I want to make a place for that.

Tomorrow, we’re opening something new inside the BeMo Community — I’m calling it MARGINS. It’s a creative writing group, but really it’s an invitation to bring whatever’s been sitting unfinished. Poetry, art, short stories, the thing you’ve been circling for months and haven’t had anywhere to put. All of it belongs here, exactly as unpolished as it is.

Thu Aug 27, 5:30 PM Mountain. That’s the kickoff.

All the details are waiting in the Community calendar: https://www.skool.com/the-bemo-community/calendar

Bring the margins. I’ll bring mine too.

— Cassandra

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Here’s the problem I keep running into, in my own life and in every conversation I have about love: Most of what we call love was never chosen. It was inherited.

Solomon puts it starkly: “Family dysfunction is like fire in the woods that rolls generation to generation, taking everything in its path, until one person has the courage to face the flame.”

Long before we ever decide what love means, we’re already living inside someone else’s definition of it. And the only way out is to actually look at it. Not perform around it. Look at it.

Recently, I published two FUNCK Method posts back-to-back on my private Substack, straight out of my BeMo Journal. I didn’t plan for them to build on each other, but they did, and it wasn’t until the second one was live that I realized where my real work had actually been happening the whole time: right in the middle of the You Note, the second part of the FUNCK Method. I’d responded to myself with everything I needed to feel seen, heard, known, the way a true best friend would. And in that response, I also heard what no longer sat with me. What no longer served me. The versions of love I’d been performing without ever realizing it was a performance.

You can read that post here → CassandraStark.com or click on it below

In Light of Knowing

What It Looks Like to Talk About the Same Thing Over and Over

One of the questions I get asked often is what to do when something is prolonged. People often feel like they’re doing it wrong when they arrive on the page in therapy — or in their own practice — and their mind wants to tell them it is the same, I already wrote about this, I already dealt with this…

Read more

8 days ago · Cassandra Stark

Some of what I found in that You Note, I want to keep. Such as writing,

The way I responded to his letter was the utmost love, support, kindness, security.

When I check in with myself, I Know that’s true. I was being genuine. I was choosing a response, an INTERaction, not REacting to a moment. That one, I get to keep.

But other lines in that same note, I recognized as something else entirely. I wrote:

You never missed a chance to travel with him. You pushed through a lifetime of pain and moved past making it anyone’s fault. You stopped talking to the people who exacerbated your reactions. You boldly uninvited people from your life and space.

Every one of those, at the time, was proof. Proof that I loved him. Proof that I cared. Rereading it now, I Can see they have nothing to do with him at all. They were choices I made: to travel with someone, to let go of pain, to protect my own peace. That’s what I call “need to” energy in BeMo. “Need to” is externalized. As I said it above, it’s proof and therefore it’s performative and proving. The moment I hand that - to travel, to let go, to protect - to someone else and say I did this for you, it curdles into resentment. Those choices served me. They were never proof I owed anyone.

But that doesn’t mean they meant nothing or that they were wrong. I also said:

I travelled toward him.

In The BeMo Practice I encourage people to change “need to’s” into part of their Cans list - to reveal empowered choices. When restated and recognized, what I was really saying is: I Can travel with someone. I Can let go of pain. I Can protect my own piece. And that’s real. It wasn’t about him. It was about me. To show up in that way is to meet a real need for love. Self-love.

How to tell if the love you’re giving is actually BS (a belief system)

Solomon has a name for this work: relational self-awareness, which she defines as “understanding in a deep and heartfelt way how you ‘show up’ for love.” Her tool for doing it is a process she calls Name-Connect-Choose: “Name: Call the past what it is, with honesty about how you were or are impacted. Connect: Allow yourself to feel the impact of the past without judgment. Choose: Consciously choose love again and again.” It’s almost the same shape as the FUNCK Method. Feel it, deal with it, reveal where it came from, heal it on purpose. Two different languages for the same excavation.

Here’s the test I actually use now: is this an INTERaction or a REaction?

A REaction is externalized.

I need to make the coffee, I need to clean the house, I need to set out the vitamins.

Underneath it, whether we say it out loud or not, is proof, performance, defense. Earning love.

Solomon maps this exactly: secondary feelings (angry, agitated, irritable, disrespected) versus primary feelings (sad, ashamed, lonely, inadequate). Reactive versus vulnerable. A linear conflict story versus a systemic one.

An INTERaction starts somewhere else entirely: I have a need for love and kindness, and I get to meet myself with it, regardless of anyone else’s response, regardless of whether the coffee is ever taken.

Here’s the smaller, quieter exampleof love I wrote about:

Making him coffee before he was awake. Setting out his vitamins, every single day, for years.

Those were real kindnesses. It made me smile to do them, they never took anything from me, and he could simply receive them or not. That was how I chose to love him. But somewhere along the way, choice can calcify into routine, and routine can quietly swallow the need it was meeting in the first place. I learned that pattern watching my mother: the vitamins, the spotless house, dinner on the table at the same hour every night. Real love, all of it. But when the need underneath gets left behind, love turns into resentment, resentment turns into servitude, and servitude turns into burnout. The same act can look identical on the outside and be two completely different things depending on where it’s coming from. As Solomon writes: “the first step toward greater empowerment, authenticity, and wholeness is becoming aware that early events in your life led you to be cast in a role that no longer serves you.”

The clearest place I saw this was a story I told myself in that same You Note, about the time I spent more money than I had on a gift, because that was how I knew to say I care about you, I want you safe, I want you prepared.

Every intention was right. But I did it at my own expense, and it wasn’t received the way I’d hoped, and there was a REaction.

Looking back, the version of me who’d met her own need first would have stayed inside her budget and simply told him what she was thinking and given him the choice. Nothing I did there was wrong, exactly. But it reminds me of every time I’ve lost the plot of why I’m showing up, and how. When I’m not starting from my own need, a need that doesn’t require being received to be complete, I default to learned behavior. A belief system I picked up early: that love meant giving more than you have. I learned that watching my parents. I learned it watching some of my sibling’s relationships too, not because it was wrong for them, but because that’s what a child watching from the outside absorbs. And the thing I also learned, watching those relationships long enough, is that the gifts never guaranteed anything. As Solomon puts it: “All we can ever truly control is what we are bringing into a relationship.” Not what it earns us. Just what we bring.

Prompts for if you want to do this work too

Straight from Loving Bravely:

Ask Yourself:

• In what ways am I being held back by beliefs and stories that do not serve me?

• In what ways am I feeling and acting from a place of old wounds?

• What can I do to shift to a place of empowerment?

• What did the people who raised me show me about the space between stimulus and response?

• How did the adults in my life manage their feelings of upset, irritation, and anger?

• What sorts of low-road behaviors were most common in my house growing up?

And one from me, a BeMo Journal prompt to sit with this week:

• Write your earliest memory of watching love happen, between anyone, in any form, that you had a front-row seat to. Don’t interpret it yet. Just tell it.

How I’m working through it

None of this is about self-blame. Solomon’s whole point, and mine, is that these were acts of love. Real ones. The work isn’t deciding they were wrong. It’s noticing where the need underneath got lost, and choosing, on purpose, to meet that need directly instead of performing it into someone else’s hands. That’s the difference between REacting from an old belief system and INTERacting from a need I actually own.

“We must know, understand, and love ourselves with such devotion and ferocity that the love of another serves as an extension, a mirror, and a validation of that love.”

That’s where I’m headed. Not away from love. Toward the version of it that doesn’t need proof.

If this resonated with you

You don’t need my story to do this work. Learn The BeMo Practice with the guide at the front of The BeMo Journal, or apply it to writing you’re already doing, to how you speak, or as an art practice. How you meet yourself isn’t the point. The practice is the point.

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Join the Community for the deep dive course into The BeMo Practice, plus:

• Weekly silent writing sessions

• Monthly guided BeMo Practice sessions

• Workshopping & AMA with author and creator Cassandra Stark

• BeMo Nidra night practice for sleep

• A monthly creative writing & art group

Not about a place. About a person. A friendship. A working relationship. A partnership. The kind of connection where something feels off and you can’t quite name it, but your body knows. Your quiet moments know. You know, even if you’re not ready to say it out loud yet.

