So naturally, when I told my friend Brie that I wanted to host a party to celebrate her birthday, the first thing I did was give her a few themes to choose from.

She chose Amalfi at Sunset.

And since I’m basically incapable of doing things halfway, especially when it comes to parties, I may have gone a little overboard.

There were lemons everywhere. Blue and white dishes. Cafe lights and lots of candles. Fresh flowers. Aperitivo and homemade sourdough focaccia. A spritz menu for cocktail hour, followed by a four-course Italian dinner with wine pairings for each course.

I spent weeks planning every little detail. The decor. The drinks. The food. The live music. I researched the best Italian wines and had menus printed and spent two days cooking.

And I loved every minute of it. Truly.

Because honestly there’s nothing I love more than creating beautiful and memorable experiences for the people I love.

And my vision for this party was a relaxing evening of simply savoring really good food while in the company of great friends, one of those magical nights where everyone is relaxed and comfortable and happy to just be together.

To make it happen, I decided to enlist the help of my teenage daughters (and one of their friends) as our servers for the evening. I told them I would prep everything ahead of time, and then leave them detailed instructions (and post-it notes) for how to prepare and serve each course.

That way I would be able to sit and enjoy the meal with all my guests.

I thought it would be easy. I think they did too.

Which is probably why they rolled their eyes when I handed them my 17 pages of notes. (Though in hindsight, it may have been a little excessive.)

Suffice to say, there were a few hiccups.

They ran out of salad during the first course and had to scramble to make more. The timing between courses got a little off. The wine pairings weren’t always quite right.

But overall, they actually did a really great job.

Even if they were flustered behind the scenes, they didn’t let it show.

And no one cared that it wasn’t perfect.

Because it was exactly what it needed to be. Lots of laughs. Flowing conversations. Good food. Good wine. A night to just savor.

And I think in the end, that’s a little bit how life works too, isn’t it?

We do our homework.

We make the plans.

We agonize over the details.

We try to account for every contingency.

But at some point, we have to let go and just let it happen.

At some point we have to decide to actually enjoy the fruits of our effort.

Or to trust that someone else can handle it.

Marcus Aurelius wrote, “You have power over your mind — not outside events. Realize this, and you will find strength.” Along those same lines, Epictetus taught that “some things are up to us, and some things are not up to us.”

In other words? We can’t control everything.

I don’t know about you, but I spend a lot of my life believing that if I just work a little harder, prepare a little better, or think through one more scenario, I’ll somehow be able to control what happens next.

Sometimes that’s true.

Preparation matters.

But eventually, every single one of us arrives at a place where preparation has done its job. Where gripping tighter won’t make the dinner any smoother. Where worrying harder won’t give us answers any faster. Where all we can do is trust that we’ve done what we can—and that somehow, that will be enough.

And I guess that’s my challenge for you this week, for whatever it is you’re carrying. To ask yourself whether you’ve reached the point where you need to stop trying to control the outcome and trust that you’ve done enough.

Maybe there’s at least one thing on your plate right now that you’re trying to control down to the last detail, whether it’s a project, a plan, or a moment. But do the part that’s actually yours to do. Then let go of the rest, even if it’s a little messy.

You did the hard part already. So go enjoy the party.

Live with purpose, friend, and have an amazing week!

xoxo, Ruth

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(As if it weren’t already abundantly clear that I have entered my Midlife Era.)

I blame the peer pressure.

My friend Beth recently started meeting to walk together on Wednesday mornings, and then a couple of weeks ago, our mutual friend Araceli joined the fun too.

They both had weighted vests. I did not.

And between the vests, Beth gleefully pointing out all the birds along the way, and my own obsession with sourdough, we joked that we’ve officially checked almost every box on Instagram’s list of midlife hobbies. Even pickleball. All we need now to complete the set is knitting and mahjong.

After the walk, I realized I might as well embrace it. So I bought the darn vest.

But despite all the midlife cliches, those morning walks have quickly become one of my favorite parts of the week.

Because honestly, I think I forgot just how soul-restoring it can be to spend an hour with a couple of girlfriends, chatting about life and nothing in particular.

Especially because the last few months have been hard–some of the hardest I’ve had in a long time.

When I made the decision back in March to dramatically simplify my business, I had no idea just how difficult and emotionally draining this whole process would be, or how much it would shake my confidence and sense of self.

Even though deep down, I knew it was the right decision, there were a lot of days where it just felt like I was failing everything.

And that made it hard to do anything. Especially write this newsletter.

After all, it’s hard to write from the middle of the storm. I kept waiting to find the lesson, the neat takeaway that would make it all make sense.

But sometimes there isn’t one. Sometimes things are just hard.

And when you’re just trying to grind your way through the muck, your world gets small. You put your head down. You push through. You tell yourself you’ll come up for air once you’re through it.

So I guess this is me finally coming up for air.

It’s a new month. A new quarter. And finally, a new set of goals.

On our last walk, I mentioned to my girlfriends that my biggest goal for the next three months is to just simply have more fun. To throw more parties and go on dates and enjoy spending time with the people I love. To get my spark back.

They laughed, not out of mockery, but relief.

“Well, thank goodness,” Araceli told me, “because when you’re not fun, the rest of us aren’t fun either. Don’t you know that you’re the one who gets the rest of us to do anything?”

And while she was teasing, she wasn’t wrong.

Bringing people together is kind-of my superpower.

And when I don’t do it, no one else really steps in to fill that gap. At least not in quite the same way.

Maybe it’s because I’m just bossy, or because I love hosting and planning and being so unapologetically over-the-top when it comes to throwing a party.

But as I sat down to plan my goals for this quarter, I realized how much fun has been missing from my life these past few months.

And I’m determined to change that.

Three years ago, my husband Chuck and I bought our farmhouse in the country with a specific vision. Yes, we wanted a beautiful space, with plenty of room to stretch out.

But more than that, we wanted a place where people could gather. A place where everyone feels welcome and comfortable and loved.

And while that vision has never changed, I think sometimes the day-to-day demands of running a business while also tackling the seemingly endless list of home projects sometimes make we forget what we’re actually doing all of this for.

Somewhere along the way, we got so caught up building that vision that we forgot to live it.

But I’m working on it.

In fact, next weekend, I’m throwing a birthday party for my friend Brie.

Naturally, I’ve gone completely overboard.

I won’t spoil the surprise, but frankly, it’s the most fun I’ve had in a very long time, and I can’t wait to see how it all comes together.

Albert Schweitzer once said, “success is not the key to happiness. Happiness is the key to success.“ Along those same lines, Mary Oliver famously asked, “tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?“

In other words? Sometimes we get so busy building the life we want that we forget to actually live it.

I don’t have it all figured out quite yet. There are still loose ends. I’m still finding my footing.

But this quarter, I’m choosing to make room for joy again. To invite people over. To linger a little longer. To savor more moments. To throw more parties and go on more dates. To remember why I started building this life in the first place.

And so, my challenge for you this week is to ask yourself the same question I’ve been wrestling with lately: What have you been working so hard to build that you’ve forgotten to actually enjoy it?

Don’t get so busy grinding that you forget to actually live.

After all, life is happening right now.

Live with purpose, friend, and have a wonderful week!

xoxo, Ruth

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It was her 17th birthday present.

And before you ask — no, I did not actually know who Noah Kahan was.

