If I close my eyes and picture the real me it’s a woman dancing in a field of dandelions in a white dress with wild hair and mischief in her eyes. But somewhere along the way, I traded that version of me for a life of corporate hustle and should, molding myself into a man-made box that couldn’t hold even a fraction of what my soul came here to do.

Eventually, I went numb. Though I am not sure I noticed it at the time—or I had become so good at lying to myself that I turned the other cheek, because if I stopped to admit just how much I was suffering, I would drop all of the balls I was juggling.

I was a mom of three little kids, fresh off my second miscarriage, in a failing marriage and running the business I founded with 30 employees. And before I became a wife or a mother, I was a woman with scars of rape, harassment and assault that I had kept neatly hidden under the mattress of my mind.

But I carried the grief in my cells.

Eventually, the decades of making a thousand of micro-compromises caught up to me. Fragments of the real me were visible at a surface level, but the most important parts of my true self were lying dormant, buried under heaps of other people’s expectations. And yet I continued on, quietly wondering, is this it?

On paper, I had done everything right—until I started to ask where the fuck the definition of “right” had come from. The knowing that I had built a whole life around someone else’s idea of enoughness pounded like a drum in my soul. And with the drum came the whisper that all of the answers were available to me, if I just made space to listen.

It was the drum that woke the woman within me—the woman who found reverence in nature. The woman who would dance in a field of wildflowers. The woman who held boundaries based on what was true for her. The woman who could create her own barometer for what it means to truly live.

It was at that moment I knew that if I wanted to find my pulse I again, I had to fight for that woman in me by listening to the language of my soul.

And here are a few things I did to tune in.

1. Started singing again. Singing has been a part of me for as long as I can remember. I have notebooks filled with lyrics starting at age 8 or 9 and through adulthood. I was in choir through college and in a band in high school and have a constant playlist of songs in my head. After I became a mother and was managing so much, I just stopped. Until my Grandma asked me what songs I was singing to my children. You see, she and I had a shared love of music. I couldn’t answer her. Because I hadn’t. But in that moment, I started singing again. It brought me so much joy that I signed up for regular lessons—not with professional aspirations (okay fine, I want a record deal), but with the sole purpose of doing it for joy.

2. Tapped into my body’s wisdom. This was major. I had learned to override my body after years of screaming for support that didn’t arrive. This came from navigating sexual assault, traumatic birth and miscarriage in systems that didn’t fully see the imprint those experiences had on my body, mind and soul. In order to keep going I had to keep moving, ignoring the signals from my body. But years of ignoring my body’s cues went by and, eventually, I didn’t know what wants and needs were mine anymore. Then, I learned to listen to the wisdom of my cells and figured out what was a YES in my body—a flutter of excitement, turn on. And I figured out what was a no—heaviness in my chest, ass clenching. And I started to tune into what my body was telling me before making decisions. Oh…and actually listening.

3. Said yes to things that didn’t make sense. This part was fun and an essential part of understanding what god and the universe had in store for me. The big takeaway was creating space to listen and then having the courage to act. Suddenly authors, speakers, and leaders appeared with insights that resonated about how to trust myself and my intuition. Each nugget built on the next, so I let each yes lead the way. I attended retreats. I booked trainings. I accepted invitations I wouldn’t have had the guts to pursue otherwise. I leaned all the way in. I traveled alone, I invited new people in. Through this I realized that my purpose on this planet was to become a teacher for other women so they had someone to turn to when it all fell apart. I said YES to that knowing, and eventually became certified in the tools that helped me find my way home. And it all started with a YES.

4. Built a tribe. Society teaches us to say, “I’m fine.” I wasn’t fine. I removed the mask and found mentors, coaches and guides who could hold me as I found my way. I attended retreats, workshops, and surrendered to the fact that I was in need of a lifeline. I joined a church with aligned values. I focused on leaning on friends who understood where I was going and what I had been through. For the first time in a long time, I allowed myself to be truly held by others as I set down the balls in my life. We laughed. My beliefs were challenged. And more than anything, they helped me see that there was only one, beautiful me in this world.

5. Gave up alcohol. If you knew me at any point in my life from 15-40, I was a party girl. I love fun. I love being the first person on the dance floor. I love turning mundane situations into adventures. Alcohol was always along for the ride. But I started to listen to myself and realized how much it was hindering me creatively. And, once I got over the hump of the first few months without it (dealing with other people’s expectations), I realized that I didn’t need it to grease the wheels in my life at all. I fostered deeper connections. I let go of people who I needed to drink to feel comfortable with. I moved to a state of flow that was never interrupted by a hangover. It’s been one of the greatest decisions of my life.

6. Explored plant medicine. It would have taken years of therapy to unlock the depths of the grief I carried. I didn’t want to bypass, I wanted to go deep and psilocybin called to me. I found trusted people to guide me through the exploration of plant medicine in ceremony. I released the grief I carried for moments when I wasn’t properly seen, or tended to. Through integration, I was able to understand my own depths and could finally witness my full self—the one I pictured in the field and the woman who did what she had to do to survive. Afterward, I was able to step fully into my own self as one complete woman, rather than the fragmented version I had let exist for so long.

7. Started channeling through the written word again. Since I was a little girl, I have been a writer. When I was in kindergarten, I won the Young Author’s Contest for a short story called Crystal Met the Ogre, about a little girl who had to take on a big, mean giant. I have dozens and dozens of journals filled with songs and poetry and the written word. I have an undergraduate degree in Creative Writing and a masters in journalism. But somewhere along the path, I stopped writing for me. And on my journey of returning, I picked up the pen again. And the words that poured out of me provided me with truth. They helped me work out the kinks of my existence. They helped me quiet my inner critic and write my stories so that I could witness myself in a new way. It was spirit moving through me. And through that process, I reclaimed The Voice that was mine.

I had built a life that by all standards was right. But I listened when it started to feel wrong. I hold so much reverence for the version of me who had the courage to look closer. Walking my own path reminded me that I can trust that voice.

And with each step after, I aligned my body, mind and soul in a way that society had taught me to abandon. And still I walk. Forward. Full of heart. Fully me. And fully alive.

With a bouquet of dandelions in hand.

Today my kids went back to school.

Today my summer of living without a cage came to an end.

I am simultaneously crushed and also on the edge of my seat.

Let me explain.

In May of 2026 I fully exited the marketing agency I founded in 2014. Building a business while starting a family was excruciating. I got married in 2015, then babies came in 2016, 2018, and 2020. On top of having three very small children, I led my global agency through a global pandemic. I fumbled my way through leading Gen Z employees through the cultural reckoning that took place after the tragic killing of George Floyd. And I spent tens of thousands of dollars to make sure my 30-person agency was getting it right in terms of making everyone feel like they belonged. I was put through the wringer by clients and put myself through the wringer just to make sure I got it all right (I didn’t).

I ran every payroll twice a week for 12 years. Sometimes that meant not paying myself. More than once, I prayed for the money to come in so that everyone would get their paychecks (It always did).

Statistically speaking, building a multi-seven figure business with little babies at home is next to impossible. And I barely survived. Let me say that the weight of living by someone else’s expectations of what it means to be a good boss, or successful business owner, or perfect mother, well, it’s crushing. That’s not something I would ever have admitted before. But it’s the truth.

