emotional connection?"

"Who hurt her? And how is this dude putting up with this?"

Those questions mattered, specifically because sex wasn't the point of the story. Instead, it was evidence of a story that wouldn't have been as powerful without it.

So, do I think every reader should read everything? No. Am I saying the content doesn't matter? Also no.

But what if we chose to look at stories as invitations, and characters as portraits of people? We often forget the dialogue, and we rarely remember what happened in which chapter...but if we look inside the story we're reading, perhaps we open a door that transforms anger into recognition of fear. Perhaps we see through arrogance to the insecurity hiding beneath. Or maybe, in the place where we once saw stereotypes, we begin to make room for humanity.

Maybe stories aren't the lessons we memorize. And maybe they don't have to be. But so often, the stories that make us fall in love with fiction are pictures of the people we carry...and maybe what we choose to notice inside them says just as much about the reader as it does about the author.

*****

Here's the thing, though. I understand why some readers gravitate to—or completely avoid—certain types of content. I know people who never read anything with even a spark of magic, people who can't sleep at night if they catch even a hint of horror, and still others who simply do not see the sense in fantasy. We all know ourselves, and it's okay that we all have different convictions, different temptations, different boundaries.

But avoiding and understanding are not always the same. We may not read war novels, but we don't accuse every war novel of glorifying violence. We may not enjoy memoirs, but we don't believe grief memoirs encourage or endorse suffering. So why do we treat romance or sexuality so differently?

At the core of almost every story, regardless of genre, we find a glimpse of what it means to be human—to work through fear, to hunger for power, to long for intimacy. Since the beginning of time, human relationships have always been the place from which we explore and understand who we are in relation to the people around us.

I've heard people describe the same novel as beautiful, dangerous, healing, offensive, romantic...the list goes on. Different readers, different experiences, different viewpoints. Maybe that's why we connect with fictional characters differently, too. Because stories don't just reveal the content of the character; they reveal the character of the reader.

So whatever you're reading this week, I hope you'll hold those pages with an open heart. I hope you'll see the characters with open eyes. I hope you'll open your mind to what reading fiction teaches us about ourselves. And I hope, as always, that you'll...

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Dad Jokes (And Other Survival Skills)

For some, Father's Day is full of laughter. We celebrate the men who raised us, guarded us, lectured us, mentored us, and smothered us in dad jokes. These men are often the unexpected heroes of our society. They're the ones who move quietly from working all day to fathering all night. They stick around to change the diapers, carry the snacks, cuddle the crying. They set the tone of our personal growth, and our childhood memories are often filled with moments where these men taught us to ride bikes, change tires, and fire up the grill. Ideally, they are the strength we run to, the provision we trust in, and the protection we lean on.

But what about when none of that happened?

I watched church online this morning because my daughter didn't want to go—and I didn't blame her. Our society laughingly calls this "daddy issues," but the truth is, it's deeper than the long-gone voice I still hear in my mind when I think of my own father. The pain of abandonment, family estrangement, and trauma recovery are no joke. And yet...

This morning, church started with a video. Very serious tones, serious faces. Stellar dad joke delivery.

And those dumb jokes got me thinking about another father figure who, in many ways, directed the early years of my life. Was he perfect? Not by a long shot. But in the midst of an incredibly difficult childhood, where every day was a crash course in surviving hard times, my older brother gave me one of the greatest coping skills I've ever learned.

Somewhere between waking me up for school because our single mom was at work...and putting me to bed at night because our single mom was still at work...

He showed me that some days, finding joy in difficult times really is as simple as healing through laughter.

No one in my family is conventionally beautiful...but none of us are ugly, either. We all have memorable traits, both good and bad. The women universally have lovely eyes, no matter what color they are—and the men were all blessed with great skin. We all seem to have our own distinctive thing, too. My cousin's wild hair, my grandma's cute little sausage fingers, my aunt's 30-year mullet.

And my older brother's slick grin, which was as slow and sly as any Grinch long before Jim Carrey took the role.

When we were little, my brother and his grinch-grin taught me to laugh like a maniac for no reason. And looking back, I think there were times when his example of determined humor saved my life.

We were raised with the kind of exceptionally strange family dynamics that can stump a trauma specialist, and if our family was the type to have reunions, we'd form a live-action cautionary tale for recovery and healing from the past. Together, we're a showcase of every level of childhood trauma, a testament to the importance of mental health awareness. If we made a yearbook, it would just be pictures of us glued to the pages of a ratty old DSM-V.

We literally had a brawl at a funeral once, and that's not a joke.

We're weird; that's what I'm saying.