My daughter, on the other hand, is obsessed. She started talking about the tour months ago, and begged me to try to get tickets.

That in and of itself, was a big deal, because Annie never really asks for things.

If you have more than one kid, you already know they come out completely different.

My oldest, Maggie, has never suffered from an inability to know what she wants.

Her Christmas list every year is always a detailed PowerPoint presentation, complete with links, and includes everything from electronics to makeup to clothes to whatever happens to be trending on TikTok.

Annie, on the other hand, is pretty low maintenance most of the time.

She got a job the minute she turned sixteen. She buys most of her own stuff, and rarely asks for anything.

So when she actually wanted something, there was a part of me that would have moved heaven and earth just to make it happen.

And so last weekend we piled into the car and headed to Orlando.

Truth be told, concerts aren’t really my thing. Too loud, too crowded, too much standing. (If you want to know the truth, I spent most of the night reading a book on my phone between glances at the stage.)

But every time I looked up, Annie was singing at the top of her lungs, having the time of her life. She didn’t even care that her nerdy mom was reading a book at a concert.

She knew every single word of every single song.

She was so happy.

And watching her be that happy made me happy in a way that’s hard to describe.

It was a good night.

Which might not sound particularly profound, except that if I’m being completely honest, the last couple of months have been hard.

Really hard, actually.

So hard that I’ve actually struggled to write this newsletter.

Because the truth is, I don’t feel like I have much wisdom or insight to give right now.

It’s been a hard season in my business, but also for me personally, in ways that I don’t totally feel ready to share publicly quite yet.

Maybe that’s not a very inspirational thing to admit.

But it’s the truth.

And maybe that’s exactly why this weekend felt like such a gift.

Not because anything got fixed. Nothing did. The season I’m in is still messy. The stress is still there.

But for 24 hours this weekend, it all felt a lot lighter.

And I don’t think I realized how much I needed that.

Because the thing about hard seasons isn’t just that things are difficult. It’s that difficulty has a way of becoming the only thing you can see. You get so deep into your own head—analyzing, solving, questioning, obsessing that eventually the problem starts to feel like the whole story. Like there’s nothing else.

But there is so much else.

Novelist Marilynne Robinson once wrote, “The thing about life is that you must survive it.“ And along those same lines, Harriet Beecher Stowe observed, “When you get into a tight place and everything goes against you, till it seems as though you could not hang on a minute longer, never give up then, for that is just the place and time that the tide will turn.”

In other words? The struggle is real. But it’s not the whole story.

The good stuff and the hard stuff exist side by side, all the time. The bright spots don’t erase the struggle. But they do remind you that the struggle isn’t everything.

And sometimes that reminder is the only thing you need.

And so I guess my challenge for you this week is the same one I’m giving myself: find the thing that gets you out of your own head.

Not to avoid your problems. Not to pretend everything is fine. But because reality is bigger than whatever is consuming your attention right now — and sometimes the most important thing you can do is remember that.

Spend time with someone who makes you laugh. Go somewhere you’ve been putting off. Do one thing that has absolutely nothing to do with whatever you’re carrying right now.

The mess will still be there when you get back.

But so will you — and hopefully a little more ready to face it.

Live with purpose, friend, and have a joy-filled week.

xoxo, Ruth

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Mommy, do you have any enemies?

I explained that “enemy” was a pretty strong word, and while I wouldn’t consider anyone my enemy, that there were certainly people out there who didn’t like me very much.

I thought that would be the end of the conversation, but it only brought more questions.

Why don’t people like you, Mommy?

Do they know you have a blog?

Do they read it?

I then had to explain that just because I share things that some people like, doesn’t mean that everyone always likes what I have to say. That sometimes, even when you’re doing your best, there will be people who criticize you, or get mad because whatever you did or say didn’t meet their expectations.

And yet we still weren’t done.

But doesn’t it make you sad that some people don’t like you?

Oof.

Out of the mouths of babes, right?

Because what do you say to that? The honest answer was yes — of course it makes me sad.

But what I told her in that moment was something like, well honey, you can never really please everyone, no matter how hard you try. All you can do is your best, and do what you know is right, even when some people don’t like it.

That little girl is now 17. But I’ve never really forgotten that conversation.

Because like most of us, I’ve spent a significant portion of my life trying not to disappoint people. Trying to keep the peace, soften the edges, manage the optics. (Honestly, it’s exhausting just typing that.)

But here’s what I’ve had to learn—the hard way, more than once—as an entrepreneur, and maybe just as a fully grown adult: disappointing people is inevitable.

Not because you’re doing something wrong. Sometimes because you’re doing something right.

A few months ago, after 16 years of running multiple businesses, I made the decision to simplify — to step back from everything that wasn’t working and go all in on just one thing.

It wasn’t a quick decision. I avoided it for years, actually. And then when I couldn’t avoid it anymore, I agonized over it for months before I finally had the courage to say it out loud.

I was terrified. Scared people would be angry, or disappointed, or think I was giving up. Afraid I’d lose credibility, or that the internet would decide I was a failure.

But after a lot of thinking and praying and seeking counsel from people I trust, I finally stopped running from what my heart had been telling me. I made the call. I said the thing.

And while there is a real part of me that feels at peace with it — a deep, settled kind of peace that I’ve learned to recognize as confirmation — there’s also a part of me that is still reeling.

Because the critics are loud.

Some people have been genuinely kind and supportive, and I am so grateful for that. But others haven’t. And the criticism stings in a way I didn’t quite prepare myself for, even knowing it was coming.

Here’s the thing I keep coming back to, though.

There is no version of this where I make everyone happy. There never was.

And the longer I waited—trying to thread the needle, trying to protect everyone’s feelings including my own—the more I was delaying the inevitable and sacrificing something true for something safe.

Abraham Lincoln famously noted that “You can please some of the people all of the time, you can please all of the people some of the time, but you can’t please all of the people all of the time.” More recently, Brene Brown put it a different way when she noted that, “daring to set boundaries is about having the courage to love ourselves, even when we risk disappointing others.”

In other words? You cannot lead your own life if you’re too afraid to disappoint people.

That’s not a comfortable truth. But it’s the one I keep needing to remind myself of.

Maybe you needed that reminder too.

And so my challenge to you this week is to ask yourself whether there’s a decision you’ve been avoiding, not because you don’t know the right answer, but because you’re afraid of what someone else will think? If so, name it. Write it down.

And then ask yourself honestly: whose life are you actually living?

Because at the end of the day, the person who actually has to live with your choices is you.

Live with purpose, friend, and have a wonderful week!

xoxo, Ruth

P.S. I’m hosting a brand new live workshop this week that I’m very excited about, based on some research I’ve been doing recently about the science of happiness. It’s called How to Be Happier Everyday, and I’d love to have you join me. The workshop is free, but you do have to register, which you can do HERE.

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The curtains are hung. The books are on the bookshelf. Everything’s all hooked up (and actually working.)

And yet….it doesn’t quite feel like mine just yet.

Don’t get me wrong–I love it.

It’s just still a little unsettling, like my brain doesn’t quite know what to do with it.

(Neither do my dogs, for that matter!)

Isn’t it funny how you can want something for so long, and then not quite know how to handle it when you finally get it?

This little barn project has been months in the making.

It started as one of those passing what if ideas.

Every morning, rain or shine, I walk a few laps around our property with my dogs.