I limped to the finish line, and in fall of 2025, I merged my agency with another firm. The deal took the business itself off my shoulders, but the plan was for me to join them as a partner in a part-time sales role, with the expectation that I'd remain for two years.

I wasn’t sure if taking the administrative function off my plate was going to help me feel less toasted, but it was worth a shot. Things in my world were wild at that point. In fact, on the same day that I got the final papers for the merger, my divorce was finalized after 867 days. And our beloved nanny of nine years had her last day with us.

Overnight my entire world changed. I was overcome with grief after the divorce was finalized, which wasn’t something I expected two years into the process. But alas, I grieved. The business I had built with blood, sweat and tears was in the hands of new partners, which was simultaneously exciting and challenging. And, most of all, for the first time since becoming a mother, I had no backup—if the kids got sick and I was in a meeting, there was no one to call.

It was just me.

At work, the resources I leaned on to help create proposals and deliver on daily tasks were reallocated. So figuring out the new systems and driving new business fell squarely on my shoulders. As did their expectations about performance.

And it was just me.

Shortly after the merger, my stepmom, who is also one of my best friends, was diagnosed with breast cancer for the second time. While the prognosis was good in that it was caught early, she would have to undergo a double mastectomy and several rounds of aggressive chemo. The person I would normally call when everything was falling apart was now the person I was worried about falling apart.

So it was just me.

At the agency, things were off to a slow start. The partners were great, but they weren’t founders. I could see ways that the business could improve, but I quickly learned that the role they wanted me to play was solely revenue-generating—shut up and sell. At least that is what it felt like.

Inside, I still felt like I was drowning and was back to trying to draw from an empty cup.

During the last few years at my agency, I had found myself in a similar place of burnout. It was through practices like sound healing, breathwork and movement that I slowly found my way back to myself. Eventually, those practices became more than tools I used to survive. They became my calling.

Even before the merger, I had started coaching and building a practice centered around helping high-achieving women reconnect with themselves through 1:1 work, workshops and retreats. I knew that was the work I wanted to focus on. Because I know firsthand what happens when you ran out of gas—and frankly, I knew too much to keep pushing through myself.

So after six months, I resigned.

What started as a merger, became a full-on exit. My last day was May 15th.

So for the first time since becoming a mom, I had the chance to slow my fucking roll this summer and be present. That meant going to the pool, riding bikes, eating ice cream, snuggling like crazy, traveling, playing spoons, and having a front-row seat to new freckles, muddy toes and lightning bugs in jars.

I worked on my own time doing marketing consulting and coaching for select clients. I walked a lot. I recharged my battery. I planned for the future of my practice. I wrote every single day. I let dishes sit in the sink in favor jumping on the trampoline in the rain. I let myself feel the moments of good, and the moments of hard. I felt the sun on my skin. I watched sunsets more than sunrises. I got back into alignment by actually using the tools that I teach.

It was more than what I needed. But then I blinked. And it was over.

The end of summer is bittersweet, especially because it happens right in the middle of actual summer. On the way to school today, my 1st grader was like, “Mom, summer was like ONE DAY. And now we have to go back to school every day forever and ever.”

He’s not wrong.

The structure we have placed on Western life sucks the life out of the everyday. And I dread that part.

And also, I know that every river needs a strong bank so it can flow. Maybe it’s not structure that is the enemy. Maybe the real problem is building a life around someone else's expectations of what good enough looks like.

So I’m stepping into the structure of the school year knowing that two things can be true at the same time. I am so excited about what I am building. I’m also scared of it bleeding me dry. But the thing about growth is that we have the opportunity every day to choose differently.

I’m choosing that every bit of this next chapter will have lots of space for new freckles, muddy toes and lightning bugs in jars.

And the expectations will be all mine.

I boarded the plane with dirty toes, feral hair and a full heart. I had just spent four days and three nights co-facilitating a retreat for girls, ranging in age from 8-16. Ten girls attended. And 10 left more deeply connected to themselves.

The retreat was called One With the Herd and took place at Awake Ranch in Oregon.

Awake is a special place and where I completed my Equine Assisted Coaching training. It’s set on a beautiful vista in the countryside about 45 minutes outside of Portland, with horses grazing in pastures, and friendly faces who are all committed to growth and learning.

The girls slept in a teepee all three nights. We danced around a fire. We ran wild in a field at dusk. We did sound baths under the stars. We made a mud pit and rolled around in it with delight. The girls were each assigned a horse to care for throughout the retreat—that part was extra special to witness. We made art. We wrote. We shared. We connected.

And we laughed a lot.

As a burnout coach who works primarily with women, I jumped on the opportunity to help lead this retreat. I was saddened to learn right away that the girls were already feeling the same pressures and insecurities that women feel as adults. Even at a young age, the conditioning was loud.

The girls were worried about offending each other so didn’t speak their truth. They were afraid of trying something new and being bad at it. They were scared to ask for help when they needed it because they didn’t want to be inconvenient. But little by little, they changed. They found their voice. They found their strength. They learned to ask for what they needed. And with each shift, they became more authentic, more deeply connected to each other and more alive.

And we could feel it.

With the whimsical gift of youth on their side, they were able to step into their own selves with confidence in a short period of time. And as I watched, it became so clear to me how much we need to protect that whimsy—while also helping women, like their mothers, reclaim theirs.

And while the pressures and insecurities are oftentimes universal across ages and generations, it was so uplifting and affirming to know that the pathway back home, from my experience, is also universal.

Here are a few nonnegotiables:

1. Creativity is a Lifeline: We all need a space to express and create. Creativity is one way to foster connection and to regulate our systems. The girls painted, made crafts and had the chance to really express what made them who they are. That outlet is necessary—at any age. Sing, paint, sew, take photos—whatever it is, creativity should be nurtured.

2. Nature is the best medicine. Being outside, looking at stars, observing birds, breathing fresh air is deeply restorative. I watched as the girls explored nature, picking and eating blackberries, finding feathers and also using the backdrop of the land and trees as a steadfast regulation tool. We need so much more of this. Take a walk. Stand barefoot in the grass. Look up.

3. Play is cathartic. It builds authentic connection and laughter is a somatic release. For f*s sake, isn’t this the whole point of being alive? When we first filled up the mud pit, everyone was curious, but nervous. Once they got comfortable? It was mud baths for everyone and it was a blast. Mud pits aren’t always available (dang it), but dance parties count and they can happen anywhere and we did a lot of singing and dancing and it helped strengthen the group, while also giving everyone permission to be themselves.

4. We need space to rest. So many women and girls feel the pressure of carrying it all. But strength doesn’t actually mean holding it all yourself all of the time—it means knowing when you need to set down the load and take a break. We built in a lot of space to rest and recharge and encouraged the girls to take that time when they needed it. And they did! And they came back together stronger and more able to support the other girls when they needed it. And it was beautiful.

5. Movement is the Conduit for Stillness. During one of the sound baths, I gave the girls permission to do what they needed to do to take care of themselves. And one of the younger girls jumped up and started running through the field. She knew she had energy to get out! She came back ready to sit still. Presence starts with being attuned to your own needs. Learning how to sit in stillness and connect with yourself and your body is critical. Your body holds wisdom and we need to re-learn how to tune into those instincts.