Anyway, my older brother is seven years older than I am (fun fact: my younger brother is seven years younger), and he was the first to teach me the value of the people who protect us. He'd beat up bullies and orchestrate bike rides. He'd sit at the riverside catching minnows, and when Mom was working, he made endless pots of beanie weenies.

I think he taught me to laugh.

Dysfunctional families are hard for kids, and there are entire years of my childhood that I can't remember. There's a scene in my mind where I'm stripped to my panties in the guidance counselor's office at school, and the police are taking photos of the bruises on my body—but I don't remember any of what happened. Someone asked me once if I'd like them to pray over me, and as they cheerfully said, "God can open those memories!" I thought about the way our minds are built to shut the door on experiences too painful to carry.

And judging by what I do remember? I don't need to know what's behind Door Number 3. I'll pass. And I'll laugh when I can, sometimes over nothing at all.

My brother invented a game when we were little, and back then I just thought it was proof of how clever he was. These days, I wonder what he took the time to distract me from. He'd sit me down, trying to be serious, wearing that grinch-grin, and he'd say, "Okay, we're gonna play Laughs."

Even now, I can feel the little girl in me sitting straight, big blue eyes trained on his face, nodding in silent anticipation.

He'd draw his brows together, thinking. I'd watch the rise and fall of his chest, waiting for the game to start. He was a skinny boy, and sometimes I'd watch his belly, looking for the telltale clench of muscle. Eventually his chest would hitch with his breath, his belly would tighten, and light would spark in his eyes. The grin would widen...and then suddenly he'd be laughing.

I never knew what got him started, but it never took long before the laugh spread. I'd laugh at how hard he was laughing, and he'd laugh until he cried, watching me giggle uncontrollably. Sometimes we'd play that game until our cheeks ached and our bellies cramped.

And so, on days like these, I tear the page of his example from the DSM-V and I keep it in my pocket. I don't need lost memories anyway.

*****

I know that for a lot of people, Father's Day is a beautiful celebration—but for others, it's a painful reminder of what was missing, what was lost, or what never really existed at all. For many, this day is a mixture of gratitude and grief, love and disappointment, laughter and longing.

Our relationships are rarely as simple as Hallmark would have us believe. Maybe that's why those dad jokes hit me so hard this morning.

And while I'll admit that I do love a good dad joke, none of today's jokes were especially funny...but they reminded me of something I've spent most of my life learning over and over. Humor and healing are not the absence or removal of pain.

They just help us carry the pain that cannot be removed. They're the healthy coping mechanisms that get us through hard conversations, the deep breaths that straighten our shoulders.

They're the building blocks of emotional resilience that remind us to keep going.

My brother couldn't change our circumstances. He couldn't erase the things that happened behind closed doors or guarantee a better future. But he could sit cross-legged in front of a little girl with that grinch-grin on his face and create a space for joy. He didn't just make me laugh. He taught me to survive.

So I don't know whether you're celebrating a wonderful father, grieving the one you've lost, or wrestling with a complicated history. Maybe you're like me, and you're just trying to make it through another difficult day. Either way, I hope you find a reason to laugh. Not because pain isn't real, but because even the darkest moments have room for light.

And sometimes, it's that belly laugh that gives you what you need to...

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You Are What You Eat

I overheard a simple question today, and it felt a little like pieces of a puzzle falling together. It wasn't even a question meant to be answered, but I thought about it long after the moment passed—because maybe the answer to a question like that says a lot about who we are and what we're made of.

We talk a lot about consumption these days. We have catchy slogans like, "You are what you eat," and we watch hundreds of thousands of body and health-related videos every day. How to look better, how to eat better, how to do intermittent fasting. We're worried about gym clothes and how to burn fat and which foods have the most fiber or least carbs or highest protein.

Then we worry about screen time and technology addiction. We analyze the music we listen to, the movies we watch, the books we read, and the impact certain words may or may not have when passed from one person to another. (Seriously, don't get me started on the Christian aversion to modern-day "cuss words." Side Note: The fear of cuss words is called Kakologophobia, which I think is hilarious.)

"You are what you eat" usually comes from a good place of dietary mindfulness, self-awareness, and moderation. But what about non-traditional consumption—like social media and advertising and all the other things we take in during the course of the day? What about the idea that what we absorb with eyes and ears shapes us just as much as what we eat? And what if we learned to look at this consumption with compassion, rather than comparison?

The question I heard this morning was, "When's the last time you put your phone down feeling more grateful than when you picked it up?"