Some days I listen to podcasts. Some days I converse with ChatGPT. But other days, I just look around and think about all the projects yet to be tackled around our six acre property.

And it was one of those such days that the idea hit me.

The tack room would make a great office and recording studio.

Because while I already had an office in the house, said office didn’t have a door or any real way to shut out the noise of two not-so-quiet teenagers and two equally noisy dogs.

And, since a good part of my workday involves writing, recording, or hosting live videos, quiet is sort-of a must-have.

So after a few months of thinking about it, I tentatively floated the idea to my husband Chuck.

I wasn’t sure he would go for it, but to my surprise, he went for it.

Sure honey, I don’t think it will be that hard.

Famous last words.

As it turns out, converting an uninsulated tack room in an old Florida barn into an actual air-conditioned, soundproofed office is a bigger job than either of us anticipated.

What we thought would take maybe two months somehow turned into seven.

Had we known, I don’t think we would have ever started.

But that’s the thing about those kind-of projects. Once you start, there’s no turning back. You’ve already torn everything apart. You just have to keep going. And at some point, I had to make peace with the fact that the timeline I’d set in my head was never going to happen.

And now, many months later, it’s finally done (or at least done enough to move in.)

It’s beautiful. And very quiet.

I should be thrilled. And a part of me is. I love it. I really do.

But I also feel a little disoriented.

For the past three years, my morning routine has been waking up at 4am, padding downstairs in my pajamas, making coffee, filling out my planner, and working quietly in my office before everyone else wakes up.

But now my office is out in the barn.

And I don’t really want to wander out to the barn in my pajamas at 4am.

So I’m still trying to figure out my new routine, and honestly it has me feeling a little off.

It’s the in-between, where the old rhythm doesn’t fit anymore but the new one hasn’t formed yet.

And it has reminded me, once again, how much our emotional equilibrium is tied to our routines. That when something—even something good, even something you really want—disrupts that routine, it can really throw you off.

It doesn’t have to be a crisis. It can be a renovation, a new job, a kid who starts driving herself places, a chapter of life quietly ending while another one begins. The transition itself can be disorienting, regardless of whether the change is good or bad.

Andre Gide once noted that “man cannot discover new oceans unless he has the courage to lose sight of the shore.“ Along those same lines, Deepak Chopra wrote “all great changes are preceded by chaos.”

In other words? Growth often asks you to release something before it gives you what’s next.

Sometimes the very thing you worked for, or prayed for, or built for, or waited seven months or even seven years for is the very thing that temporarily dismantles your comfort zone before it rebuilds it into something better.

And maybe that’s not a sign that something went wrong.

Maybe that’s just what transition feels like from the inside.

So here’s my challenge for you this week, the same challenge I’m giving myself: if you’re in an in-between season right now—not where you were, not quite where you’re going — give yourself a little grace. You don’t have to have the new rhythm figured out on day one. You don’t have to feel instantly at peace with a good change just because it’s good.

Sometimes it takes a minute to settle into the next version of your life.

And that’s okay.

Live with purpose, friend, and have a wonderful week!

xoxo, Ruth

P.S. Are you in a season of transition right now? Hit reply and tell me about it, or leave a comment below—I'd genuinely love to hear what's shifting in your life.

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Decorating is not my gift, and most of the things in our home are a random hodgepodge of things we inherited or got for free paired with Wayfair and Ikea finds.

But our river table is special. Honestly, it’s a work of art.

We had it custom made several years ago, and it is by far the most expensive piece of furniture we’ve ever bought.

So naturally, when we first got it, we were a little hesitant to actually use it.

But thankfully, that didn’t last long.

The day after it was delivered, we had a few friends over to play dominos, thinking a tablecloth would be sufficient to protect our brand new table.

Unfortunately, one of our friends had a rough night and spilled their drink three separate times.

The table survived, and we learned how to relax.

And I’m so glad we did, because that table is where life happens in our home.

Family meals. Dinner parties. Crafts. Legos. Taxes.

And of course, game nights almost every weekend with our friends George and Brie.

Right now our current obsession is Ticket to Ride: Rails and Sails, which is, somehow both super fun and incredibly stressful at the same time. I can actually feel my cortisol spiking while we play, and yet the second it’s over, we’re all immediately ready for another round, complete with all the smack-talking that only happens around people you love.

My husband Chuck, ever the engineer, is the slow one. George hoards all the cards. Brie can’t play unless the board is facing her. And apparently I’m just annoyingly lucky all the time.

But this past weekend, as we played a game we’ve played a hundred times before, I had one of those little moments.

One of those oh this is so good moments.

And I savored it.

Because this idea of savoring is something I’ve been thinking about a lot lately.

A few weeks ago I stumbled across a post on social media that was talking about a famous class taught at Yale called the Science of Well-Being–the most popular course in Yale’s history.

It’s built around one surprisingly humbling question: what actually makes us happy?

And the answer, backed by a ton of research, is not what most of us think.

Because it turns out that we as humans are genuinely terrible at predicting what will make us happy. We chase achievement, money, status, a nicer house, a more organized life, always convinced that the next hill we climb, the next milestone we achieve, is finally going to fill us up.

And sometimes it does feel good, at least for a little while. But then it quietly becomes our new normal, the baseline shifts, and we’re already scanning for the next thing.

The solution, according to the course, is to learn how to rewire your brain with simple daily practices that create more joy. To savor moments. To practice daily gratitude and small acts of kindness. To prioritize connection and take care of your body by getting enough sleep.

That’s it. The secret to happiness. Simple, yet so hard to actually do.

And I think the reason it resonated with me so much is that I know this pattern well.

I’ve built four businesses, written seven books, made the New York Times list, stood on a TED stage in front of thousands of people. And I’m genuinely proud of those accomplishments. I don’t regret striving, or trying to achieve them.

But at the end of the day, they’re just highlights.

They’re not what makes me happy, day-to-day.

And what I’m realizing right now, in my current season of simplifying my life and creating more margin and free space, is that it genuinely feels good.

But unless I’m intentional about actually savoring it, even this will just become my new normal. Something I take for granted. Because that’s what our human brains are wired to do.

Stoic philosopher Marcus Aurelius famously wrote, “the happiness of your life depends upon the quality of your thoughts.” Along those same lines, Jim Rohn more recently noted that “happiness is not something you postpone for the future; it is something you design for the present.”

In other words? Happiness isn’t a destination. It’s what you choose to practice every day.

And you have to choose it on purpose, or your brain will quietly default back to looking for what’s missing.

Because that’s just how we’re wired.

And so I guess that’s my challenge for you this week. Practice savoring. Every single day, find at least one moment and intentionally pause to take it in. The warmth of the sun. A conversation with your kids. A quiet cup of coffee. A small win at work. Whatever it is, don’t just let it pass, but actually take the time to notice what’s good.

It’s more impactful than you think

Then, when you get a chance, hit reply and tell me what you noticed. I genuinely want to know.

Live with purpose, friend, and have a joy-filled week!

xoxo, Ruth

P.S. Happy Mother’s Day!

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She can walk into any cluttered space, no matter how messy, take one look around, and immediately know exactly how to fix it. Then, like a decluttering superhero, she somehow magically transforms into Force of Nature mode and just springs into action.

It’s a sight to behold.

And this past weekend, I was lucky enough to have her superpowers focused on my garage.

The fact that she was technically here on vacation didn’t seem to phase her.

