Grief doesn’t just change life without the person you lost - it changes you, too. I learned that I could miss my dad and still be angry he left, live him deeply, and still find a way to keep living. Our relationship looks vastly different now. It’s distant, but it’s not absent.

We spent so much of our lives being the strong one, the dependable one, the one everyone can count on. But somewhere along the way, we can forget to ask ourselves: What do I actually want?

Some relationships are meant to last a lifetime. Others are meant to teach us something, change us, and eventually become a chapter we have to close. Letting go doesn't mean it didn't matter—it means trusting yourself enough to know when it's time to turn the page. Sometimes the change we fought the hardest is exactly what we needed to find ourselves again.

We'd never leave the back door unlocked to protect a burglar's feelings. So why do we do exactly that with the people in our lives? Boundaries are selfish — and that's exactly why they matter.

Rest isn't something you earn by doing enough. It's a basic need — and you're allowed to have it now, not once you've proven your worth.

The day of my birth was the definition of trauma. I was born in prison (yes, for real), thirty minutes later my uncle passed away in a terrible car accident, and my dad wasn't even allowed to meet me at the hospital. That was the day my family fell apart.

So I grew up fast. I became the good kid — perfect grades, always did her chores, never in trouble — because if I was complacent, no one would have to see me. And if no one saw me, I wouldn't be the reminder of all that pain.

It wasn't until a psychedelic journey of my own that I met that little girl again — backwards hat, silly smirk, carefree. She didn't have life figured out. She was just living for herself. And in that same journey, I saw my higher self. The second it hit me, I burst into tears. I saw ME. Every inch of me.