6. We learn from each other: The age range was stunning because the girls took care of each other in what felt like an initiation into the next stage of their being. The younger girls looked to the older girls for comfort and assurance. The older girls were there for the younger girls, remembering how it felt to be in their shoes. Natural leaders emerged. Growth happened at every age. And it reminded me that we have a responsibility to continue to learn from each other at every phase of life.

7. You do not need to make yourself smaller to belong. Throughout the retreat, each girl experienced moments of highs and lows. Some were tired and homesick. Others had moments of feeling left out. But we watched as they learned to navigate the ups and downs, not by shrinking, but by using tools that helped them feel connected to themselves. Belonging didn’t mean becoming someone else. It meant showing up exactly as the beautiful, unique person they already were inside.

8. We need each other. We were never meant to do this life alone. We need a herd. Each person plays a role. Each person brings their unique medicine and that medicine is necessary. By the end of the retreat, each girl was shining and had a role to play. She knew that she belonged and in that knowing, the magic was born. Find a tribe where you can be yourself. And lean in.

It was unforgettable in every sense—not just for the girls, but for the facilitators. Here I thought I was going to spend four days teaching girls the tools I use for women. Turns out, watching the girls reminded me why we as women need these tools at all: Because we all need to feel a sense of belonging.

And that comes from within.

The underbelly of a summer in bloom is the hot hell of drought and burning and rot. Flies feasting on the carcass of the warmer months. As a child of light, I prefer to imagine a summer made of lakes, cool breezes, butterflies, music and laughter, but a life of bypassing all true parts is long behind me, and with July this year came a reckoning of the shadows only made possible by longer days.

It sounds ominous.

I love the 4th of July. I love the joy, the connection, the smell of sulfur and barbecue and hot pavement. I love hearing Lee Greenwood playing during the finale of the fireworks that always happen on the 3rd of July and the town parade on the 4th that made me fall in love with small towns again.

But this year, I was dreading it. It was the last major milestone in a long list of divorce-related firsts.

This year my children were with their dad.

And I was alone.

Even writing that, I instantly want to comfort you, dear reader. I want to tell you that it was all okay so that your knee jerk response of I’m so sorry or Oh my god doesn’t rise in your throat.

Instead I am going to let it sit.

Because it was the truth. And after years of lying to myself to survive a marriage that let me down, I learned that lying to myself created wounds I couldn’t see to tend to. And they festered. Once I settled on the other side, I vowed never to lie to myself again.

I didn’t pretend to be okay and begged for help well in advance of my favorite holiday. I put out the call to anyone who would listen that I could not be alone on the 3rd or the 4th. I didn’t lie when people casually asked me what I was doing for the holiday. I told them that this year would be hard. But the 4th is for families and parties and people who aren’t sad and nothing by way of plans had come to fruition.

I think as women, we wave the white flag out into the world a lot. And sometimes help arrives. And oftentimes that help is well intended, but imperfect. Or sometimes the way it arrives is disappointing because parts and pieces get dropped. In those moments, we’re tempted to say, “Stop! I can do it myself.”

And then there are the moments when help doesn’t arrive at all, and then the moment comes when we have to put down the flag and pick up the load and keep going.

My task now was to keep going. But the July heat was smoldering and I could feel the burn.

On July 2nd, I found a nest of baby bunnies in my yard. Well, my dog did actually. I am not sure how many she picked off over time, but there was one in her mouth and two more in the nest and I’d been here before with the dog and with bunnies and I prayed the baby would live as I pulled it from her teeth tucked it back into the nest, bleeding.

By morning that one was cold and lifeless but the other two were fine, so I gently moved her from the nest into a grave of hydrangeas just as the rain started coming down.

And it was an epic rain.

The nest flooded so I brought the surviving two inside for the night and gently tucked them back into the nest at the early break of dawn so they could feed from their mother.

July 3rd had arrived and the loneliness came like a wave. I let myself steep in the waters of grief because if I have learned anything at all it is that pretending those feelings don’t exist is where you stop being open for miracles. I fell on my knees, came to my senses, and slowly mopped up the spills of my own heart like I have been doing for years.

But each moment of pain can be a catalyst if we hold its gaze, so I covered two canvases with fuchsia paint and brought a vision to life that had been simmering in my mind: A pair of paintings with two feathers, one up close, one far away, and mapped them out on the canvases, with the feather of a red tail hawk in hand for inspiration.

That night the fireworks went off at dusk before the storms again came and did it ever rain.

I brought the bunnies back inside and tucked them in a house made of dishrags and Tupperware and kept them there overnight.

On the 4th of July, my heart had softened and I painted more. The feathers were bright and colorful, with a golden thread through the stem that I viewed as a prayer for hope. I played music and poured myself into something I could see, feel and touch and while I felt it all, mostly I felt alive. I paused only to buy kitten formula to feed the baby bunnies because the nest was still wet and cold and, from what I could tell, untended. I held them in my hands as they drank and dried out the nest with dishtowels before settling them back outside for the night, hoping help would arrive in the form of their mother.

Two paintings complete. I woke in the early morning proud that I had turned my grief into something beautiful, instead of festering in the despair. I made it through the storm. The neighbor girls came over mid-morning to see the bunnies and as I lifted them up, I saw they were covered in fly eggs. And that some of those eggs had hatched. And that they were being eaten alive from their bellies by maggots.

It’s called Fly Strike and it happens to bunnies and chickens sometimes when flies find animals defenseless and bite them so furiously it draws blood and then they lay eggs and when they hatch they start to feed. And in the right conditions the eggs can hatch in a matter of hours and that’s what happened here.

Death was certain. But it would take hours for the bunnies to succumb and while I couldn’t save them, I couldn’t watch their slow demise, so I drove them to the wildlife refuge wrapped in a dishtowel, inside a Tupperware that was used to holding leftover chicken nuggets and Mac and cheese and watched as they poked their heads up with curiosity during the drive, despite the agony they must have felt. There, the animals were humanely euthanized.

The thing about summer is that we often talk about the magic of butterflies. But flies transform too. From eggs to a maggot to a chrysalis and then a fly emerges, drawn to flesh and rot, seizing every opportunity to feast on the wounded. And the cycle is faster and less gentle and less beautiful, but it’s a metamorphosis all the same.

I had hoped the mother would come back and save them.

I had hoped help would come and save me.

The bunnies would be eaten alive.

I would not be.

I will not pretend that at times it feels like the easier path—to let grief and anger eat me alive. But I continue to choose the path of something more.

And it’s also true that sometimes something more feels out of reach. And maybe it is. Because life keeps happening. But the way we live through it comes down to what we choose to feed.

On the hardest days.

On the days that smolder.

On the days that reek of decay.

And on the days that glisten with the possibility of a summer breeze, by a clear lake, with the sound of music lingering in the air.

In 2022 I wrote this poem from a place of depletion. I had become all things to everyone around me and forgot about the part of myself that made me come alive. It was the first time I had picked up the pen in years.