She took one look at the overwhelming mass of chaos that was threatening to swallow us whole and told me, “okay this is what we’re doing this weekend.”

Not gonna lie. I was a little scared.

But I was more scared of getting in her way..

Funnily enough, I actually had a whole different project plan for her visit. (Because she’s not the kind of visitor who comes to just sit around and chat!)

We were finally going to decorate my new in the barn–the one my husband Chuck has been working on for the past six months. Her visit was the perfect motivation for getting the drywall done and the walls painted. He literally finished the final coat just hours before she arrived.

But it was the garage that caught her attention.

To be fair, it was a disaster zone.

Since moving to our farmhouse in the country three years ago, we’ve never really managed to get it organized. It’s just the place we throw everything we don’t quite know what to do with.

And then we spent last weekend finally moving things out of our old house, which meant piling chaos on top of chaos. Stuff from the old house mixed with stuff from this house mixed with things we haven’t touched in years. Keepsakes and old toys from both our daughters. Dozens of boxes of old photos and vintage memorabilia passed down from Chuck’s mom and sister. Along with piles of miscellaneous crap all somehow lumped together without any sort of rhyme or reason.

It was a lot.

And I’ll be honest, it wasn’t something I really wanted to deal with.

Because it’s the kind of overwhelming that shuts you down before you even start.

At least that’s what it does to me.

But not my sister.

She just digs in.

One box turned into two. Two turned into ten. Piles started forming — keep, donate, trash, kids, Chuck’s.

And somehow, piece by piece, what initially felt totally impossible started to just come together.

By the end of her visit, we’d made multiple trips to Goodwill, filled the trash cans twice over, and somehow created a system where everything actually has a place. Every box has a label. (That girl loves her label maker!) Each daughter has her own section. Chuck’s things are organized. Even the craft supplies have a home, along with an area where they can actually be used.

She made more progress in four days than we’ve made in 20 years.

It was incredible. It was also completely exhausting.

Because the thing I was reminded of, as we worked through it all, is that clutter is really nothing more than a big pile of unmade decisions.

Every single item in that garage was a decision we hadn’t made yet.

Keep it? Give it away? Store it? Let it go? And when the stuff isn’t even yours–when it belongs to your kids, or to people you loved and lost—the decision isn’t just logistical. It’s emotional.

There’s so much guilt, and the weight of not wanting to be the one who decided wrong.

And so we just hadn’t decided.

Which is exactly how things got so cluttered in the first place.

But it’s not just garages that fill up with too much stuff.

And to be honest, it’s a realization that I’ve been coming to in my business as well.

For the past few months, I’ve been wrestling with big decisions about what to keep and what to let go.

And this past week, I finally shared publicly that I’m shutting down my business brand at the end of this quarter, and that I’ve brought on a majority partner for my Thinlicious brand, and will be stepping away from the day-to-day operations. So instead of running three separate brands, I’ll only have one.

That was not a small decision.

There were so many “what ifs.” What if I was making a mistake? What if I let people down who were counting on me? What if I regretted it later?

So I just kept carrying it. Like those boxes in the garage. Not deciding. Because not deciding felt safer than deciding wrong.

But the lesson I keep learning is that the weight of an unmade decision is almost always heavier than the decision itself.

Because once I finally made the call, all I really felt was relief.

And this weekend, standing in my now-clean garage, looking at the space my sister helped us transform, I couldn’t help but believe all these decisions are creating room for what actually matters.

William James once wrote, “when you have to make a choice and don’t make it, that is in itself a choice.“ Along those same lines, Henry David Thoreau wisely noted that “it is not enough to be busy. The question is: what are we busy about?“

In other words? It’s not really the stuff that exhausts us. It’s the failure to decide.

And not just in your home, but in your work, your schedule, your commitments, and your life.

So I guess my challenge for you this week is the same one I’m giving to myself–to decide to decide. What’s that thing you’ve been putting off? Something you’ve been quietly avoiding because not choosing feels safer than choosing wrong. Name it. Write it down.

And then ask yourself honestly: what is it costing you to keep carrying it?

Because on the other side of that decision? There’s usually a whole lot more room to breathe.

Live with purpose, friend, and have a wonderful week!

xoxo, Ruth

P.S. I’d love to hear back from you on this one. What’s the decision you’ve been putting off? Hit reply and tell me, or leave a comment below!

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On the same light fixture.

Walking around what used to be our dining room with my eyes fixed to my phone, trying to manage a steady stream of Facebook Marketplace messages.

By the third time it happened, my daughter Maggie just stared at me.

Mom. What is wrong with you? Can you just look up?!

And then we both completely lost it.

Sitting there in an empty room, laughing until we almost cried, just one of many surprisingly hilarious moments during a task I had not only been dreading but actively avoiding for almost three years now, ever since we moved to our farmhouse in the country.

Because when we moved, we didn’t fully move out of our old house.

That was the plan, of course. We wanted to settle in to the new place, then clear out the remaining stuff in the attic and the garage, the furniture that no longer worked in the new place, and then get the house on the market.

Except we didn’t.

At first we were too busy trying to settle in. And then it was the holidays. And then the interest rates skyrocketed and it seemed like a bad time to sell. And then. And then. And then.

But this year my husband Chuck and I are determined to finally deal with all those personal finance tasks we’re both so good at ignoring–all that boring adult stuff we both hate dealing with that just ends up hanging over us like a cloud.

So far this year we’ve tackled appealing our property tax assessment, which was an arduous months-long process and straightening out our insurance. I also bought a Nokbox, with the intention of getting all our most important paperwork organized and filed in one place.

But the biggest thing was dealing with the house we no longer live in.

After going back and forth for months on what to do, we finally decided to rent it.

And now, with a new tenant moving in on May first, we had no choice but to finally make some decisions about all the stuff we left behind.

Which is how, after a crazy work week, Maggie and I ended up spending our Friday night together in a mostly empty house selling random things (including many packages of non-septic friendly toilet paper) to random strangers on the internet.

And despite repeatedly whacking my head, it was actually the highlight of my week.

Because the truth is that there were a million reasons to feel completely overwhelmed this past week.

At home, we’ve got dogs and teenagers and a few too many projects to keep track of and out-of-town guests to prepare for this coming week.

At work, it was launch week for my new program, Home Systems Made Simple. I hosted three live workshops. I had coaching calls, meetings, deadlines, and a very important contract to sign.

And then there’s all the stuff I didn’t get to. The stuff I had to skip or just let slide.

And the irony wasn’t lost on me that despite all this chaos, the workshop I hosted live three separate times this past week (and that I’m hosting again one more time tomorrow) is called The Peaceful Home.

Because what I’ve realized is that peace isn’t really about having everything magically under control, and it’s not something that shows up once everything is finally handled.

It’s something you have to choose. It’s a state of mind.

My friend Rachel always says, “You can choose to feel stressed, or you can choose to feel blessed — but you can’t feel both.” Along those same lines, someone else wisely said “Peace does not mean to be in a place where there is no noise, trouble, or hard work. It means to be in the midst of those things and still be calm in your heart.”

In other words? Peace isn’t a destination. It’s a choice you make in the middle of the mess.

I’ve spent a lot of time this year thinking about what I actually want my life to feel like, and the word that keeps coming up, over and over, is peace. Peace at home. Peace in my business. Peace in my life.