In Light of Knowing

Should I Stay or Should I Go Now

At the start of July, I went away. I asked a question, steering as far from an ultimatum as possible when, really, that was never the point. It really was just a question. And then I left to hold space for my own answer…

Read more

a month ago · 4 likes · Cassandra Stark

That post resonated with a lot of you. And what stood out to me in the messages I received wasn’t the specific situations. It was how similar the feeling was underneath all of them:

“I know something isn’t right. I just don’t trust myself to make the call.”

I want to sit with that for a minute. Because I think that sentence, I don’t trust myself, is actually the whole thing. That’s the real issue underneath the relationship question. It’s not really about the other person. Not yet. It’s about you, and whether you’ve lost touch with your own voice somewhere along the way.

And that’s exactly what The BeMo Practice is here for.

BeMo Is a Coming-Home Practice

I want to ground us in this before we go any further, because it matters for everything else I’m going to say.

BeMo is a wellness practice. And at its core, what it does, what it has always done, is teach you how to stay with yourself.

That might sound simple. It’s not. Most of us have gotten very good at abandoning ourselves. We abandon ourselves when we say yes and mean no. We abandon ourselves when we swallow our feelings to keep the peace. We abandon ourselves when we look to everyone around us for confirmation of what we already know inside.

BeMo is the practice that brings you back. Again and again and again. Through writing, through speaking it out, through honest reflection. However you practice, the purpose is the same: you’re checking in with yourself. Not once. Not only when things hit a breaking point. Regularly. As a practice. The way you’d practice anything you wanted to get better at.

And when you practice staying with yourself, something really beautiful starts to happen. You begin to see, clearly, without all the noise, what you’re staying with in your relationships, too.

That’s the question underneath the question. It’s not just should I stay or should I go. It’s: Am I staying with myself inside this relationship? Or have I left myself behind to keep it going?'

Why This Is So Hard (And Why That’s Okay)

I want to be gentle here because I think we put too much pressure on ourselves to have this figured out.

Relationships are complicated. They’re not math problems. They don’t have to add up to an expectation or perception. They aren’t always balanced.

The people we love and care about, even the ones who are hurting us, are not villains in a story. They’re human beings, and so are we, and the space between two people is always going to be messy sometimes.

So if you’re sitting with a relationship that feels heavy right now and you don’t know what to do about it, that’s okay. You don’t have to know today.

What you can do is start paying attention. And that’s where the practice comes in.

Using BeMo to Find Your Staying Power

When I say “staying power,” I don’t mean the ability to endure. I don’t mean white-knuckling your way through a relationship that’s hurting you and calling that strength.

I mean the power that comes from staying with yourself. Staying present with your own feelings. Staying honest about your own experience. Staying rooted in your own values even when a relationship is making that hard.

The BeMo Practice builds that staying power. Here’s how it works when you bring it to a relationship you’re struggling with.

Start with your body.

Before you try to think your way through this, feel your way in.

The next time you’re about to see this person, or right after you’ve spent time with them, just pause. You don’t need to do anything complicated. Just notice.

How does your body feel? Are you tense? Tight? Are your shoulders doing that thing where they creep up toward your ears? Does your stomach feel knotted?

Or do you feel easy? Open? Like yourself?

This is information. Really important information. Most of us skip right over it because we’ve been taught that feelings need to be justified before they’re allowed to matter. They don’t. Your body doesn’t need a reason. It’s just telling you the truth.

Capture that. Write it down, say it into a voice memo, talk it through with yourself. Not what you think about the person. What you feel in their presence. You’re coming back to yourself here. You’re practicing staying with what’s real for you.

Get honest.

This is the part of the practice where you let yourself say the thing you’ve been editing.

We do this all the time, right? We soften. We qualify. We say “I’m a little frustrated” when what we actually mean is “I feel invisible in this relationship and it’s been breaking my heart for longer than I want to admit.”

However you practice BeMo, whether you write it or speak it or sit with it quietly, this is the moment to stop editing. To let yourself hear your own unfiltered truth. It’s just you, coming back to yourself. Telling yourself what’s real.

Try finishing these sentences and let whatever comes out, come out:

• After spending time with this person, I usually feel...

• The thing I’m most afraid to say out loud about this relationship is...

• If I’m being really, truly honest, this relationship makes me feel ______ about myself.

This is you, staying with yourself. Even when what you find there is uncomfortable. Especially then.

Listen to what you’ve been asking for.

This one is important, so stay with me.

Think about the things you find yourself complaining about in this relationship. The things you ask for. The things you keep bringing up that never seem to change. The things that a negative society might call “nagging.” I really dislike that word, by the way, because usually what people dismiss as nagging is just an unmet need being voiced for the hundredth time because it’s never been heard.

Maybe you’ve said things like:

“You never support me.”
“I’m always cut out. Like I don’t even belong in this family.”
“You don’t ever champion me.”
“You never ask me about my life or my day.”

Now, here’s what I want you to do. Look at those sentences and pull out the needs hiding inside them. Because that’s what they are. Every complaint, every repeated ask, every frustrated plea is a need trying to get met.

I have a need for... support.
I have a need for... belonging.
I have a need for... championing.
I have a need for... communication. To be asked. To be seen.

If you have a BeMo Journal, open it to the front. In the Needs Glossary you’ll find a whole list of core values and needs right there. Some of them might surprise you. We’re not just talking about the big obvious ones. We’re talking about things like Adventure. Teamwork. Beauty. Regulation. Sexual Expression. Real, specific, human needs that you are fully allowed to have.

Find yours. Name them.

Now flip it toward yourself.

If you only do one thing from this entire post, I want you to do this one.

Take those needs you just named, the ones you’ve been asking someone else to meet, and turn them toward yourself.

I want you to be really honest here. This isn’t about blame. It’s not about letting the other person off the hook. It’s about coming back to yourself, which is always what this practice is about.

Ask yourself:

How and where do I show up for myself in this way?

If your need is support: How am I supporting myself? Am I backing myself up? Am I making choices that support the life I actually want? Or am I abandoning myself and then being devastated when someone else does the same?

If your need is belonging: How am I tapping into my own sense of belonging? Do I even feel at home with myself? Have I created spaces where I belong, or am I relying on one relationship to give me that feeling?

If your need is championing: How do I champion myself? Do I celebrate my own wins? Do I speak well of myself, even privately? Or am I waiting for someone else to do that before I believe it’s true?

If your need is communication: How do I communicate with myself? Am I willing to ask myself about my day? To actually check in? To be honest about how I’m doing, not just the surface-level “I’m fine” version, but the real version? Am I willing to capture that? To write it down, to say it out loud, to let it be real?

This is the heart of The BeMo Practice. This is what it means to stay with yourself. Because here’s what I’ve found, and what I think you’ll find too:

When you start meeting your own needs, you get a lot clearer about what you’re actually asking from the people around you. And you get a lot clearer about who is capable of showing up and who isn’t.

That clarity? That’s your staying power. That’s you, coming home to yourself and seeing the whole picture from a place of honesty instead of desperation.

Check in with your values.

Once you’ve done that work, take it one step further. Look at your core values. The Needs Glossary in the front of your BeMo Journal is a great place to start if you’re not sure what yours are. You might find that your values include things you hadn’t thought to name before: things like beauty, rest, adventure, regulation, creative expression, teamwork, autonomy.

Then ask yourself two questions:

Does this relationship honor those values?

Do I honor my own values when I’m around this person?

Because sometimes the relationship itself isn’t the problem. Sometimes the problem is who we become inside of it. We shrink. We perform. We people-please. We slowly stop being ourselves because being ourselves felt like too much of a risk.

That’s you, leaving yourself. And The BeMo Practice is how you notice that you’ve left. It’s the path that walks you back home.