The setting was the jungle just outside of Tulum at a tiny resort nestled in the biosphere. I slept in a canvas tent in the sand. There were 15 women with me on the journey, all who had said yes to a retreat rooted in sisterhood and we all came yearning for something more.

At home I had three small children. A girl and two boys, ages 6, 4 and 2 respectively. I had endured a miscarriage only weeks before.

I was not okay.

But if you met me then, you would have thought I had it all together. I was showing up. I was making dinner. I was racing for the morning train to commute to work and racing home to relieve the nanny. I was social. I posted adorable photos of my family even though every single day I felt like I carried the weight of a truck on my chest that was crushing me.

In my case, I was also a business owner, managing payroll, 30+ employees and had just crawled my way through the pandemic with three babies in tow, one born in May of 2020.

I was gasping for air. The retreat offered me a space to hold me and let me breathe and let me writhe while I shed the layers of a thousand compromises.

And there, like a viper I shed. I shed stories and beliefs and swam naked in the ocean at dusk after sitting in a temazcal ceremony with a shaman. I cried more than I had cried in a decade. I wrote. And wrote. And wrote. The women came together because we told the truth.

I came back whole and holier. And while there was a long road ahead to reclaim my footing, I had tools I could lean on to sustain me. I had words pouring out of me that could feed my soul. I learned that if I walked toward the fire that I would come out on the other side but I had to take the first step, because the only way through was through.

Help had arrived on shaking legs. And while I was the one wearing the cape, the experience of being held in sisterhood and remembering a glimmer of the woman I was inside was the kindling I needed. That fire was the torch that guided me through and the burning went on and on.

I did come out on the other side.

But many do not.

And I think of those women as I reflect on the place I was in when I wrote this poem. I was puffy. I was depleted. I was exhausted. I felt lost in my own life.

It was never a question of if I loved my children—they were everything to me. But the brutal expectations of mothering today had asked me to stop loving myself. And I obliged, bending my intuition to follow rules about feeding, sleeping, holding, pumping, crying and everything in between. Everyone with an opinion. Experts asking me to follow a play book—to do everything right.

To be perfect.

Since then, I have learned that I am the perfect mother for my children. But I had to fight tooth and nail to believe that to my core in a world that tells mothers in every single way that they are not enough.

We all deserve better.

The poem below came with me out of the jungle. And I’ve carried it with me since.

You Got This, Mama

I woke up in a cage I built with a thousand compromises.
Me, the spinner of webs, and also the thread. 
Weaving lies I was conditioned to believe,
You can have it all.
No one mentioned the rules,
Of what they say happiness is supposed to be and what happiness actually is.
I’m drowning. 
Screaming behind the glass, while the water pours in. 
Trying to plug holes with a thousand thoughts per minute 
and a list as long as the hats I am wearing.
Go to work, don’t wake your husband when the baby wakes you
Get your jeans back on, take the bun out of your hair, smile, God Dammit. 
Fuck your man.
Around the clock working or milking or hushing or stirring. 
You got this, mama.

Fists pounding. Someone see me.
See me. 
See me in this body I don’t recognize as my own
Save me, or lie to me, or scream
But don’t you dare ask for more,
Convince yourself that this is how it’s supposed to be.
Even if you’re dying in plain sight.

Here, take these pills, you won’t feel a thing. 
(Everyone’s taking pills.)
And every day I bend to fit in
Saying yes, when every single cell in my body says, 
No, this is not the way.
This is not how we lived, how we birthed, how we loved.
Complacent.
Playing a game with no finish line,
until death do us part.

But it’s me who is dying inside.
And I want to live. I want to feel. I want to soar.
I don’t want these pills.
I need my feet in the dirt and the sound of the ocean 
and someone to hold me up, in wisdom and knowing, so I can share these words
Without them giving me a stare 
That suggests that I’m failing or flailing, 
Without someone saying under their breath,
You asked for this.

The biggest beneficiary of me doing the work has been my daughter.

She has also been my greatest teacher.

From the moment she was first ripped from my body (literally, but a story for another day), she has changed me for the better. Because she held up a mirror to where I was living out of alignment from what I was teaching.

It started by noticing what I was passing down through convenience—the rules, the expectations, the societal conditioning. Maybe it was through the subtle scrunch of her nose when I said something that didn’t feel true to me. Maybe it was my own flinching as words I had been heard said by others a thousand times came out of my mouth that I didn’t actually believe in. The little things, like telling her she looked pretty, rather than telling her she was smart. Or rushing to get from place to place without considering her nervous system.

None of it felt right. And it was up to me to figure out why.

Parenting her became my catalyst for looking inward. I realized that if I wanted to teach her, I had to reach her. And the only way to do that was to actively participate in the world I kept telling her was possible.

I understood then, if I wanted her to be strong, I needed to also be strong. If I wanted her to be confident, I needed to be confident. If I wanted her to stay calm, I needed to access calm in my own body. If I wanted her to follow her dreams, I had to follow mine.

My journey of healing began in those moments.

Because of her, I started to question everything.

How could I ask her to show up differently in life, if I wasn’t willing to do the same?

How could I ask her to be all that I wanted her to be, if I wasn’t following the same guidelines?

Why would I ask her to follow rules that society handed to me, when those same rules had made me feel small?

She was my biggest mirror and my biggest source of truth. I couldn’t be in integrity and keep showing up halfway or by passing along things I didn’t actually believe. I examined my belief systems and constantly asked myself, is this true? And if it didn’t feel true, I didn’t say it. And I thought about all of the truths about being alive today that weren’t being spoken out loud. And I started to speak them. Embodiment isn’t easy. But it was necessary.

My life changed. My relationship with her became unbreakable because it was rooted in the present not the past. And now I am modeling for her the life I believe she can live for herself, while also providing her with the tools to follow her own path. I don’t always get it right, but I am always, always trying to lead her towards a better future, one where she is deeply connected to herself, her body and the world around her. And I can do that because I am more connected to myself, my body and the world around me.

My daughter was my catalyst for growth and perhaps the greatest beneficiary. But the ripples extended for beyond that. It also deeply enhanced my relationship with my sons, my own mother, and the people around me.

I understand now more than ever that doing the inner work is the most important way we can reach back to the generations that came before us and carry the torch for them, while also creating a new way forward for our children before we ask them to hold the fire.

We get to be the ones who forge the rivers for them to flow and it must be done consciously and with intention. It’s about holding onto what is important and also having the courage to evolve our behaviors in a way that our mothers and parents could not.

We have but this one moment in time to do life differently. And we have never been more free as women to take agency of our lives. It’s how we advance consciousness and the voices of women. But we have to choose it and put in the time. We have to stand in our power and carry forward what is most important, and embody that for both for ourselves and for our daughters.

Some people call it breaking generational trauma. I call it doing the work. But whatever it is, it benefits the generation who came before us and those that come after us. And as parents, it is our responsibility. And as mothers who stand for creating a safer world for our daughters, it’s essential.

The ripples are impossible not to feel when you do.

So, I have a tree. I go visit it.

If you’ve ever gone in a walk with me you know this tree. It’s a massive Oak in front of a massive house whose owners I don’t know but I’m guessing they know me. They probably wonder who the woman is who stops every other day to put her hands on it. The woman who pretends to stretch when a car goes by while laughing to herself. Silly, really. Or delightful. You pick.