I still remember the world before smartphones, and the way my first one felt like an open door. Through it, I could access people and places from all over the world. I could look up anything I wanted to know, and as social media became more and more prominent, I fed my sense of curiosity almost endlessly. At a moment's notice, I could research any topic, learn the answer to any question. The smartphone connected the ecosystem of humanity in a beautiful way...until it didn't. Somewhere along the way, our phones stopped being tools we use, and became collars that tightened with each passing day.

I think social media had a lot to do with that. And I don't often struggle with comparison, but I think we're all susceptible to how it chips away at gratitude and contentment. We want that body, that house, that relationship, that life—and before we know it, we've consumed so much of other people that our personal development isn't even personal anymore, and our sense of identity is dictated by where we stand on a scale of systemized envy.

We talk about it all the time. We limit social media, campaign against screen time, campaign to keep our kids from drowning in an ocean of content they're not ready for. And now, we compare that, too. We judge each other based on how often we post, what apps we're using, how many devices our children do or do not have access to.

But maybe social media wasn't the whole problem after all. Maybe it only highlights a problem that was already there: the trap of all-or-nothing mentality.

We've all fallen into this one. It's the one that makes us think that if eating an entire cake is bad, cake itself must be bad. The one that tells us if green eyes are pretty, brown eyes are not. The one that makes us choose between perfectly sterile, photo-ready homes and the cluttered spaces we actually live in.

The all-or-nothing dichotomy that stole our discernment. That made us forget the joy of all-things-in-moderation, leaving us afraid to consume and interact at all.

But what if we exchanged comparison for curiosity? What if we saw the world as a giant spice rack that's delicious specifically because of its variety?

As a mom, I watched my children learn the world around them by consuming. Dora the Explorer helped them learn about adventure and problem-solving. Ni Hao Kai-Lan nurtured my oldest daughter's fascination with foreign language and culture. The Backyardigans taught my youngest that despite the rigidity of Autism, pretend play is not illegal. And music taught them both to love movement and storytelling.

They weren't comparing themselves; they were learning that the world is bigger than they are. That one person might feel this way, and another might feel that way. If the world is a spice rack, media consumption taught my children that it's okay if some people like cilantro and other people don't. Not because one is better, but because it's okay to be different.

They learned about the world from books, from songs, from TV shows. They've watched how-to videos, listened to podcasts—and yes, they've scrolled through social media. And now I wonder if one of the greatest life lessons for all of us was buried there all along.

Maybe it doesn't have to be all-or-nothing. Maybe our phones aren't the problem at all. Maybe it's deeper than the vicarious experiences we find on those screens.

Maybe the real problem is what we allow those things to bring out of us.

*****

These days, I keep my phone on silent most of the time. I've turned off the notifications for almost every app. And I'm getting better and better at asking "What can I learn from this?" instead of "Why don't I have that?"

The truth is, we're consuming some thing in some way almost all the time—but there's a difference between consuming something and being consumed by it, and we still have a choice. We can consume endless content and surrender control of our narrative, or we can consume the experiences of the people around us and let those experiences fuel our growth.

The same Instagram feed that discourages one person inspires another, the same movie that softens one heart will harden another, and the same phone that connects us to people we love can convince us we aren't enough. Because the problem isn't the feed or the phone or the book or the number of letters in a particular word. The world is not inherently dangerous, and the things we consume universally are not universally problematic.

And maybe it's not about consuming less or comparing less, either. Maybe we just need to pay closer attention, to notice what leaves us more grateful. To appreciate what makes us more curious. Undaunted living has never meant hiding, isolating, or rejecting the world, and we don't need to avoid every challenge that comes our way.

We grow the most by moving through our challenges without losing ourselves in them—and a truly Undaunted life is found in the courage to choose curiosity over comparison and appreciation over envy.

You don't have to be fearless or untouchable to be Undaunted. You just need the kind of heart that still sees beauty in ugly places and creativity where everyone else conforms. Choose abundance no matter what you have. Remember who you were before the world had an opinion, before comparison convinced you that curiosity wasn't enough. Wherever you go, there you are anyway, so you might as well...

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Permission to be Human

Today in church, my family lined the row beside me: my youngest daughter, my oldest brother and his girlfriend, his two youngest daughters, and a family friend. The church felt full in those moments, and so did I.

Our pastor talked about the balance between faithful work and spiritual rest, and how easy it is to slip away from that balance. The tendency to perform as a workaholic. The easy slide into laziness. The way imbalance impacts self acceptance when we think we're not keeping up, and the way that same imbalance stunts our personal growth when we stop trying for too long.

It's funny sometimes, how what I hear in church is so aligned to what I'm experiencing privately. Struggling to keep self compassion from becoming self absolution. Embracing imperfection without letting go of effort. Giving myself permission to rest without hearing hurtful echoes of my childhood. 