Over the past few months, I feel like I’ve been taking a lot of steps in the right direction. I’ve made big decisions. I see progress happening.

But this week I actually felt it. Or rather, I chose to feel it.

And that’s my challenge for you this week too. Regardless of all the things on your plate right now—and I’m guessing it’s a lot—pay attention to where your focus is going. The stress and the good stuff always exist side by side. The peace and the chaos. The beauty and the mess.

Which one will you focus on?

Live with purpose, friend, and have a wonderful week!

xoxo, Ruth

P.S. I’d love to know—what’s one thing in your life right now that could feel stressful, but you’re choosing to see differently? Hit reply and tell me, or leave a comment below!

P.P.S. If you didn’t catch my live workshop last week, The Peaceful Home, I’m hosting one more live session tomorrow at 12pm ET. It’s free to join–just register HERE.

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It finally feels like I’m making real progress on a number of different fronts, and that feels really good, although I’ll also admit that going into launch week for Home Systems Made Simple this week, I also feel like a ball of nervous energy.

New product launches always do that to me. You spend all this time pouring your heart and energy into creating something that you think is going to be amazing, and then figuring out how to talk about it in a way that hopefully helps other people see how amazing it is too.

But you don’t ever really know how it will be received. And that’s always a little bit terrifying.

So that’s pretty much where I’m at right in this moment.

Feeling good about the progress, but also anxious about the results.

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And by wrong, I don’t mean that he messes it up.

He’s actually much better than I am at getting things clean and removing tough stains. He’s very particular and has all sorts of tips and tricks that would make Martha Stewart proud.

So when I say wrong, what I really mean is that he doesn’t do it the way I do it.

We have one of those laundry sorters, the kind with three separate sections for whites, lights, and colors, and he refuses to run a load until the washing machine is completely full.

Which I suppose sounds reasonable in theory, except when you’re waiting for your favorite t-shirt or you run out of underwear. (I’ve learned to stock up.)

And while I guess I shouldn’t really be complaining about the fact that my husband does all the laundry in our home, the truth is that for a long time, this drove me crazy.

Because when I was in charge of laundry, I had a system.

Laundry day meant everything got done—whites, lights, colors, sheets, towels, all of it—start to finish, folded and put away, in one single day. Done and done.

It’s so me. All or nothing. Obsessed or totally uninterested.

So his way made no sense to me. And mine made no sense to him.

But laundry is just the beginning.

Tomorrow Chuck and I will celebrate 20 years of marriage, which is quite a feat when you consider that we are, in almost every measurable way, complete opposites.

I am driven and intense and yes, a tad bit obsessive when I get excited about something. I love a plan. I love a checklist. I want to know exactly what’s happening, and when, and what comes next. I tend to run hot and cold.

Chuck, on the other hand, is laid back and steady. He is also an engineer through and through. Methodical. Thoughtful. But also spontaneous. He does not love a plan. Or a list, for that matter. His favorite way to grocery shop is to wander around the store, Publix flyer in hand, scouting out this week’s BOGOs. (He loves a BOGO!)

In 2013, after my little side-hustle blog turned into a full-time business, we switched roles. I rented an office and went off to work every day, while he became the stay-at-home dad.

The culture shock was real. Not really for him so much, as for me.

Because I had a schedule. He did not follow the schedule.

I had routines. Routines were not his thing.

And dinner every night was somehow always a surprise. I would walk in the door and ask “what’s for dinner?” and he would look at me like I had two heads. Like dinner wasn’t a thing that was going to happen every single day for the rest of our lives.

I had to learn how to let go.

Just like he had to learn how to deal with all that intense Type-A energy now being focused on growing the business that was supporting our family.

It was hard on both of us, and it definitely didn’t happen overnight. In fact, we both spent more time than I’d like to admit being frequently frustrated that the other person wasn’t doing things the “right” way.

And I honestly can’t remember exactly when it started, but at some point we began saying this one dumb little sentence to each other, the sentence that I think is ultimately our secret to 20 years of marriage.

At first it was a joke. But it stuck.

Because what it really meant, underneath the silliness, was this:

Let’s stop trying to change each other.

It sounds simple. But for two people as different as we are, it was a game changer.

We finally stopped contradicting each other and started complementing each other.

Because the truth is that he is the yin to my yang and the calm to my storm. Where I am reckless, he is steady.

We are each better together.

Case in point–a few years ago, we were trying to finish a massive pool refurbishment before our daughter Maggie’s graduation party. It was a big project and while Chuck had been working on it for months, the week before the party, he started to panic that it wouldn’t be done in time.

All I needed was his permission to go full “psycho Ruth,” and I was all in. We worked morning until night, pressure washing, staining the pool deck, assembling furniture, and making it all come together, because I refused to let either of us stop until it was done.

The party was perfect.

And when it was over, Chuck said, “I’m so glad you jumped in. I needed you to be the driver.”

It was the moment I realized that, after all this time, we’ve finally learned how to just let each other be exactly who we are.

Leo Tolstoy once wrote, “What counts in making a happy marriage is not so much how compatible you are, but how you deal with incompatibility.“ Along those same lines, Ruth Bell Graham once said, “A happy marriage is the union of two good forgivers.”

In other words? Maybe the most powerful words in your marriage aren’t “I love you,” or even “I’m sorry.”

They’re I want you just the way you are.

Or, as we prefer to say, You do you, Boo.

And I guess that’s the challenge for all of us. To think about that someone in your life you’ve been trying, whether consciously or not, to change. Your spouse. Your teenager. That annoying coworker.

What would it look like to just let them be who they are?

Not because you’re giving up. But because the energy you’ve been spending trying to be right could be going toward something so much better.

Like figuring out how you complement each other instead.

Live with purpose, friend, and have a wonderful week!

xoxo, Ruth

P.S. What’s YOUR secret to a happy marriage? Let me know in the comments below or hit reply to this email—I’d love to hear it!

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In any case, between my birthday on Tuesday and Easter on Sunday, it was a very celebratory week, which honestly felt like the perfect way to start a new quarter and a new month.

And while I did hit one big roadblock (more on that below), overall it was a really good week, with lots of momentum on multiple fronts. Which, after weeks of struggling with motivation, actually feels really great.

What I’ve been working on this past week…

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Not because I don’t know what I want to put there. I actually do. At least, in theory.

I found this gorgeous vintage-style world map on Etsy where you can stick pins in all the places you’ve traveled. It’s perfect for our family and for the big blank space above the couch.

I love it. I’m completely sold on it.

But every time I go to order it, I get to the part where you have to choose a color and I just freeze.

There are way too many options.

My husband Chuck, who leaves most of the decorating decisions up to me, finally asked about it the other day.

Hey, whatever happened to that big map you were going to order for over the couch?

And so it goes.

Because the truth, my shameful secret, is that I have no style.

I wish I did. I honestly try.

But decorating overwhelms me.

When we moved into our farmhouse almost three years ago, our living room sat completely empty for over a year. I just couldn’t figure out what to do with the room. It’s this long, awkward space with a fireplace that’s a little off-center, and honestly, I just didn’t know where to start.

I finally hired an online interior decorating service, which was actually amazingly helpful. She picked out rugs and a couch, and showed me exactly how to arrange the furniture.

The room looks great now. Except for, you know, that blank wall over the couch.