But really what she’s doing is taking a moment of connection with something bigger than herself, to marvel in its presence, it’s knowing. It’s ancient wisdom, if you will—the wisdom all trees carry of the when to grow, when to change and when to winter.

That’s the thing about trees and this one was special in its stoic presence and its upward reach. I have a hundred photos of the view of this tree. Looking up at its branches that season over season would stay the same but its leaves would not.

It’s been years of this.

Some time ago, one large stem from its regal trunk came tearing down and the tree bore the scar from the rupture, but it still stood tall. And for that reason I always worry that someone will view it as damaged and cut it down, people do such things, and that all the things the tree has seen would be lost in a day. Hundreds of years old, I think of how it watched the neighborhood change and how many kids have ridden by on bikes or how many couples holding hands passed it by. And how many people didn’t take notice at all.

But not me. To me this tree was magic.

Even my dog understood the tree was special and as a puppy on her first walks she instinctively knew to stop and bow down. No prompting. She just curled up in its trunk the moment we got near. Over and over each time we walked by.

You see, this tree, for me, was a marker of connection of my place in my timeline when nature became my sanctuary. My escape but also my returning. My acceptance of change and growth and seasons in a season of life of growth and change.

After the storms, something in me said to drive by and I held my breath when I saw the road blocked off, only to see the giant branches of the tree I call mine corpse-like on the street, splintered shards and power lines tangled in the sprawl. A branch so big it dwarfed almost every other tree on the block had split from the trunk, taking down nearly everything in its path.

I climbed over the barricade and placed my hands on the trunk I knew so well and looked up like I have done so many times before, coming to terms with the knowing that this might be the end.

Or maybe for this tree it was the beginning. Maybe my tree had to shed that part of it like an old story.

Maybe it’s a lesson that when your roots can’t sustain the pieces of you that are too heavy to hold, saving yourself is really letting go.

Maybe in some ways that’s me. Maybe in some ways that’s all of us.

Maybe that’s what it means to grow old.

I don’t yet know it’s fate. And if I’m honest, I don’t want to look. Not yet. But I will.

But I’ll hold onto it, either way. The tree that stood for me while I learned to stand for something more.

I have spent the last several years in a state of deep introspection. And to me, that looked like actualizing my life to make sure that it was in fact mine. That I was making choices based on what was true for me and trying to get in touch with the parts of me that had dissipated over time.

The truth of the situation is that I created a life that the real me didn’t quite fit into. I founded a marketing agency that I ran for over a decade, while raising young kids. If you’ve been following along, you know a bit of my story. I burned out—and then rose back up again.

I did the work and the work takes work but it’s worth it. Ya know?

And over the last few years, I have been able to readjust and realign and find myself again. And now, I am in a full chapter of reinvention. My divorce was finalized late last year. I fully exited my marketing agency last month and was ready to go FULL THROTTLE into the next chapter.

And my body was like, no dude, you gotta be still.

So I listened, because I could no longer override my system like I had for years prior. And wouldn’t you know that the thing that came up for me in the stillness brought me to my knees: In all of the work of fixing and healing and tending to the parts of me that I wanted to illuminate, I realized that I wasn’t telling the whole story about the parts of me that I didn’t want to illuminate. Fuck, I wasn’t even seeing the whole story.

The whole story includes the ways that I co-created all of the problems I needed to heal from in the first place. Those were behaviors rooted in trauma, shadow, and the parts of me that I had treated like I needed to heal from, rather than fully witness and integrate into my entire being.

Those parts need to be seen, because if I was to actually move forward, to actually love myself, I had to love ALL parts of me. And if I wanted to truly love someone else, I had to be able to love ALL parts of them. The good and the bad.

I got really curious about all of this by sitting in reflection and asking myself some hard questions. What had really gone wrong in my marriage? What had really gone wrong in my business? What mistakes do I not want to make again?

And it’s easy as a person walking through this life to say things like, “Well I had toxic employees,” or “My husband didn’t help me when I needed it,” and believe those things to be true. Because, sure, to some extent they were. But HOW did I end up in a situation where both of those things were true. How did I co-create it? How did I create circumstances that made me *allow* those behaviors?

The gut punch came from the inquiry that started something like this: Was it true that you didn’t get the help you needed when you asked?

-Well, I didn’t always ask for what I needed. (Why)

-Because it was hard for me to ask (Why)

-Because I didn’t feel worthy of being seen (Why?)

-Because I am scared that they won’t like what I have to say (Why?)

-Because I am scared that they won’t like what they see and I will be alone (Why?)

-Because when I was little, speaking up meant I would get in big trouble—or worse, help wasn’t available when I needed it (AH HA!!!! AND FUCK).

OOF. Going deep on our behaviors leads to better self understanding. So I figured out that my work isn’t to find a team or find a partner who will listen…nope, that’s surface level problem solving that would just lead me to repeating the same behaviors again.

My work is to find a way to use my voice. And trust myself and my boundaries when my needs aren’t being met, and then use my voice again. And release the fear of being rejected because what I learned through all of this…if you reject yourself, you are already lost. If you don’t love yourself, you are already alone.

You still with me?

Since that realization, it’s been epiphany after epiphany that means seeing a whole deeper layer of bypassing and system overriding that I wasn’t consciously aware of. It means loving my shadow self. It means looking at the voice in my head who says I am not enough and holding the part of me that still feels that way—and loving her. It means tending to the part of me that is afraid of getting hurt again, and witnessing her and integrating her so that I am not just presenting the LOVE AND LIGHT version of me, but I am also presenting the parts of me where I need holding.

I’m writing this on the Summer Solstice and it hit me this morning as I watched the sun come up: The light and the dark cannot exist without the other.

If we want to truly be ALL that we are, at some point there has to be an integration process, where we have to bear witness to ALL parts of ourselves, the good and the bad, the weak and the strong, the light and the shadow, and pay homage to how the whole is the sum of ALL of its parts. And as I watched the sky turn beautiful shades of red, pink and gold, I realized that the absolute most beautiful times of day is when the the light meets the dark—and the dark meets the light.

That’s the work. Being radically honest with ourselves about what is true down to the very core. And finding a way to love what we see.

So take a look at the voice in your head and where it’s tearing you down. And witness the part of you that needs to be seen. So that you can guide her through the darkness, and back into the light, whole, rather than fragmented. Holy, because you are. Be a sunrise. Because that’s what you are meant to be.

Love y’all.

And this morning almost at the very moment my eyes opened up, the sky opened up too and a symphony of raindrops tapped along my ceiling. I thought about the gift of rainy Sunday mornings and how they are perfect for making sleepy love or snuggling back under the covers or pulling out a book and what a luxury it is to simply bask in the lullaby of a slow start. I thought about each of those things and the Sunday mornings I’d had before and the Sunday mornings I would never have again, and then I remembered the tent outside.