Take one brave step.

I’m not going to tell you to stay or go. That’s not my call to make, and honestly, it’s rarely that black-and-white anyway.

But I will say this: once you’ve done the work of coming back to yourself, once you’ve listened to your body, told yourself the truth, named your needs, and turned them inward, you’ll know what the next step is. Maybe not the final step. But the next one.

Maybe it’s a conversation you’ve been avoiding. The kind where you say the real thing, kindly and clearly, and see if the relationship can hold honesty. Some can. That’s worth finding out.

Maybe it’s a boundary. Not a wall, a boundary. A way of protecting your peace without disappearing.

Maybe it’s giving yourself permission to create some distance. Quietly. Without drama. Just a gentle shift of your time and energy toward the relationships that help you stay with yourself instead of the ones that pull you away.

And sometimes, yes, it’s letting go. With sadness. With love, even. With the understanding that a relationship ending doesn’t mean it failed. It means it finished. Those are different things.

Whatever it is, name it. Make it real.

A Soft Word About Grief

You’re allowed to grieve a relationship that hasn’t ended yet.

You can grieve what it used to be. You can grieve the version of it you hoped for. You can grieve the distance between what it is and what you needed it to become.

Grief isn’t only for endings. It lives anywhere something is shifting. And if you’re carrying this question around, something is already shifting, whether you’ve made a move or not.

Let your BeMo Practice hold that. That’s part of what it’s for. A place to put the heavy things down so you can see them clearly, feel them fully, and then decide what comes next from honesty instead of fear.

You keep coming back to yourself. That’s the practice. And every time you do, you get a little more clarity, a little more trust in your own voice, a little more of that staying power that makes everything else possible.

💛 I'd love to hear from you. What's one need you've been asking someone else to meet that you realize you might not be meeting for yourself? Drop just one word or sentence in the comments below.

Leave a comment

You’re Not Doing This Alone

In our BeMo Self-Care Book Club, we’re reading The Company We Keep by right now, and if this post stirred something up for you, this book will meet you right where you are. It’s about looking honestly at the relationships in our lives and understanding how the company we keep shapes the person we’re becoming.

The conversations happening inside the paid BeMo Community around this book have been tender and real and deeply supportive. It’s a room full of people doing this same work: learning to stay with themselves so they can show up more honestly in every relationship they’re in.

If that sounds like something you need right now, I’d love to have you with us.

👉 Join the BeMo Community at BeMoJournal.com/Community

The BeMo Practice won’t make this decision for you. But it will bring you back to the one person whose voice matters most in this conversation: yours.

And the more you practice staying with yourself, the clearer everything else becomes. Including who deserves to stay with you.

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And that last part matters more than anything else. Insight alone doesn’t rewire a nervous system. Repetition does. That’s the quiet reason so many people find longer-lasting results here than with traditional talk therapy alone: you’re not just understanding a pattern once, out loud, in a fifty-minute hour — you’re practicing a new response over and over until the new way stops being effort and starts being who you are. BeMo is built for breakthroughs.

More than CBT and DBT

Most people would liken The BeMo Practice to just two traditional modalities — cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) and dialectical behavior therapy (DBT) — and that’s because it holds both. From CBT, the practice draws the science of noticing and naming what you feel, and catching the distorted, automatic thinking that runs underneath it — the always, the never, the I have to that quietly steers a life. From DBT, it draws emotional regulation and distress tolerance: concrete ways to move a big feeling through the body instead of drowning in it or exploding from it.

And mindfulness runs through all of it. The practice trains present-moment, nonjudgmental awareness — noticing what’s actually here without rushing to fix it, allowing it to exist, and returning, again and again, to the present. You learn to notice where you used to numb out, to allow where you used to guard, and to regulate where you used to react.

But CBT and DBT are only the entry point. The BeMo Practice reaches further — into the places traditional talk therapy often gestures at but rarely gives you a repeatable way to work.

The four stages of self-discovery

The whole of the practice moves you through what BeMo calls the four stages of self-discovery — feel, deal, reveal, and heal. Rather than leaving you stuck in insight, it gives you the space needed to actually do something with what surfaces — and to unearth deeper inner child work, supported by our online community and our deep, guided BeMo Practice events. Here’s how the science shows up along the way.

The deeper layers, woven into one practice

Naming feelings — with the body (CBT + somatic). The practice opens by helping you approach and accurately name what you feel — and that includes somatic, body-based sensing. You learn to let the body tell you what words haven’t caught up to yet: the tight throat, the softened chest, the held breath. Naming a feeling precisely is the CBT move that robs it of its automatic power; sensing it in the body is what keeps the work honest.

Self-compassion (Kristin Neff). The next movement of the practice is centered entirely in self-compassion — the research-backed work of Dr. Kristin Neff. You learn to respond to your own story the way a wise, loving friend would, rather than the way the inner critic was taught to. This is not indulgence; it’s the specific condition under which real change becomes possible.

Parts work and ACT. At a pivotal moment, the practice invites you to step outside your own story — to look at your experience as a part of you rather than the whole of you. Something you can hold at arm’s length and examine with clear eyes, rather than something that defines you. That single shift — seeing your story as a part, not a verdict — is the living heart of parts work, and it’s the same move Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) calls defusion: you stop being fused with a belief long enough to decide whether it’s even yours to keep.

Shadow work and mirror work. BeMo pairs deep self-compassion with the quiet, foundational truth you already carry — and lets the two reflect each other. The tenderness you offer yourself and the knowing that lives underneath it mirror and shadow one another, meeting in the same place. That reflection is where disowned parts of you — and often the inner child who first learned the belief — come back into the light, and where you finally see yourself clearly: not as the critic taught you to, but as you actually are.

Narrative and expressive writing. Bringing what you’re living right now into the practice is narrative therapy in motion — the understanding that you are the author who can re-tell your story, not a prisoner of it. You may have heard of Morning Pages; this goes further. Where free-writing and automatic writing can leave you staring at the page wondering what to do with whatever surfaced, every turn of The BeMo Practice is a self-prompting machine. It shows you what to work on next and gives you something to do with your repetitions, so you’re not endlessly circling the same story. This is therapeutic, expressive writing with a spine — you unearth what’s real, what’s needed, and what’s now.

Exposure therapy. This is the thread most people miss. BeMo is a self-regulation practice that takes you genuinely deep — deeper than most practices dare to go — and then, just as deliberately, brings you back up and out. That’s exposure: you move toward the hard truth inside a safe, held container, stay long enough for the charge to settle, and then return to solid ground. Do that again and again and you build real capacity — for hard truths, hard things, and conflicting information. And when you build that capacity with yourself, you build a knowing for exactly how to meet the situations in life that surprise you and try to take you down.

Gratitude practice. BeMo never leaves you stranded in the hard place. Woven through its closing movement is a deliberate turn toward gratitude and the present moment — but it’s careful about it. This isn’t toxic positivity, and it never erases grief. It teaches your body that grief and gratitude can be held at the same time — truth and hope, loss and possibility.

Core needs: attachment, personality, and values

Where many frameworks stop at Maslow’s hierarchy, BeMo goes further. Attachment theory — and attachment-based therapy — are a central part of how BeMo teaches core needs, and of the unique way the practice guides you to arrive at your true need rather than the surface one. Alongside your attachment needs, it works with your personality needs and your value- and character-based needs — not just to explain you to yourself, but to give you direction. The result isn’t only insight; it’s an empowering map toward yourself: humanistic psychology and self-actualization made practical.

I’ve watched it change all kinds of people

I have witnessed people be deeply moved and forever changed by how they take up The BeMo Practice — men, women, teens, and children. Neurodivergent individuals, functioning autistic individuals, and people with ADHD. The ones who identify as weird, unique, or lonely — the odd ones out, the misfits — right alongside the popular ones, the go-getters, the over-doers, and the people pleasers. It helps so many, from all walks of life, understand the way in which they learned to walk — and then teaches them, from within, how to sit with themselves instead.