Letting go of unrealistic expectations, learning how to be more authentic, allowing myself to celebrate growth after hardship without fear of pride. Accepting the complexity of being human.

When I got home, it was seventy-six degrees in my house because the a/c is on the fritz—and the trouble with seventy-six degrees is, I have Chiari Malformation, post-covid asthma, and moderate heat intolerance.

So...I took a cold shower, turned my bedroom fan on blast, and spent most of the afternoon feeling guilty for being affected by something as simple as the weather. Because here's the thing. My to-do list doesn't care if the house feels like an oven. My giveaway blanket still needs crocheting. My office desk still needs building. The paperback for STILL FIGHTING FOR FREEDOM still needs formatting. This blog post still needs writing.

The show must go on.

And maybe that's part of the problem—or maybe it's the solution I didn't know I was looking at.

My oldest daughter told me once that I have "main character energy," and I was insulted.

I'm a single mom, and I raised my kids mostly alone. I went to the appointments, waited during the surgeries. I learned the names of dozens of doctors. I kept track of favorite foods, dietary limitations, medications. I hosted friends, drove endless miles. And I bought eleventy-thousand glue sticks every August for as long as I can remember.

I did those things while building a career from the ground up—again, mostly alone. I wrote every chapter, coordinated every blog post, designed every piece of social media content. I did it while my books briefly made bestseller lists, and I did it when weeks passed without so much as a single sale. I noticed when comments flew in like hurricane winds, and I wrote anyway when every word was met with silence.

And I did those things while juggling relationships that mean the world to me. The time with God that keeps me healing from the past and looking toward the future. The bond I share with my cousin, without whom I could not be what I am. The friends who taught me emotional resilience and vulnerability, healing and personal growth. The safe people I laugh with, who give me permission to be human and keep loving me anyway. The ones who see the intensity of a deep-thinking introvert...and never turn away.

For forty-two years, I have been daughter, sister, friend, aunt, and mother. I have been wife and ex-wife. Student and teacher. The counselled and the counselor, the driver and the driven. In turns, I have played the parts of chauffer, chef, event coordinator, financial advisor, interior designer, maid, nurse, party planner, and therapist. I have acted as coach, handyman, nutritionist, and tutor.

I've made critical decisions that impacted everyone around me—and as the mother of more than one child, I've more than earned my unofficial badge as Peace Talk Facilitator.

But I've never once felt like the main character in anything. Not because my life is small, but because I’ve always understood it as something I’m moving through, rather than something centered on me. And I'm just trying to stay faithful to the human experience I'm caught in, to be mindful of what's in my hands. To see beyond the surface. To stay present, even when I'm stewarding responsibilities that don’t pause just because I’m tired or unsure.

Not because I am the center of the story…but because I choose to be fully present in it.

I think that's what my daughter and I both missed about whatever "main character energy" actually means. Maybe it doesn't have anything to do with a spotlight on a star at center stage. Maybe it doesn't need to be cinematic at all—even if my life does look a little like a sitcom sometimes.

Maybe it's something more simple.

Like light, shifting slowly on the facets of a gem under pressure.

*****

Halfway through the year of no, what I'm learning is that truly knowing yourself, understanding yourself, and accepting yourself are all deeply tied to being okay with being more than one thing.

Some days you're the comedian, some days you're the joke. All too often, you're both at once without knowing how to separate the two. The trick is to embrace all the parts of yourself boldly, with no apology—and trusting the process as time shapes you, facet by facet, into who you're meant to be. Because becoming who you are means you can no longer go back to who you were, and that truth always brings both grief and freedom together.

We've all seen growth through challenges. We've found, or are at least looking for, purpose and healing. We've learned how to push through emotional exhaustion. And regardless of personal identity, I think we all know what it feels like to wonder why people hide parts of themselves in the first place.

And maybe that's part of authenticity, too. Learning to accept yourself as you are, where you are, instead of pretending to be someone you're not. Accepting your limitations, giving yourself grace for mistakes. Overcoming perfectionism that always seems to make just-fine feel like not-enough. Maybe it even means seeing people clearly for the first time, without painting them into who you wish they were.

Maybe it means offering more empathy and understanding, not only to others but also to yourself.

But what if at the core, it's more simple than that? What if you've just been living under the pressure of "main character energy" for too long—and you've started thinking you need someone else's permission to be human?

If that's you today, print this out or take a screenshot or something. Call it a permission slip if you need to. Either way, I hope it reminds you to make room for rest, to make peace with all the facets of who you are, and to...