I had bought this particular tent last summer in a fit of desperation and exasperation when it started to sink in just how expensive it was going to be to drag my kids on meaningful vacations, and as a single mom, spending $10,000 a vacation when I was still paying my legal bills from the divorce felt irresponsible compared to dropping $500 on a tent that could sleep four. I also bought a camping chair and solar lights and some special metal containers to hold things like meat and condiments, which made perfect sense since I didn’t yet have a cooler, and that’s pretty much me in a nutshell. I still had the camping stove in the “save for later” section of my cart and at least had the sense to wait on that until we had a campsite booked and any interest whatsoever from my kids and I was proud of myself for that level of restraint.

The tent arrived and I kept it in the box leaning upright against the garage wall, where over the course of the next 10 months the bottom of the box was occasionally dampened by rain seeping into my garage from a backed up sump pump. I didn’t forget about it entirely, though my gusto for camping had wained just a bit because as beautiful as life can be, it can be hard too, and camping solo with three kids felt like a lot of work, and maybe for once I should just make life easier.

This weekend, my last child to be born alive turned six and it was a beautiful day and family was coming over to celebrate him and I decided to haul the tent out and pop it open. And though it took longer than the 90 seconds promised in the instructions, up it went and cute it looked in the corner of my yard that was now lush from the spring rains (and in case you are worried, I did get a new sump pump and now things were draining just fine, thank you very much.)

My kids were delighted and ran right in and then brought their sleeping bags up from the basement and opened all the zippers and latches and showed their cousins the doors and windows with awe. The birthday boy declared that it smelled terrible in there and that made me laugh because he doesn’t hold back, and I wondered if it did in fact smell terrible and if it was mildew and if it was my fault for letting the tent sit for so long in a saturated box and figured leaving the tent up for a few days would clear that right up, so that’s what we decided to do.

Saturday morning was the official big day and I was grateful that my son could wake up with me before heading to soccer games and then to his dad’s house for the rest of the holiday weekend. A compromise in parenting time made that possible and for that I was grateful, too.

So on this Sunday morning I woke up alone in my bed while it rained, and remembered the tent and thought of how lovely it would be to take a blanket out there and lay on the ground and feel the pulse of the earth beneath me while listening to the rain in a little nest of sound and senses.

So outside I ran and into the tent and under a blanket I laid. I didn’t scroll, I listened. I didn’t worry, I rested in quiet meditation while the birds woke up and the thunder rolled. I didn’t expect two hours to go by. But it did. And it mattered. And I knew before it started that the experience would make me feel alive and that’s why I did it.

Life is meant to be lived and that means taking chances and following nudges and remembering that you are the one who gets to decide how much magic you create in your own life. And I wanted to tell you about this simple Sunday morning just in case you needed that reminder, too.

My body buzzed all over.

It was early morning on my second sunrise on the ranch I had visited three times before and God did it feel like home.

I was at Awake to meet with my cohort to finalize our equine assisted coaching program. This weekend was a culmination of years of moving into the work I was born to do—support people in the journey back home to themselves using somatic practices. Breathwork. Sound healing. Reiki. Gateless Writing. And now, the horses.

You see, starting in 2020, I began a quest of learning and self-discovery rooted in neuroscience and mind-body connection, while going through my own deep spiritual awakening.

All of this unfolded while raising three little kids and running the marketing agency with a global footprint that I founded more than a decade prior. My marriage didn’t make it through the transformation and I sold my business to a local agency and signed on to join their team as partner in 2025. It took less than six months for me to realize that I could no longer straddle two worlds and resigned from my position, surrendering into trust that I will be supported in this new chapter as a healer and practitioner.

The final step was that I needed the partners to buy me out and in this precise moment we were far from reaching a deal that would complete the process.

By now I had learned a thing or two about surrender and trust.

Because the sun would continue to rise and fall as it did this morning and I was basking in aliveness as the light emerged on to the ranch. I noticed Zora standing in her pen, the white mare staring at me like she had since I arrived the night before. I said hello to her, and then walked up the hill and down the path of stables, greeted only by the most curious horses. Hayden with her long limbs and grey spots and soft tongue and silly disposition.

And then Titan.

He walked up to the fence, but it felt less like a greeting and more like a cry for release, a demand to be witnessed. A villain and a victim all at once. And we’d had our moments before—galloping side by side down the pasture after a session of reiki where I didn’t know if he was going to kick me or hold me or some combination of both, before he let me place my hands on him. That was last May when the whole equine work began and my heart cracked open.

Looking at Titan now, I wanted him to love me, but I just couldn’t think I would ever fully reach him, a story I’d seen before in my own life. And as I sat there gently scratching his ears, I knew that he wasn’t fully at ease with me and I wasn’t fully at ease with him, and then he bit my arm just to make sure his point landed and it did.

I turned away toward the field, plodding through the long grass feeling the pulse of the earth and the song of the morning moving my earthly body to tears and it felt so fucking good to be alive. I walked up to the property edge and down through the path of mowed grass, up to the fencing on the north, back towards the teepee, down through the pasture.

While my body and soul walked together, I could feel in every step the spirit of the wolf beside me, the horse behind me, the spider on my shoulder and the hawk above.

My journey has been a long unraveling and I am grateful for the Spider for tending to the threads and carefully weaving the loose ends into a tapestry that fit. He was wise and thoughtful and knowing.

I am grateful to the Hawk for knowing what was ahead and gently steering the path. Her wisdom reminded my that I was going in the right direction, while also letting me find my way. And I hold her in reverence.

The Wolf showed me that I was never alone. Not alone to walk. Not alone to fight. Not alone to climb. He was by my side like the steady mother.

And it was the Horse that carried me home. Being the mirror to show me when I wasn’t being true to myself and when I was, and she helped me understand the feeling of the divine and the truth of being alive.

In that moment in the golden light of the morning sun, I felt congruence. And I felt a deep sense of gratitude for the endless stream of guides along the way who were the medicine I needed at the exact right time.

As as I stood there, my phone pinged and the counter-offer came through from the agency to buy back my shares that was actually in range. Tears streamed down my face and I kneeled down in the grass with more gratitude than I could hold, so it oozed like light beams through my pores and I felt like the sun.

The closing of a chapter so that a new one could be written.

The path to get to this moment has been both bitter and delicious. Tumultuous and transcendent. And adventure, a quest. A journey to find myself except instead of Homer, it was me and god I am grateful for her. Since 2022 I had been walking 10,000 steps a day toward but in this moment I realized actually that my journey started years ago and I was completing a 13-year cycle that started with the version of me in 2013.

I pictured her standing outside of Jack and Ginger’s, a bar in Bucktown, and she was restless, alive, bursting at the seams with ideas and knowledge and ready to escape to another place. Grad school was coming to an end.

The man she would marry leaned over and whispered in her ear that he loved her and that she was the one. And something inside her body remembered an agreement. She knew she could neither go nor stay where she was and that a whole timeline would have to fit inside the next decade.

And she held it all and built a business that would sustain them through marriage and motherhood, a vision on the tip of her tongue but too far away to taste. She kept going.

It was as if she knew she would have to lose herself all the way to find herself again and god there was something gorgeous about that.

The agreements were clear. Antonia, James and Sammy had to be birthed—the Horse, the Spider and the Wolf.

That woman years ago knew about the quest and all of its twists and turns and the way the divine would come back home. It was written. There were times, though, that looking back I didn’t revere that version of me, in fact I resented her. I didn’t understand that she knew exactly what was necessary to get to this very moment. And I am reminded through and through to trust the version of yourself that got you here.