Why it lasts

The old wound still rises — it always will. But you meet it differently, and because you’ve practiced meeting it differently, that new response grows faster and more natural over time, until it’s not a technique you reach for but simply part of how you move through the world. As one longtime practitioner put it: the hard moments now get processed with more and more ease, faster and faster — like it’s a part of me. Because it is.

The BeMo Practice isn’t just a set of tools. It’s a scientifically grounded methodology that addresses not only the symptoms but the root beliefs beneath them — woven into one practice small enough to carry and repeated enough to keep. Still more supportive practices are named and taught in The BeMo Extras. And the practice itself is there for you every day: taught at the front of every BeMo Journal and woven through our other core products — the weekly planner, the daily planner, and the desktop balance notepad.

Come grow with us

If any of this stirred something in you, don’t just read about it — practice it. Join our community at BeMoJournal.com/Join, take The BeMo Practice course, attend a live event, and share what it is you’re growing through. That’s where the breakthroughs happen — and we’d love to hold that space with you.

This week I wrote something personal on my IN LIGHT OF KNOWING Substack. It’s about what it looks like when a relationship transforms instead of fails. When two people choose practice over performance. When moving out is not the same as leaving.

It’s called Growing Apart So We Don’t Grow Apart.

I share it here not because it’s about me — but because the things I Revealed through The BeMo Practice while writing it are the same kinds of things that move through all of us when life asks us to let go of something we thought we were supposed to hold onto forever.

You can read the full piece here as inspiration for this week’s prompts:

In Light of Knowing

Growing Apart So We Don’t Grow Apart

I am alone…

Read more

2 months ago · Cassandra Stark

Three Prompts to Sit With This Week

These came directly from the practice that carried me through what I wrote about. They’re yours now. Take them into your journal, your morning pages, your walk, your silence — wherever your practice lives.

1. Where in your life are you pouring energy into not losing something instead of letting go of what has to go?

2. What is the difference between what you are keeping and what you are choosing?

3. Where have you made yourself small to fit in a space you’ve already outgrown? What would it look like to stop?

There’s no right way to move through these. Write it. Speak it. Reflect on it. Meditate with it. Work through it while planning your day or walking the dog. However you practice, the goal is the same: learning a different way to move through your life.

If you have a thought, even now, please share one sentence, one thought, a beginning with me below in the comments.

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The BeMo Community Is Open

After months of building, it’s here.

The BeMo Community is a place to return to whenever life gives you something to celebrate, grieve, question, or understand. Inside you’ll find monthly Guided BeMo Practices, thoughtful conversations, member resources, and a growing library of practices designed to help you move through life — not just think about it.

The BeMo Practice isn’t just for journalers. It’s for anyone willing to show up.

Learn more and join us at BeMoJournal.com/join

What’s Coming Up

THURSDAY MORNINGS — Morning Pages
Silent writing sessions for creativity, accountability, and more. Show up. Write. Be in it together without having to perform.

JULY 15 — Self-Care Book Club Kickoff
We’re reading The Company We Keep by Alex Elle over the next 4-6 weeks. This is not a book report. This is a practice of reading as self-care — sitting with someone else’s words so your own can find their way out.

JULY 23 — Guided BeMo Practice
Theme: What Belongs To Me Now?

If you’ve ever wondered what it looks like to practice alongside other people who are also learning how to move through — this is it. This is the space.

Already a member? Log in to add these events to your calendar.

One More Thing

Whether you’re joining us for your first Guided BeMo Practice or continuing your own rhythm at home, BeMo products remain at the heart of the practice. Available in multiple colors while current inventory lasts. We have FIVE colors that are being retired. If you have a favorite that’s still available, don’t miss your chance.

Explore the Collection

Thank you for being here.

Whether you’ve been part of BeMo for years or just discovered us this week, I’m grateful you’re here.

I’ll see many of you inside this month’s Guided BeMo Practice.

With love,
Cassandra Stark

PDA is a term used to describe a pattern of experiencing everyday demands as overwhelming pressure. For someone with PDA, even things they genuinely want to do can suddenly feel impossible the moment they become something they feel they have to do. It’s most commonly discussed as a profile within autism, although many people with ADHD, trauma histories, anxiety, or chronic nervous system dysregulation recognize themselves in the experience as well.

To be clear, this isn’t your average “I don’t want to because I’d rather be…” scenario. That’s not PDA. That is almost always an avoidance strategy coming into play. When PDA talks about everyday demands as overwhelming pressure, we’re talking about things that most of us would consider basic — like brushing our teeth.

One of the reasons I find PDA so interesting is that it can look remarkably similar to so many other coping mechanisms. Is someone avoiding the dishes because they’ve come to believe they’re lazy, because they’re overwhelmed, because they learned early in life that demands weren’t safe, because they struggle with executive functioning, or because the moment something becomes a “have to,” their nervous system freezes? Is someone avoiding a text because they don’t care, because they’re anxious, because they’re afraid of saying the wrong thing, or because even replying now feels like another overwhelming demand? We may never know exactly what came first—and sometimes there isn’t just one answer. But that’s also why understanding matters more than labeling. Understanding helps you uncover what you Need, what experiences may have contributed to it, what helps unwind those patterns, and from there, discover what you Can do next.

Whether PDA is primarily neurodevelopmental, shaped by early experiences, or some combination of both is still being explored. As I started reading about it, though, I realized something surprising.

I wasn’t actually looking for another diagnosis.

I wasn’t looking for another identity.

I was looking for another answer.

The same question I’ve been asking for years.

“Yeah...but how?”

How do we actually work with our own minds? Why can two people experience the exact same situation so differently? Why does one person hear a simple request while another experiences overwhelming pressure? Why can one person make a plan and immediately begin, while another freezes the moment the plan exists?

Looking back now, I realize BeMo didn’t begin with a journal, a community, or even a framework.

It began with three subjects I couldn’t stop researching: autism, communication, and sleep.

At the time, I wasn’t trying to build anything. I was trying to solve very personal questions. I wanted to learn how to sleep. I wanted to understand why communication worked beautifully with some people and completely fell apart with others. I became fascinated by masking, executive functioning, attachment, nervous systems, and the incredible diversity of human processing.

I wasn’t trying to become an expert.

I was trying to understand.

Now, after more than 10,000 hours of reading, researching, writing, practicing, teaching, and watching thousands of people move through the BeMo Practice, it doesn’t surprise me that those same three subjects continue pulling me forward. If anything, I think I’m simply asking better questions than I was ten years ago.

Learning about PDA didn’t fundamentally change the way I think. Instead, it helped me realize why the BeMo Practice seems to resonate with so many different kinds of people. It wasn’t designed specifically for one diagnosis, one personality, or one way of processing. BeMo was built to help people understand themselves. And the more I thought about it, the more I realized that’s what every diagnosis should help us do.

Not become our identity.

Not become another explanation for why we can’t.

Simply help us understand ourselves more deeply.

A Diagnosis Is a Map

I think diagnoses are incredibly valuable.

If a diagnosis helps you understand yourself more deeply, it’s doing exactly what it’s supposed to do. It gives language to experiences you couldn’t previously explain. It replaces shame with awareness. It allows you to stop asking, “What’s wrong with me?” and begin asking, “Oh...this is how I experience the world.”

That’s incredibly useful.

What becomes less useful is when understanding quietly turns into identity. When the diagnosis becomes the first thing you tell yourself. The first explanation you reach for. The first reason you stop trying something new.

“I can’t because...”

“I’ll never be able to...”

“That’s just who I am.”

I don’t believe that’s what understanding is for.

Understanding should increase your Knowing.

And as your Knowing grows, so should your Cans.

That’s why I keep coming back to one simple idea:

Every diagnosis should give you more Cans, not more Can’ts.

The Question We May Never Be Able to Answer

One of the biggest conversations surrounding neurodivergence is where it all begins.

How much is genetics?

How much is environment?

How much is early attachment?

How much is trauma?