And it’s not just that room. Right now I have a collection of navy paint swatches taped to my kitchen cabinets that have been sitting there for months while I try to decide which one to use for a simple island refresh. (I know it’s just paint. I just can’t seem to choose.)

I’ve had to come to terms with the fact that I simply cannot visualize things until I can actually see what it looks like. I need a picture. My brain does not do that thing where you look at a blank room and picture what it could be.

My sister Beth has that gift, as does her husband. Their house is beautiful. I’ve lost count of how many different houses they’ve renovated over the years, houses that I thought were basically unsalvagable, but they somehow made them amazing.

And I’ll be honest, sometimes I beat myself up about this lack of vision. I wonder why something that seems so natural to other people feels so impossible to me.

Why can’t I be more like my sister?

Here’s the part that really made me think this week, though.

Last week I sent out a survey to my audience about home management for an upcoming project I’m working on. I wanted to understand what’s actually causing frustration for women when it comes to running their homes and their lives.

The results were pretty eye-opening — nearly 70% of women said they feel like they just can’t keep up. Like they’re constantly behind, no matter what they do.

And I kept thinking about how many of us spend enormous amounts of energy beating ourselves up for the things we’re not good at.

Looking at someone else who seems to do it effortlessly and quietly assuming something must be wrong with us.

But maybe that’s not actually the problem.

Albert Einstein once said, “Everybody is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid.” Along those same lines, Abraham Maslow noted, “If the only tool you have is a hammer, you tend to see every problem as a nail.“

In other words? You can’t be good at everything.

We all have things we’re naturally wired for, and things we’re genuinely not.

I will never be the person who can walk into a room and instantly see its potential. But I am really good at finding systems, solving problems, and figuring out the workaround.

So instead of forcing myself to be something I’m not, I’m learning to ask a better question: what tool, shortcut, or bit of help would make this easier?

Sometimes that means hiring someone who has the gift you don’t. Sometimes it means leaning on a tool like AI to fill a gap your brain simply won’t fill on its own. And sometimes it means calling your sister and asking her to come visit in April so she can help you finally figure out what to do with your new barn office. (Hi Beth.)

The point isn’t to be good at everything. It’s to build a life that works for the way YOU are actually wired.

And so, my challenge for you this week is to pick one area of your life where you’ve been quietly frustrated with yourself about something that feels harder for you than it seems to be for everyone else. Instead of trying to brute-force your way to being better at it, ask yourself: what’s the workaround? What tool, what person, what system could close that gap so that you can save your energy for the things you actually are good at?

Because there’s always a way. You just have to stop expecting to be a fish that climbs trees.

Live with purpose, friend, and have a wonderful week!

xoxo, Ruth

P.S. I’m genuinely curious—is there something that comes easily to almost everyone else but just does NOT click for you? Hit reply and tell me, or leave a comment below!

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I set it up thinking that it would be a “fun to think about later” project, so imagine my surprise when I logged in and saw that I now have seven whole paid subscribers.

So congratulations, you’re one of 7 lucky early adopters! When this all blows up, you’ll be able to say you were there from the very beginning.😂

But since we’re all just navigating this whole new world, I do want to be upfront about what my intention is with this paid tier, at least for right now.

It’s not a course. It’s not coaching. It’s not a polished, carefully packaged thing.

It’s basically just me, every week, telling you what’s actually going on in my life, behind the scenes. What I’m working on, what I’m wrestling with, what’s on my mind, what didn’t go the way I planned, and even what’s on my menu, because meal planning is part of my weekly planning.

My hope is that it feels like getting a note from a friend who’s just trying to figure out how to juggle all the pieces of a busy life, one who happens to also be running a business and thinking hard about what her next steps should be. I’ll also include photos from my planner so you can see how I actually plan in real time.

Some weeks will be exciting. Some weeks will be boring. Some weeks I’ll be figuring things out in real time.

That’s kind of the whole point.

Okay. First recap is below. Happy you’re here.

xoxo, Ruth

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Six weeks of casual mentions, followed by polite asks, followed by increasingly annoying reminders, until I finally had to resort to flat-out begging.

That’s how long it took to nail down my daughter for a dinner date. Just me and her.

I had no idea, at the beginning of February, when I decided that a good goal for the month–as part of my “mama mentoring” goal for the quarter–would be to plan a special one-on-one outing with each of my two girls.

For added incentive, I gave them each a budget, and told them we could do anything they wanted, as long as it included at least an hour of face-to-face time over a shared meal.

My younger daughter Annie was easy. Breakfast followed by a day of shopping.

My older daughter wasn’t quite so enthusiastic.

I tried hard not to take it personally.

But after weeks of stalling, she finally decided she wanted to go out for dinner at the fancy steakhouse where she works, since she never actually gets to try any of the incredible food she watches other people eat all day long.

So on Wednesday, we got dressed up. We ordered way too much food. (Thank goodness she gets a discount!) We laughed at ourselves for being so ridiculously full by the end of the night we could barely move.

The sweetest part of the whole evening was seeing how well-liked she is at work. Her manager came over to the table. The chef came out of the kitchen to say hello. Her coworkers stopped by one by one to introduce themselves and tell me how wonderful she is.

And as a mom, let me tell you–that’s a pretty great feeling..

But to be honest, what made the evening feel so special wasn’t just that it finally happened.

It was that it felt easy.

There was no big dramatic breakthrough. No tear-filled heart-to-heart. She didn’t suddenly open up and share all her deepest secrets.

But I didn’t need her to.

When she was a baby, I had all these ideas of what it would be like to have a daughter, sure it would be so different from my relationship with my own mom. I couldn’t wait for us to be best friends.

In my mind, we’d be just like Rory and Loralei.

But that’s not who she is.

She’s fiercely independent. A girl who has always had to do things her own way, in her own time.

Sometimes it drives me crazy. And sometimes it hurts my feelings.

But what I realized at dinner is that the shift I needed wasn’t in her.

It was in me.

That dinner felt special because for once, I was just enjoying what was.

Not grieving what wasn’t. Not trying to manufacture a moment. Not wishing she were different, or wishing I were different, or that our relationship could somehow be different than it is.

Just receiving the gift of who she actually is.

It’s a lesson I’ve had to learn with my own mom too, after years of hurt and distance and disappointment and a battle with mental illness that made her unpredictable and not the mom I needed her to be.

But then, about ten years ago, an unexpected health crisis ended with her finally getting the care she needed. And these last ten years with her have been such a gift.

I called her on Sunday to wish her a happy birthday. She was sharp and funny and chatty, telling me stories and making me laugh. And it was perfect.

Not because she became the mother I once wished I had.

But because I finally stopped needing her to be.

Epictetus once said, “Make the best use of what is in your power, and take the rest as it happens.” Along those same lines, Anne Lamott put it a little more bluntly when she wrote, “expectations are resentments waiting to happen.”

In other words? People are who they are.

They’re messy and flawed and imperfect, and they will probably disappoint you at some point.

But something amazing happens when you’re willing to meet people where they are instead of where you wish they would be.

And that part is entirely in your power.

And so, my challenge for you this week–the same challenge I’m giving myself–is to meet people where they are. Love them for who they are. Accept the relationship as it is. Be willing to let go of the picture you had in your head in order to absorb the beauty right in front of you.

Then see what shifts.

Live with purpose, friend, and have a joy-filled week!

xoxo, Ruth

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That’s exactly what I blurted out to my best friend Alysha as we chatted on the phone this past weekend, before I really even thought about what I was saying.