And here for me right now was a spot in the tall grass staring into the sun, body alive, heart pounding with pride and a nervous system that has never quite felt so settled.

All of my parts were here. Together. And it was beautiful.

In full trust and surrender to what is next. Because if this path taught me anything at all, it is that when you trust the guidance of your soul, anything is possible.

Sarah Cassidy is the author of Swaddled: Sage Stories to Wrap Mothers in Love, a book that collects the true stories of 12 women navigating the profound, and profoundly under-supported, transition into motherhood. When I met her, I felt instant connection and recognition—and at ease. Because she was actually telling the truth about what it means to become a mother…and she had the courage to write it down.

What I love most about Sarah is that she’s a type-A, prepare-for-everything kind of woman who was still completely blindsided by new motherhood. She read the books. She organized everything. And then her son arrived and she felt like she’d disappeared. And no one warned her that it was going to happen!

So she decided to be the voice who names that sacred, brutal and beautiful in-between space of unbecoming of who you were before motherhood, and becoming all that you are.

This conversation is for every mother who has ever whispered, or screamed into a pillow, “I don’t feel like myself,” and every woman who is about to.

In this episode we explore:

• Why “with every baby, a new mother is born,” and why we prepare for everything except that

• The liminal space between unbecoming and becoming, and why that disorientation is not a sign that something is wrong

• How a single honest exchange from another mother can land differently than all the advice in the world

• What Sarah actually experienced in those early feeding hours, and the formula bottle she hid in the wastebasket

• The three core messages woven through Swaddled: you are not alone, you are already the perfect mother for your baby, and your life will come back to you

• Why telling the truth about motherhood—the hard, raw, messy truth—is the very thing that rebuilds the village

• How the commercialization of motherhood has hijacked the real initiation, and what it would look like to dismantle it

There’s something in this conversation that I think will crack something open for you, whether you’re in the thick of new motherhood right now, decades past it, or somewhere in between. Your body remembers, your wisdom counts, and when you speak the truth of your experience, you might just become someone else’s lifeline.

Connect with Sarah Cassidy:

• Sarah’s Book: Swaddled

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/swaddled.by.sarah/

• Website: https://www.swaddledbysarah.com/

• Join the Swaddled Community: https://www.swaddledbysarah.com/community

Connect with me, Ashley Logan:

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ashleydlogan

• Website: https://ashleydlogan.com

• Substack: https://substack.com/@ashleydlogan

Allison is an Executive Coach and Founder of The D Tales Podcast - a podcast dedicated to sharing real divorce stories and expert insights for anyone contemplating a split, navigating the process, or rebuilding life on the other side. Before she ever hit record, she spent years in management consulting, then interviewed over 50 people anonymously about their own experiences with divorce. What kept surfacing across all of it: the hardest part isn’t the legal process. It’s everything that happens before and after.

I got to know Allison over recent months and felt an immediate kinship. She was also gracious enough to have me on The D Tales Podcast (link in the show notes - go listen here!), and this conversation picks up where that one left off.

We went deep on what it actually feels like to sit inside a marriage that isn’t working - the years of quiet questioning before a single word gets said out loud, the shame that makes people white-knuckle through it alone, and the well-meaning things friends say that land all wrong. Allison is also a self-proclaimed data nerd, so she shares what the research and data keep showing: that life on the other side is almost always better than people could imagine. .

Whether this episode finds you in the middle of a hard season in your relationship, supporting someone you love through one, or simply trying to understand an experience that’s far more common than we talk about - this conversation is an honest one.

In This Episode We Explore:

• Why the contemplation phase - not the legal process - is the hardest part for most people navigating divorce

• The three things well-meaning friends say that don’t help, and what actually does

• What the data and the stories both keep showing about life on the other side of divorce

• The difference between solitude and loneliness, and why you can feel more alone inside a marriage than living on your own

• How nervous system regulation (or the lack of it) shapes the decisions we make in our most pivotal moments

• What rebuilding actually looks like: new cities, new careers, new relationships with yourself

Connect with Allison Kahler:

• The D Tales Podcast: https://www.thedtalespodcast.com/

• Instagram (The D Tales Podcast): https://www.instagram.com/thedtalespodcast

• Instagram (Personal): https://www.instagram.com/allisonjkahler

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/allisonkahler/

• Linktree: https://linktr.ee/thedtalespodcast

• Website: https://www.allisonkahler.com/

Connect with me, Ashley Logan:
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ashleydlogan
Website: https://ashleydlogan.com
Substack: https://substack.com/@ashleydlogan

I wanted to take a moment to tell a story that is all mine, because the truth is we all have one, though the tapestry of our lives are all woven together whether we like it or not.

I was born a creative force of nature but the wind in my wings was dulled by the storms of patriarchy and belonging. I craved freedom and creativity while the world was screaming to be one way and I was caught in the cross fires, a stubborn fire striving for something more, but admittedly landed on a path that didn’t belong to me.

Rather than creating full time, I molded myself into a professional, with income at the center. I founded and bootstrapped a creative agency with the goal of having freedom over my schedule and my time—claiming that I could channel my creative energy into a way to make money. But business asks a lot of us and as my company grew alongside of my family, my senses dulled and I lost my way.

In the face of trauma, grief and misdirection, I hit rock bottom and finally started to listen to what the universe was asking of me. Little by little I can back home to myself through the help of writing, connection to nature, moving my body, somatic therapy, talk therapy and so much more. I was a creator and it was time to build something that was true.

And the more I loosened my grip, the more clearly the path unfolded. I took up sound healing, reiki. I became a certified Gateless Writing teacher and breath work facilitator. I learned how to hold space for people in ceremony and deep medicine work. And I became certified in natural intelligence, with equine assisted coaching. Somatic work saved my life and I suddenly had the tools to create something real.

And by saying yes to the unfolding path at my feet, my why became so much more clear. I was someone with a strong inner compass and a will to create meaning in my life. If I could be blown off course by the whispers of should and expectation, I knew that any woman could be. So I started hosting workshops and retreats to help teach the things I had learned. Not because I was above anyone else, but because I was willing to look under the hood and be the mirror I always needed.

My work is rooted in helping women connect to the deeper voice within and actually listen. And that voice doesn’t sound like the words of our fathers, or teachers or preachers or politicians, it comes through as a knowing in our bodies.

In this day and age, when it’s increasingly more difficult to know what is real, attunement to our bodies is going to be the way forward. And it’s something that has been conditioned away from both men and women in an effort to have us all conform to societal norms. It was a massive experiment of control and it worked. But it doesn’t mean we can’t come home to ourselves and course correct the trajectory both within and without for our sons and for our daughters. There is a path forward for us to claim.

And talking about that path is my why.

It doesn’t always feel easy to post about the inner work when the world is on fire. But if I can help one person connect to their own truth, then the ripples of that are vast. And the only way through the fire, is through our own hearts and minds.

Thank you for being here.

I showed up puffy. That’s the only word for it. Burnt out in my body in a way that was visible on my face.