How much is simply the unique way one nervous system develops compared to another?

The honest answer is that we don’t know.

By the time we’re old enough to explain what’s happening inside us, our brains have already spent years wiring themselves around the lives we’ve lived. Some people clearly demonstrate neurodevelopmental differences from a very young age. Others grow up in environments that profoundly shape what feels safe, what feels threatening, how they communicate, and when they shut down.

Could trauma amplify something that was already there?

Could a naturally sensitive nervous system become even more sensitive through experience?

Could both things be true at once?

I genuinely don’t know.

I’m also not convinced we’ll ever be able to separate biology from lived experience for every individual person.

If I ever pursued a PhD—and I genuinely think about that more often than people might expect—this is probably where I’d spend my time. Not because I think I have the answers, but because I have so many questions.

Questions I’d love to see studied.

Questions I’m constantly studying myself.

I’ve noticed patterns in the people I’ve worked with through BeMo. They’re observations, not conclusions. Current research doesn’t support many of the connections I’m curious about, and I want to be honest about that. Curiosity is different from certainty.

What I do know is this:

Regardless of how someone arrived where they are today, understanding themselves gives them more options than misunderstanding themselves ever will.

And to me, that’s where the conversation becomes far more interesting.

Why BeMo Starts Somewhere Different

As I learned more about PDA, I noticed that most conversations begin in the same place.

How do we help someone follow through?

How do we reduce avoidance?

How do we motivate them?

How do we get the task completed?

Those are all reasonable questions. They’re simply not where BeMo begins.

BeMo begins with understanding because behavior is only half the story. If someone says, “I have to clean the kitchen,” and immediately feels resistance, most of us focus on the kitchen. We focus on the unfinished task, the dishes piling up, the responsibility that isn’t being met. I’m far more interested in what happened inside the person the moment the demand appeared.

What feeling surfaced?

What story did their mind immediately begin telling?

What Need suddenly became threatened?

Because if we only focus on changing behavior, we’ll spend our lives trying to force different actions while leaving the original pattern untouched. That right there is what I call “need-to-ing” ourselves and the situation at hand.

Over the years, I’ve realized that people don’t necessarily struggle with the same step inside the BeMo Practice. One person immediately knows what they’re feeling but can’t identify what they Need. Another has no trouble identifying a Need but struggles to imagine what they Can do next. Someone else gets stuck believing they don’t deserve to have Needs at all.

The place we get stuck changes.

The practice doesn’t.

That’s one of the reasons I think it resonates with so many different kinds of people.

The Difference Between “Need To” and “Need For”

If you’ve spent any time around BeMo, you’ve probably heard me gently interrupt the phrase, “I need to...”

Not because I’m trying to police language, but because I’ve become deeply interested in what that phrase does to our nervous system.

“I need to” often carries pressure before we’ve even begun.

I need to clean the kitchen.

I need to answer that email.

I need to work out.

I need to be more productive.

I need to be better.

Sometimes those words become so heavy that our nervous system stops hearing the task altogether. All it hears is pressure.

Hello, PDA! Or at least, being able to relate to it. Am I right?

What if we asked a different question?

Instead of, “What do I need to do?”

What if we asked, “What do I have a Need for?”

That shift has become one of the quiet revolutions inside BeMo.

Maybe your Need is for autonomy.

Maybe it’s for certainty.

Maybe it’s for progress.

Maybe it’s for contribution.

Maybe it’s for rest.

Maybe it’s for connection.

The task hasn’t disappeared.

The pressure has simply made room for understanding.

I’ve become increasingly curious about whether this shift is especially meaningful for many neurodivergent people. This isn’t something research has established, and I want to be careful not to overstate what we know. It’s simply something I’ve observed over years of helping people process through BeMo.

For some people, “need to” seems to create anxiety that becomes the fuel for getting things done. The task gets completed, but the nervous system pays the price.

For others, “need to” creates so much internal pressure that the brain responds with complete resistance.

“I can’t.”

“I don’t know why.”

“I just can’t.”

Whether someone identifies with PDA, ADHD, autism, trauma, burnout, perfectionism, or none of those labels at all, I keep seeing the same thing happen.

The moment someone identifies the underlying Need, the conversation changes.

Not because life suddenly becomes easy.

Because they stop fighting themselves long enough to understand what their mind has been trying to communicate.

Knowing Creates Cans

This is the part that excites me most.

Every new piece of Knowing should create another Can.

If I Know reminders make me feel trapped, I Can create reminders that come from me instead of waiting for someone else to manage me.

If I Know my brain struggles to initiate large projects, I Can break them into one meaningful first step instead of expecting myself to finish everything at once. I Can remove unnecessary decisions before I begin. I Can body double with someone I trust. I Can organize my environment in a way that works for my brain instead of forcing myself into someone else’s system.

If I Know I focus better after movement, I Can nourish my body and move it before expecting sustained concentration.

If I Know I disappear when I’m overwhelmed, I Can explain that to my partner before silence becomes distance.

The diagnosis didn’t disappear.

It became useful.

Not because it told me who I was.

Because it helped me understand how I work.

And once I understand how I work, I have infinitely more choices about how I move forward.

That’s the difference between collecting labels and collecting Knowing.

One creates limitations.

The other creates possibilities.

What This Looks Like in Real Life

Understanding ourselves should always make us better at understanding one another.

If your partner experiences requests as overwhelming pressure, understanding that changes how the two of you communicate. It doesn’t remove responsibility, but it creates space for both people to build systems that work with their nervous systems instead of constantly fighting against them. The partner who experiences demand avoidance can begin communicating before shutting down. The partner making the request can stop interpreting every moment of resistance as a lack of love or commitment.

If you’re the person experiencing that pressure, your Knowing creates Cans. You Can create reminders that come from you instead of waiting for someone else to remind you. You Can build routines around your own strengths. You Can explain what’s happening before disappearing into silence. You Can identify what environments help you begin instead of assuming you’re lazy because traditional productivity advice doesn’t work for you.

If you’re an employee who freezes every time work becomes rigid, understanding doesn’t remove accountability. It simply gives you somewhere to begin. You Can ask for clear outcomes instead of constant check-ins. You Can organize projects visually. You Can identify when your Need is for clarity, autonomy, or progress before trying to force productivity.

And if you’re managing someone who seems to stop moving the moment expectations become explicit, understanding invites curiosity before judgment. Accountability still matters. Deadlines still matter. But people rarely do their best work when they feel misunderstood. Curiosity often creates better solutions than assumptions ever will.

Knowing Yourself Isn’t Giving Up on Yourself

One thing I never want BeMo to become is another self-improvement system that quietly tells you you’re broken until you become someone else.

You’re not.

BeMo isn’t here to fix who you are.

It’s here to help you understand how you arrive.

There’s an important difference.

When we understand ourselves, we don’t suddenly stop growing. We don’t lower our expectations or decide this is simply “the way we are.” Understanding isn’t resignation. It isn’t permission to stop trying. It isn’t another reason to explain away the life we want.

It’s the opposite.

Understanding gives us a better place to begin.

That’s why I don’t want a diagnosis to become another “I can’t” list.

I don’t want it to become a collection of beliefs about what you’ll never be capable of, who you’ll never become, or why you’ll never fit in.

Those are belief systems.

They’re not the diagnosis itself.

Knowing yourself is NOT accepting that you’ve been different all along and therefore don’t belong. All of that is what I call BS (Belief Systems)!

Knowing yourself is understanding what works best for where you are now.

It’s Knowing how your mind processes.

It’s Knowing how your nervous system responds.

It’s Knowing how you make progress, one step at a time.

It’s Knowing what you want to be able to do, even if you’re not there yet.

Most importantly, it’s Knowing you’re capable of creating a path that works for you instead of spending your life trying to force yourself down someone else’s.

That’s a very different kind of hope.

We already understand this when it comes to our bodies.

No two bodies are exactly alike. We don’t expect everyone to become the same height, have the same metabolism, enjoy the same foods, recover at the same speed, or respond to the same workout. We recognize that health looks different from one person to the next.