That’s the thing about friends who have been by your side since elementary school–there’s no hiding. She could hear it in my voice the minute I picked up the phone that something wasn’t quite right.

But I wasn’t quite expecting her response.

Girl, me too. Aren’t we all?

And then we both just started laughing. Because what else are you going to do when you’re turning 48 and you realize you’ve become a walking cliché?

But as much as we laughed about the ridiculousness of getting older, the truth that something in my life needs to change, even if I’m still not quite sure what that looks like yet, has been gnawing at me for a while now.

Because just a few days earlier, I had hosted the Spring Reset, a one-day event where I walked people through my process for planning their next 90 Day Sprint. And because I typically use my own work as examples to show people, this past week I also spent a fair amount of time working on my own plan for the next 90 days.

And maybe that’s where it all went sideways.

Because what I teach is that you can’t look forward until you look backwards.

That means taking an honest look at your life and where you’re at right now, and looking back on the last 90 days to figure what worked, what didn’t, and what needs to change. Sometimes those are hard questions.

And I realized that while there was a lot I was proud of this past quarter in some areas of my life, there was also a lot of room for improvement in others.

Most of my big goals for Q1 were intentionally focused on my family and building relationships.

My husband Chuck and I started having coffee together for an hour every morning, and together we made a point of reaching out to friends and hosting several dinner parties. I also worked on fostering a more “adult” relationship with both of my girls, and consciously worked on allowing them to make their own mistakes without automatically trying to step in and fix everything.

So that part was really good.

But what I’ve noticed about life is that when you pour your attention into one area, something else tends to get less.

And when I finally sat down to ask myself those same hard questions about the business side of my life, I realized there were things I’ve been avoiding.

Questions I haven’t wanted to answer. Realities I haven’t wanted to face.

And somewhere in the midst of processing my thoughts with the help of ChatGPT, I had a realization that stopped me cold.

The reason I’ve been resisting change isn’t because I don’t know what needs to change.

It’s because I don’t know who I am without it.

For the last sixteen years, my whole identity has been wrapped up in my work.

And I think the thought of letting go of even part of that—even the parts that maybe aren’t serving me anymore—felt, in my mind, like failure. Like quitting. Like losing.

But this past week I also got word from another close friend that her husband has cancer. In an instant, all her big plans have changed.

It made my little existential spiral feel insignificant in comparison.

But it also snapped something into focus for me.

Life is short. And clinging to an identity that no longer fits isn’t noble. It’s just fear.

So I finally let myself imagine what it might actually look like to do things differently.

And something surprising happened.

Instead of grief, I felt relief.

Joseph Campbell once wrote, “we must be willing to let go of the life we planned so as to have the life that is waiting for us.” And along those same lines, C.S. Lewis reminds us that “there are far better things ahead than any we leave behind.”

In other words? Sometimes you have to let go in order to grow.

I think sometimes we cling to who we’ve been because we’ve worked so hard to get there. And maybe because letting go feels like admitting we screwed up somehow.

But letting something go so something new can emerge isn’t failure.

Sometimes it’s the bravest, most honest thing you can do.

I don’t have everything figured out yet. To be honest, I’m still in the middle of making some big decisions about what this will all look like for me (and for my business.)

But in case you’ve been wrestling with something similar, I just wanted to say this:

Your worth is not defined by the role you’ve been playing.

And you are absolutely allowed to grow into a new one.

And I guess that is also my challenge for you this week too, to ask yourself whether there is something in your life you’ve been holding onto, not because it still fits, but because you’re afraid of who you’d be without it? A role. A title. A version of yourself you’ve quietly outgrown but can’t quite bring yourself to release?

You don’t have to have it all figured out. But those “midlife crisis” moments are worth paying attention to.

And if you need someone to share it with, I’d love to hear about it–just hit reply to this email (or leave a comment below!)

Because sometimes it’s nice to know you’re not all alone.

Live with purpose, friend, and have a joy-filled week!

xoxo, Ruth

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My TED talk in 2019 was my last time on stage, which I guess is a little bit ironic when you consider that most speakers use TED talks as a way to launch their speaking careers.

But when my friend Araceli asked me to speak at a brunch she was hosting at her local restaurant this past Saturday to celebrate International Women’s Day, I said yes. Because that’s what friends do.

She told me she wanted me to speak about entrepreneurship, and about helping women create a life they love.

And that I’d have eight minutes to do it.

Eight minutes. To sum up sixteen years of entrepreneurship.

Honestly, I didn’t even know where to begin.

So I started with the thing you’re always supposed to do when you’re speaking to a room full of people who don’t know you at all, which is to establish your credibility.

For those of you who don’t know me, my name is Ruth Soukup and I’ve been an entrepreneur for sixteen years. I’m a New York Times bestselling author of seven books, I’ve built four separate seven-figure brands, and my work has been featured everywhere from Time and Entrepreneur to The Today Show and Good Morning America.

It’s the highlight reel that instantly gets people to sit up and listen.

Even if it’s actually the least interesting part of my journey.

Because that highlight reel actually says nothing about what it actually takes to be an entrepreneur, or to do anything else in life, for that matter.

So I then continued my talk by explaining that I didn’t start out trying to be an entrepreneur, or even trying to start a business.

In 2010, I was a stay-at-home-mom of two toddlers without a whole lot to keep me busy while my husband Chuck worked long hours as an aerospace engineer at a job he absolutely despised.

To cope with the boredom, I went to Target. A lot. But that only led to fights with my husband, who couldn’t help but see every dollar I spent at Target as more time he needed to spend at work.

He begged me to find a new hobby, so I decided to start a blog about my adventures of trying to live well and spend less.

But starting that blog opened up a whole new world to me, a world of blogs and bloggers and all the ways of making money online.

And I decided that if other people were making money online, I could too.

That was it. No big idea. No grand business plan.

Just a quiet understanding that if other people could do it, it was possible.

And if it was possible, then I could probably figure it out too.

So if I had to boil sixteen years of entrepreneurship down to the most essential lessons I’ve learned, I think there are really just three things that stick out to me.

First, you have to believe in yourself before anyone else does.

When, armed with my newfound belief in what was possible, I told Chuck that I was going to make enough money blogging that he could quit his job, he laughed at me and said “honey, that’s the stupidest thing you’ve ever said. You cannot make money on the internet.“

Ah, famous last words.

Of course the truth is that what he knew about my personality, even back then, was that the best motivation he could’ve ever given me was telling me it wouldn’t work.

Because I wanted to prove him wrong.

And that forced me to believe in myself.

Before there was any proof. Before it made sense on paper. And before anyone else could see what I was building.

Which in the end, was a gift. Because if you wait for people to understand your dream before you start, you will never start.

Second, no one tells you what to do.

The hardest part of entrepreneurship–or life in general, for that matter–isn’t coming up with the next brilliant idea.

It’s realizing that you are fully responsible for your success or failure.

There’s no one to tell you what to do. No one to keep you focused or motivated or on track. No one forcing you to stick to a deadline. And no one to blame when things go wrong.

You have to push yourself.

And that’s not just true in business. That’s true in life. In your health, your relationships, your finances, your purpose. Nobody is coming to hand you the life you want. At some point, you just have to decide you want it more than you’re afraid of it.

Third, you will screw up more than you win.

It’s easy to look at successful people and believe that everything they touch turns to gold.