That weekend I did breathwork for the first time and felt something crack open. I did a sound bath and learned how to actually meditate. I did something called gateless writing—I’d been a writer my whole life but I’d never written from that place before. I went into a Temazcal with a shaman and sweated my ass off and then swam naked in the ocean at sunset.

And the grief I’d been carrying finally moved. I came home, recharged, connected to myself and was clear about what my life needed to look like.

And some of the women from that retreat are still some of the closest people in my life. They’ve been guests on this show. We still cheer each other on.

What made all of this possible was the retreat container. A shared experience under a shared set of values, where a skilled facilitator sets clear expectations.

Since then, retreats and weekend workshops have become non-negotiable for me. I have a high appetite for learning and growth and connecting with people who are living differently than I am. And I’ve learned that we have a tendency to get insular—to forget how much is out there, how many people there are who can add color and texture to our lives if we say yes to being in the room with them.

Which brings me to why I recorded this episode: I’m hosting two retreats this year and I am so excited about both of them.

The first is The Restore Retreat, September 25–27 in Potosi, Wisconsin. It’s located in a stunning mansion on 175 acres overlooking the Mississippi River—old-growth forest, hiking trails, a pond, an indoor pool with a jacuzzi. Incredible food prepared for you. Breathwork and sound bath. Real free time. And a whole range of accommodations from private suites with balconies and jacuzzi tubs down to bunk rooms, so there’s a way in at different price points. It’s about three hours from Chicago. Think of it as a girls’ weekend where you don’t have to make a single decision—you just get to be there.

Learn more about the Restore Retreat here.

The second is Ignite, January 28–February 1 in Sayulita, Mexico. This retreat is all-in—private bungalow with a balcony, airport transportation, a chef for every meal, horseback riding on the beach, salsa dancing, restorative yoga and breathwork, and real unstructured time that belongs to you. You fly into Puerto Vallarta and from that moment, you don’t have to think about a single detail.

Learn more about the Ignite Retreat here.

In This Episode We Explore:

• What a retreat container actually is, and why the structure makes it feel so safe to finally let your guard down

• The difference between a vacation and a retreat, and why one restores you while the other just exhausts you somewhere new

• My first retreat experience in Tulum—the grief I carried in, the clarity I came home with, and the women I’m still close with today

• Why getting outside your insular bubble is one of the most underrated things you can do for your growth

• What happens when you give yourself permission to set down your load for a few days—to your body, your nervous system, and yes, apparently, sometimes your fertility

If not these retreats, I hope this episode inspires you to say yes to something for you this year. That solo trip, that class, that weekend that scares you just a little. You can trust yourself.

The people in your life will survive without you for a few days. They might even be better for it. And so will you.

Connect with me, Ashley Logan:
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ashleydlogan
Website: https://ashleydlogan.com
Substack: https://substack.com/@ashleydlogan

It starts with creating spaciousness.

I can’t emphasize enough how hard it is for someone who is burned out, depleted, over-scheduled to show up for the people right there in their community who are in need. It’s very hard to make a meal for someone who’s just had a baby when you have kids in sports until 9 p.m. It’s hard to make that phone call when you are absolutely tapped out. It’s hard to even have that level of awareness of when someone needs an extra moment of your time when you have to run from one thing to the next.

I’m so guilty of this. I am an entrepreneur with so much to accomplish in each and every single day. And I’m also a mother of three little kids. And I also have a huge desire to show up for the people in my community. That’s where it starts. Truly, the biggest difference you can make is right there in your own life, in your own community, and in how you show up.

So that’s what we’re talking about today. Finding ways to actually create that spaciousness, to create more capacity–so that you can really show up in a way that can make an impact.

In This Episode We Explore:

• How many of us have said yes—in the last week, month, year—to doing something we didn’t want to do, and how those “should” statements drain your life force

• Why it’s okay to say no, and how to shift to “I’d love to help and I can do this” when no feels too hard

• Your breath—inhale, hold, exhale—and how just a second to breathe settles your nervous system as you transition from one activity to the next

• Why starting your day by reaching for your phone is a great way to just mess with your nervous system, and the one app setting Ashley never bypasses

• Moving your body to move stuck energy, because that stuck energy can create frustration, disconnect, and we are all energetic beings processing emotions every single minute

• Those moments of spaciousness in between transition—pulling into the driveway, sitting in your car—and why you don’t need to feel guilty about the moments you take for yourself

When we take care of ourselves and our bodies in even the most small, basic ways, it creates more space, more capacity. Suddenly you have time to make dinner for the neighbor, to talk on the phone with a friend who’s going through something, or to notice when someone needs an extra moment of connection without having to run to the next thing.

Women are the culture centers of our families and our communities. We are the ones who organize, we are the ones who create dinners and run the social calendars. And when we have the spaciousness to show up and connect, that is how we change communities. That is how we bring more good, more love, more affection into the world.

And that is what the world is needing so much right now.

Change starts within us. It starts within you.

Connect with me, Ashley Logan:
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ashleydlogan
Website: https://ashleydlogan.com
Substack: https://substack.com/@ashleydlogan

And that’s exactly what we’re talking about in today’s episode. I’m joined by Chiara Mecozzi - an Argentine-American visual artist and creator of Fuerza Cruda, a body of work exploring women’s relationships with their bodies and the internal dialogue that shapes how we see ourselves.

Chiara and I met because a friend of mine, Stephanie Redlenner (go listen to her episode if you haven’t yet), shared her work with me. I saw this beautiful Argentinian woman moving, painting, and creating these raw, powerful reflections of the female body, and I was instantly drawn in.

After following her for about a year, I reached out, took a cab ride to Brooklyn, New York, showed up at her brownstone… and got naked. Literally (although, maybe not in that exact order).

But the reason I went was simple: I wanted to love my body. I wanted to feel connected to my body.

What unfolded was a healing experience. It felt like liberation. Chiara created this sacred space for me to truly feel safe in my own body… and from that place, feel empowered in it.

But this conversation is about so much more than that experience.

In this episode, we go deep into what it actually looks like to come back into your body after years of disconnection, shame, and conditioning.

Chiara shares her journey from abuse, self-abandonment, and external validation… to using art as a tool for healing, rewiring, and radical self-love. What started as photographing her own body through discomfort and grief became a full-body reclamation, and now, a movement helping women do the same.

This episode is about remembering that you have a choice, learning to feel safe in your body again, and what becomes possible when you stop shaming… and start choosing yourself.

​​We also explore:

• How shame and conditioning disconnect us from our bodies

• The “pick me” pattern and why it runs so deep

• Art, photography, and creative expression as tools for healing

• What it actually feels like to be seen without judgment

• The difference between discomfort and misalignment

• Why safety in your body changes everything - your relationships, your boundaries, your life

And maybe most importantly… what it feels like to say, “this is me,” and mean it.

I hope you enjoy this episode as much as I enjoyed the conversation with Chiari!

If this resonates with you, please reach out to us. We’d love to hear from you.

Connect with Chiari Mecozzi:
Instagram: @chiaramecozzi
Email: art@chiaramecozzi.com
Website: www.chiaramecozzi.com
Substack: art@chiaramecozzi

Connect with me, Ashley Logan:
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ashleydlogan
Website: https://ashleydlogan.com
Substack: https://substack.com/@ashleydlogan