Why wouldn’t the same be true for our minds?

Why do we expect every brain to process information the same way, communicate the same way, focus the same way, or move through the world with the same ease?

The goal isn’t for all brains to become one singular, perfectly organized way of thinking.

The goal is to understand the brain you have.

The goal is to understand the life you’ve lived.

The goal is to understand the patterns you’ve developed—not so you can judge them, but so you can decide which ones still serve you and which ones no longer do.

That’s what BeMo has always been about.

Not changing who you are.

Changing your relationship with yourSELF.

Helping you replace automatic beliefs with intentional Knowing.

Helping you move from “I can’t” toward “I Can.”

Helping you identify the core Need underneath the pressure instead of spending your life fighting the pressure itself.

Helping you realize that progress doesn’t always look like doing more.

Sometimes it looks like understanding more.

And understanding has a remarkable way of creating movement.

Maybe that’s why I’ve spent so many years studying autism, communication, sleep, relationships, attachment, and now PDA.

Not because I’m searching for the perfect explanation. Because I’m searching for better understanding. And every time I understand something new—whether it’s about myself, someone I love, or the people I work with—it gives me another Can.

That’s what I hope every diagnosis does.

Not become your identity. Become another piece of your Knowing. Because Knowing isn’t the end of the story. Knowing is what helps you write the next chapter.

I’d genuinely love to hear your thoughts on this.

What part of this resonated with you? What challenged you? What questions did it raise?

I’d love to continue the conversation in the comments.

Leave a comment

Join the BeMo Community

If conversations like this are the kinds of conversations you’ve been looking for, I’d love to invite you into the BeMo Community.

Every month we’re filling our calendar with opportunities to practice this work together—not just learn about it.

Inside the community, you’ll find Silent Writing: Morning Pages, Margins (our creative writing group), monthly Guided BeMo Practice sessions, Rest & Reveal, our Yoga Nidra-inspired evening BeMo session, along with workshops, Ask Me Anything sessions, community discussions, and other opportunities to better understand yourself alongside people doing the same.

If you’re ready to move beyond collecting information and begin building a practice of understanding yourself, we’d love to have you join us.

Learn more and become a member at BeMoJournal.com/join.

For a long time, many of us believed that loving someone deeply meant carrying more.

We carried the emotional labor.
We carried the remembering.
We carried the planning.
We carried the awareness.
We carried the conversations nobody wanted to have.
We carried the consequences of things that were never ours — because it felt easier than watching someone we loved struggle beneath them.

It felt like protection.
It felt like devotion.
It felt like love.

But eventually, something began to feel heavy.

Not because we loved them less.

Because we were carrying things that never belonged to us.

The Difference Between Supporting and Carrying

There is a distinction that doesn’t get talked about enough, and it’s one that changes everything once you see it.

Supporting says:
“I am with you.”
“I believe you can hold this.”

Carrying communicates:
“I will do it for you.”
“I don’t believe you can.”

Sometimes we carry because we are afraid.

Afraid they will fail.
Afraid they will suffer or be embarrassed.
Afraid they will leave.
Afraid that if we stop compensating, everything will collapse.

Sometimes, the people we love become so accustomed to us carrying things that the moment we set them down, it feels like abandonment.

But setting down what isn’t ours isn’t abandonment. It’s truth. It’s trust. It’s Knowing that another person is capable of doing hard things and facing difficult emotions, hard conversations, and life’s ebbs and flows. It’s Knowing we are safe regardless of what others close to us choose for themselves.

This is perhaps the most difficult thing to add to your Knowing. It’s something that can change everything, as I found in my own healing journey and recently started to write about here:

In Light of Knowing

What Was Never Mine To Carry

When I first stepped into the core of my healing journey, I had no idea that one day The BeMo Practice would be born from it…

Read more

3 months ago · 5 likes · Cassandra Stark

When Accountability Gets Confused for Criticism

Here’s where it gets complicated.

When we finally start to set things down, we often don’t do it in silence. We name it. We say, "This isn’t mine." I’ve been carrying this, and I can’t keep doing it.

And sometimes, the person we say it to hears something very different.

They hear judgment.
They hear rejection.
They hear: You are broken. You are a problem. You have failed me.

This is the place where we have a need for honesty:

There is a difference between abusive criticism and healthy accountability.

And that difference matters — not just for the person receiving it, but for the person saying it.

Abusive criticism says:

“You are the problem.”
“Something is wrong with you.”
“You need to become different for me to be okay.”
“I will keep pressing until you agree with me.”

Holding someone accountable says:

“This is yours.”
“This is the impact it has on me.”
“This is what I am no longer willing to carry.”
“What you do with that information is your choice.”

The distinction is not about whether someone feels hurt.

People can feel hurt by accountability.
People can feel shame when no shame was intended.
People can feel criticized when someone simply names reality.

The distinction is where the responsibility lands.

Abusive criticism tries to make the other person responsible for your Feelings – your regulation, your worth, or your happiness.

Healthy accountability returns responsibility to its rightful owner.

A Real-World Example

Here’s the difference in practice:

Abusive criticism:
“You never show up for me. You’re never there. I always have to…”

Healthy accountability:
“Hey, I want to ask you about something. And maybe I am misunderstanding things here because it isn’t what I’m used to, but I feel hurt and sometimes a little disregarded when I tell you about something really difficult for me, and it just seems shrugged off as no big deal. You are important to me. I have a need for connection in that moment; for being shown up for. I stop feeling safe in that connection when it happens consistently. Can you tell me what’s going on for you in that moment? I’d love to know.”

One attacks identity.
The other describes behavior and, in very difficult conversations, consequences.

The Question That Helps

When I’m in the thick of it — when something feels urgent, when I need to say something, when I can feel myself reaching toward the other person — the most honest question I can ask isn’t about them at all.

It’s this:

“What need am I trying to meet right now — and am I trying to meet it from within, or am I trying to get them to meet it for me?”

Because here’s what I’ve learned:

You are not your partner’s therapist.
You are not responsible for their growth.
And they are not responsible for your regulation.

When your needs are met within a relationship, when that need is met by someone else, that is a gift. It is the icing on the cake and the cherry on top. But it will never replace the need to overlook meeting your own needs.

Since creating The BeMo Practice, I’ve been great at meeting my needs. I’ve utilized the hyper-independence that came from trauma to create a ladder to climb out of holes created by learned behaviors and victim/hero/martyr mentality. Every time I practiced, I did better. I learned more. I practiced the very things that would help me let go of the rigid clutch on hyper-independence and instead open up to the vulnerability necessary for true connection. I started to become increasingly grateful for the “cherry on top” needs met through connecting with others – laughter in friendship, a listening ear, a cooked meal, a cleaned house, and so much more. But here’s the crux, what you Know may not yet be what someone else knows or is growing toward. That is not your journey. It is not your responsibility. When you lay down what you once thought was protection and instead churn up more of a fight, it can feel overwhelming and entirely confusing. It doesn’t mean you did it wrong. It doesn’t mean the protection is gone. It doesn’t mean the responsibility is yours. It means you’ve entered a new level of your healing journey and found new growing pains.

When we walk into a hard conversation hoping the other person will finally see, finally get it, finally validate what we’ve been experiencing, we’ve already externalized something that was ours to hold.

That’s not a character flaw.
That’s a very human thing to do.

But it creates chaos.

Every time.

Because the moment your sense of resolution, connection, or safety depends on what someone else does with what you say, you’ve handed the keys to your nervous system over to someone who was never meant to have them.

The need for connection is real.
The need to show up honestly in your relationships is real.

But meeting those needs begins within.

It begins with asking:

• Am I connected to myself right now?

• Am I showing up from a grounded place, or a desperate one?

• Am I speaking because I am meeting a core need by honoring what’s true for me — or because I need them to respond in a specific way for me to feel okay?

If the answer is the latter, the conversation isn’t ready yet.

Not because you don’t deserve to have it.

But because you deserve to have it from solid ground.

What You Can Say Instead

If you’ve been struggling to find language that is honest without being harmful, here’s something to try:

“I Know that some of what I say may sound similar to criticism you’ve experienced before. I understand why that would be painful.

But my intention isn’t to convince you that you’re bad or broken. My intention is to be honest about what I experience, what affects me, and what I can and cannot continue carrying.”

When Pain Recognizes Itself Before It Recognizes Reality

The hardest part of all of this is something that deserves its own space.

Sometimes, people who have been deeply criticized in life experience accountability as criticism.

Sometimes, people who have spent years over-functioning for others experience boundaries as cruelty.

Neither experience automatically tells us what is actually happening.

The question isn’t: “Do they feel criticized?”

The question is: “Am I asking them to carry what is theirs, while carrying what is mine?”

If the answer is yes, then you may still be loving someone deeply — while refusing to continue protecting them from the consequences of their own choices.

That isn’t abandonment.

It’s the place where love stops rescuing and starts respecting another person’s responsibility.

Love Doesn’t Ask Us to Abandon Ourselves

Love doesn’t ask us to rescue someone from every consequence.
Love doesn’t ask us to carry another person’s half forever.

Sometimes love asks us to stand beside someone and trust that they are capable of carrying what is theirs.

Even when they don’t believe it.
Even when they wish we would continue carrying it for them.
Even when they mistake our boundary for a withdrawal of love.

Because the deepest form of love is not always protection.

Sometimes it’s respect.
Sometimes it’s trust.
And sometimes it’s finally setting down the weight that was never ours to carry.

Take It Into Your BeMo Practice

This week’s BeMo prompt invitation:

Think of something you’ve been carrying in a relationship that may not be yours.

Use your BeMo Journal to explore:

• What are you carrying that belongs to someone else?

• What fear is underneath your willingness to keep carrying it?

• What would you need to believe about them — and yourself — to set it down?

• What’s the difference between the accountability you want to offer and the control you might be reaching for?

You don’t have to have the answer right away. That’s what the practice is for.

Leave a comment

Want to Go Deeper?

Cassandra shares the more personal, behind-the-scenes side of navigating these exact dynamics — including what it looks like when the people we love are dealing with wounds that make accountability feel like an attack — over on her personal Substack 👉 CassandraStark.Substack.com

It’s raw, it’s real, and if you’ve ever wondered “how does she actually use BeMo in her own life?” — that’s where you’ll find it.

If this piece resonated with you, you’re exactly who this space was built for.

The #BeMoJo Community is a place for people who are done just understanding their patterns — and are ready to actually shift them. Through guided BeMo journaling events, honest conversations, and a community of people who get it, we go further together than we ever could alone.

Here’s what’s waiting for you when you subscribe:

✅ Free tools and guided BeMo Practices
✅ Behind-the-scenes insights and community conversations
✅ Access to live journaling events and replays
✅ A space where growth is honored, and you don’t have to carry it alone

Join the BeMo Community → Get live guided BeMo Practice sessions FREE every month

A space for self-discovery, emotional growth, and grounded connection — one journal entry at a time.

Because healing shouldn’t be lonely.
And you were never meant to carry all of this by yourself.

Leave a comment

A proud moment.
A relieving moment.
A moment you worked toward for years.

And sometimes it does.

But what people do not talk about enough is what happens after.

What happens when the structure disappears?
When there is no next assignment?
When your schedule changes overnight?
When the pressure shifts… but does not go away?

When the noise stops—and you are left asking:

What now?

For a lot of people, graduation does not just bring excitement.

It brings:

uncertainty
pressure
loneliness
disorientation
and sometimes… a quiet sense of sadness

If you are feeling more drained than excited, that does not mean anything is wrong with you.

It means something real is happening.

You are not just stepping into something new.

You are adjusting to change.

In Light of Knowing is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

You are losing structure, even if you did not like it.
You are stepping away from familiarity.
You are facing yourSELF in a way you may not have had to before.

And if you have spent years moving from one demand to the next, it can feel incredibly unsettling to suddenly be in a space where no one is telling you what to do.

Most people respond to this by trying to figure everything out immediately.

What is my next step?
What should I do?
What is the right decision?

But the pressure to decide is often covering something deeper.

Because graduation does not create uncertainty.

It reveals it.

When that happens, most people either:

rush forward
shut down
or start questioning themselves

But there is another way to approach this moment.

Not by forcing answers.

Not by pretending everything feels exciting.

But by actually noticing what is happening underneath it.

You might notice:

“I thought I would feel more ready than this.”
“I feel pressure to get it right.”
“I feel excited… but also kind of lost.”
“I do not fully trust myself yet.”

That is the part most people skip.

And that is the part that changes everything.

Before you move on, pause for a second.

When you think about “what now?” what actually comes up first?

Not what you think should come up.
Not what sounds impressive.
Not what you are trying to convince yourself is true.

What is actually there?

Leave a comment

Most people move straight into solving, deciding, or distracting.

But when you pause like this, something different happens.

You stop reacting to the pressure of what comes next and start noticing what is actually driving it.

That matters.

Because you cannot make a clear decision from a feeling you have not acknowledged.

This is exactly where your BeMo Practice comes in.

Not to tell you what to do next, but to help you move through what is already here, so that what comes next actually feels like your choice.

If you are in this moment right now—or you are watching someone you love go through it—you do not need to have everything figured out.

You just need a place to begin.

To help move through what you go through, enter into this new phase of life with more security, confidence, and an understanding of how to communicate what it is you need without shame, blame, or self-abandonment. Join The BeMo Community.

Because it is not just about what comes next.

It is about what comes up.

If you want to learn how to actually move through moments like this with more self-understanding, more intention, and more self-trust, you can…

👉 Join The BeMo Community here

Leave a comment

One of the most beautiful surprises we can experience is seeing how you are taking The BeMo Practice and truly making it your own. Recently, BeMo community member Kelly Thompson shared an honest look into her own journey, and it completely warmed our hearts to see how she is creating space for herself.

Kelly wrote about finding clarity and honoring her feelings as part of her morning routine. She so generously shared an inside look at her journal, and even gave our practice a wonderful accolade in her recent list of things that “do not suck” (a special treat reserved for her paid subscribers which you can read right here: https://substack.com/@kellythompsontnwwy/p-181727493

“A while back, I stumbled on a new journaling tool called BEMO. I rolled my eyes, of course, but ordered one anyway—because I’m a sucker for a fresh notebook. I figured, if I don’t like the concept, it would still be a new journal — take what works and leave the rest, right?

Turns out it’s brilliant. At its heart is a process called FUNCK, and it works. It’s a great way to move toward clarity, so I’ve been implementing it as part of my upon awakening morning practice.”

Taking up space looks different for everyone. If you have a desire to see how Kelly navigates her feelings and works through the steps, we highly encourage you to read her full post.

We can’t wait to share this space with you. Click here to read Kelly’s post and see inside her FUNCK practice!

There’s Nothing Wrong With You (And There Never Was) ™

Won’t You Be My Neighbor?

The Red Bus is a new coffee shop 1400 steps from my front door—a double-decker perched on busy Wadsworth Blvd on the west side of Denver. For a 71-year-old writer who doesn’t leave the house enough, having a workspace within walking distance changes everything. It gives me a reason to get dressed, brush my teeth, put on real clothes. It means structure…

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10 months ago · 31 likes · 18 comments · Kelly Thompson TNWWY

We spend so much time moving fast, but true healing begins when we simply allow ourselves to pause. Jen’s Within series on Substack is a beautiful testament to what happens when we create space to just be. In her writings, she captures the quiet, everyday moments of honoring her feelings and invites us to do the same.

You can read one of her beautiful reflections here:

Embers in the Pines

Within 06.

You don’t need to arrive anywhere while you’re here…

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5 months ago · 6 likes · 1 comment · Jennifer Edewaard

When we open our BeMo, we give ourselves the freedom to drop the fluff and engage in meaningful processing. Taking up space isn’t just about filling lines on a page; it’s about giving yourself permission to explore whatever is rising to the surface.

When you allow yourself to process without the pressure of perfection, something incredible happens. Jen has a profound gift for taking her raw feelings—navigating through The FUNCK Method—and transforming her everyday processing into poetry.

Take a look at how she navigates her inner world here:

Embers in the Pines

Within 02.

You don’t need to arrive anywhere while you’re here…

Read more

6 months ago · 10 likes · 1 comment · Jennifer Edewaard

If you have a desire to dive deeper into her beautiful process, Jen posts her own journal prompts every Wednesday on Substack in her Within series. We highly encourage you to follow her journey and subscribe at jennifereedewaard.substack.com.

And if you are craving even more connection and community, join us this weekend for our Online BeMo Retreat! Jen will be joining us live to teach a special class on how she creates poetry straight from her The FUNCK Method.

We can’t wait to share this space with you! Click here to get your ticket!

We talk a lot about how The BeMo Practice is designed for real life—not just the quiet, curated moments. But we wanted you to see exactly what that looks like in action. Recently, Sarah took over our Instagram to show us behind the scenes of her own BeMo journey. If you missed it, don't worry. We’ve compiled her incredible story right here for the BeMoJo community. Meet Sarah: a mom, a wife, a student, and someone who proves that healing doesn't require a perfect setup.

“Hi, I’m Sarah!!!

I bought my first BeMo Journal in January 2025.
I had never filled a journal cover to cover before.

Now I’m on my third.

This practice found me at a time when I really needed somewhere to put my thoughts — and it turned into something I cannot imagine not having.

I’m so excited to share what it’s been like for me this week 💛”

So often, we hold ourselves back waiting for the "ideal" conditions. We tell ourselves we will honor our feelings when the house is quiet, or when we have an hour of completely uninterrupted time. But healing doesn't work on a perfect schedule. Sarah beautifully illustrates how The BeMo Practice allows us to show up for ourselves in the everyday, in-between moments.

”I want to say something clearly:

You do not need the perfect spot to start.

My BeMo is in my purse.
On my desk.
In the pick-up line at school while I wait for my kids.
Next to my coffee in the morning.

So often we imagine some ideal time and space.

We think, “When I have alone time.”
“When the house is quiet.”
“When I am not needed.”

Especially as a mom.

I’m here to say — no, you do not.

Write when the kids are playing.
Write while you are waiting in line.
Write at your desk between emails.
Write with your morning coffee.

Just BeMo.

The BeMo Practice works on good days, bad days, and every day in between.

Some days it is long and takes up pages.
Some days it turns creative with cards, clippings, scraps.
Some days it is short — just enough to work through a funky moment.

The best part?

You do not have to use it the same way every day.

It teaches you.
It guides you.
And it gives you space.

It does not trap you in a workbook square that does not fit your life.

It gives you space — and quietly encourages you to take up space.

That is part of the practice.”

When we stop treating journaling as a structured chore and start allowing it to be a safe place to land, something beautiful happens.

“I’m a mom. A wife. A student.

And this has become part of my daily routine — like brushing my teeth.

If I skip a day, I feel it.
Cluttered.
Off.

It’s the most meaningful journaling I’ve ever done.

Some nights it’s in bed like this.
Some days it’s five minutes between everything else.

BeMo arrived at the right time in my life — and it stayed.”

The pages become lived-in. They become a reflection of our true selves. It’s not about keeping things neat or staying perfectly inside the lines; it’s about taking up space and allowing the journal to hold whatever you are carrying that day.

“What does my BeMo look like right now?

Honestly? It looks full.

There are glued-in cards from friends.
Funny clippings.
Little scraps from seasons I didn’t want to forget.

Some pages are just the BeMo Practice.
Some are messy.
Some are layered and creative.

It’s kind of become my everything book.

I go back and look at my old ones now — which I’ve never done with any other journal — and they’re stuffed and busting at the seams. And I love that.

It evolved into what I needed it to be.

And the best part?

You don’t have to use it the same way every day.”

I always say that BeMo gives you structure without boxing you in. It provides a foundation, but the freedom to evolve it into whatever you have a desire for on any given day is entirely yours.

“How do I make my BeMo Journal my own?

Because it teaches this amazing practice you can use however you need from day to day.

It gives you structure — like a workbook would.

But it also gives you space — unlike anything else out there.

Some days I just walk through the Practice.
Some days I glue in cards, notes, funny scraps.

It evolves into what you need it to be.

You don’t have to use it the same way every day.”

We aren't here for fluff or overwhelming workbooks that leave us feeling like we're failing at our own self-care. We are here for meaningful processing.

“No fluff.
No overwhelm.
Just something I can actually use.

That’s what surprised me the most.

There is so much in here I can really use — in good times and bad times.

The first time I tried the practice, I felt instant relief. And that surprised me.

It isn’t just a product to me.
It’s the most meaningful journaling I’ve ever done.

It gives me a place to land what I’m feeling — and actually move through it.”

I am so incredibly grateful to Sarah for sharing her wonderfully messy, deeply real practice with us, and for showing us what it looks like to truly honor our feelings.

This is just a taste of her story. If you have a desire to get a closer look at her layered pages, read her exact insights, and see the full picture, head over to our Instagram https://www.instagram.com/bemojournal/ to swipe through Sarah’s full carousels.

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You didn’t find this by accident.

Most people come to BeMo after trying everything else—
therapy, journaling, self-help…
and still asking:

“Ya, but how?”

How do I actually change?
How do I stop repeating this?
How do I feel better in real life—not just understand it?

That is what BeMo is for.

This is not about doing more.
This is about doing differently.

You are not here to fix yourself.
You are here to learn how to meet yourself.

And I am really glad you are here.

BeMo is not a blank journal.

And it is not a place to vent.

Because most people already know how to think about their problems…
but thinking alone does not change patterns.

BeMo is a structured practice.

It helps you:
understand what you are feeling
identify what you have a need for
and actually move forward differently

So instead of looping…
you process.

Instead of reacting…
you respond.

Instead of staying stuck…
you build change.

The BeMo Practice follows a simple flow:

Flow — get it out of your head
Feel — name what is actually there
Understand — respond with compassion
Need — identify your core need for
Can — choose what you can do
Know — ground in truth
Positive — reinforce what is working

You do not need to do it perfectly.
You just need to move through it honestly.

That is where the shift happens.

The biggest question I hear is:

“What do I write about?”

Start here:

What is taking up the most space in you today?

Not what is most important.
Not what you “should” work on.

What is loud?
What is repeating?
What feels slightly off?

That is your entry point.

You do not need a perfect prompt.
You need honesty.

One sentence is enough to begin.

BeMo is not just for big moments.

It is for:
the text that triggers you
the conversation you replay
the decision you are avoiding
the feeling you cannot shake

You can use it in 3 minutes or 30.

The goal is not depth every time.
The goal is consistency.

Because practice builds awareness.
And awareness builds change.

Most people either:
think about their feelings
or react to their feelings

BeMo does something different.

It moves you through them.Wha

Psychologically, this works because you:
process emotion (instead of suppressing it)
create cognitive understanding
identify unmet needs
and take regulated action

You are not skipping steps.

And that is why it sticks.

BeMo is not just something you do alone.

We have:
live guided journaling events
writing circles
workshops
and a growing community

You do not need a journal to attend.

You can come to:
learn
write
listen
or just be in the space

Because healing happens faster
when you feel seen, heard, and known.

If you want ongoing support, come join me on Substack.

That is where I:
go live
share prompts
teach in real time
and stay connected with this community

You will also find:
event updates
new practices
and deeper conversations

This is not something you do once.

It is something you return to.

If you stay with this practice…

You will start to:
notice patterns sooner
react less intensely
understand yourself more clearly
communicate more directly
and feel more steady in your life

Not because life gets easier—
but because you know how to meet yourself in it.

That is what changes everything.