Because we only see the highlight reel.

And while my list of accomplishments over the past 16 years can be summed up in a sentence or two, my list of mistakes could fill a whole book. Maybe two. The ideas that failed. The launches that flopped. The projects that quietly died on the vine.

That’s not false modesty. And I don’t believe that’s true for only me.

It’s true of anyone doing something real.

Theodore Roosevelt once said, “The only man who never makes a mistake is the man who never does anything.” Along those same lines, Winston Churchill put it this way: “Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.”

In other words? Success and failure always go hand-in-hand.

And yet, when we look at other people’s successful lives or businesses (or when we see their #humblebrags on Instagram), we forget about all the not-so-shiny parts of their story that also played a big role in getting them to where they are.

Which makes it very easy to look at your own messy middle and convince yourself you’re doing something wrong.

But maybe you’re just in the part of the story that doesn’t make the highlight reel.

And I guess that’s my challenge for you this week: stop comparing your behind-the-scenes to someone else’s finished story. Every person you admire has a mistake list that is so much longer than anything they’ve ever put on a stage or posted online.

That’s not failure. That’s what building something meaningful actually looks like.

Live with purpose, friend, and have a wonderful week!

xoxo, Ruth

P.S. Next week I’m hosting a live workshop on goal-setting called How to Set Goals You Can Actually Follow Through On, and I would love to have you join me! It’s free to join, but you do have to register, which you can do HERE.

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Crazily enough, she’s the third niece to get married in the past year, and weddings have become my extended family’s unofficial excuse to all show up in the same place at the same time and just enjoy being together. Everyone’s happy. Everyone’s having fun. It’s awesome.

Honestly, I’m a little sad we don’t have another one on the calendar. (At least not yet!)

But what made this particular wedding especially sweet was the story of how Haley and Bryan met.

On an airplane.

She was on a flight she normally wouldn’t have been on—some random business trip that took an unexpected detour through Columbus. Bryan happened to be seated next to her. And for some reason, despite the fact that most of us go out of our way to ignore the strangers sitting uncomfortably close, they talked the entire flight.

And despite their 13-year age difference, he gave her his business card.

She texted him a few hours later.

But he didn’t respond.

At first she shrugged it off, figuring it just wasn’t meant to be.

Then something nudged her to double-check the number. Turns out she’d messed up one digit.

She tried again, and this time, he responded immediately. They had dinner that night, after which she rearranged her whole schedule to spend the weekend at his parent’s lake house.

The rest, as they say, is history.

Of course, if you know Haley, you know this story isn’t actually all that out-of-character for her. She’s fun. She’s confident. And very spontaneous.

But as the officiant shared the story during the ceremony and everyone quietly chuckled, he pointed out how their sweet love story was evidence that God always has a plan. And that what looks like coincidence or serendipity is often something much bigger quietly unfolding beneath the surface.

And I believe that. I really do.

Because there were so many ways that story could have ended differently.

If she had never texted him. Or thought to double-check the number. Or said yes to a weekend meeting the entire family of a guy she just met. If she had decided long distance relationships were too hard, or wouldn’t have been willing to uproot her entire life and move to Columbus.

Faith isn’t passive.

God may have a plan. But we still have to participate.

And as I sat there, I couldn’t help but think about my own love story, because honestly, there were more than a few parallels.

When my husband Chuck and I first met, I was 25 and he was 45 and I was right about to move to St. Louis to attend. It was my lifelong dream, the plan I’d been working toward for years, at least until I was derailed by a three-year battle with depression.

But I had finally pulled my life back together. Gone back to school, finished my degree, and took the LSAT.

So, when after exactly two months of dating I announced that Chuck would be quitting his job to move across the country with me, my family was not thrilled.

My oldest brother Mark–who also happens to be Haley’s dad—was especially furious. He called me and told me I was ruining my life. Again.

But I knew it was right, in a way I couldn’t fully explain. So off we went to St. Louis.

And then I hated law school.

I hated everything about it, with every fiber of my being. It was cutthroat and boring and way too rule-oriented. I was miserable.

But I never once thought about quitting. Because I’m not a quitter. Failure was not an option.

So I just became more and more unhappy by the day.

Until one Sunday afternoon Chuck and I went for a walk, and as he listened to me complain for the thousandth time he stopped, looked me in the eye, and said the words I’ll never forget.

You know you don’t have to do this, right? It’s okay to quit.”

The next day I walked into the dean’s office and told her I was withdrawing.

She looked at me and said, “Normally I’d try to talk you out of this. But this is the happiest I’ve seen you look all year. You’re doing the right thing”

She was right. I never once regretted dropping out of law school.

But I would never have been brave enough to make that decision without Chuck by my side.

It took a few more years and more than a few wrong turns to find my way after that. It wasn’t like I dropped out of law school and immediately discovered my purpose. Not even close. But looking back now, I can see how every single step, even the wrong ones, were leading somewhere.

Then a couple of years ago, I got a call from my big brother Mark, who told me they had just met Haley’s new boyfriend Bryan, who she met on an airplane.

He laughed and said, “You know, I probably would have freaked out about her dating an older guy, but now I’ve seen how good it worked out for you and Chuck, so I’m okay with it.”

I guess it was all part of the plan.

Proverbs 16:9 says, “In their hearts humans plan their course, but the Lord establishes their steps.” And Corrie ten Boom wrote: “Never be afraid to trust an unknown future to a known God.”

In other words? Make the plans. Take the steps. But also trust that the One who can see the whole picture is working even when you can’t see it yet.

And don’t get me wrong, I’m a girl who loves to make plans. (It’s why I started a planner company!)

But I’ve also learned that sometimes you have to walk straight into the plan you thought you wanted in order to discover it’s not the plan you were meant to keep.

And that’s okay too.

And speaking of making plans, my challenge for you this week is to join me this coming Monday, March 9th, for The Spring Reset, where we’ll spend a half-day mapping out a focused plan for your next 90 days.

Because while you might not see the big picture just yet, getting clear and intentional about what your next step should be can sometimes unlock doors you didn’t even know were there.

So come join me. Let’s figure out your next step together.

Live with purpose, friend, and have a wonderful week!

xoxo, Ruth

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But my daughter Annie loves track. All of it. The practices. The bus rides. The camaraderie. The competition. Spending the whole day on the field, cheering for her friends.

So despite the fact that she had to be on the bus by 6am for her second meet of the season, she was raring to go.

So we kissed her goodbye and wished her luck.

(For the record, she prefers that we don’t go watch, especially when it’s an away meet–she says it’s more fun without us there. Teenagers.🙄)

When we checked in a few hours later to see how her events had gone, her only response was a picture of her very swollen ankle.

It didn’t look good.

And while neither my husband Chuck or I are run-to-the-doctor-for-every-little-thing kind of people, we both had the same immediate gut reaction: Uh oh. That looks broken.

We offered to come get her. She said no. We asked to talk to the trainer. She said no. She wanted to stay at the meet, ride the bus home with her friends, tough it out, and deal with it later.

It’s fine mom, it’s just a sprain.

But it wasn’t fine. The x-ray confirmed our parent’s intuition. A fracture of the lower fibula.. Otherwise known as broken ankle.

And that’s when she finally cried. Not because of the pain—she’d been tough about the pain all day. But because she loves track, and the thought of losing the rest of her season hit her all at once.

And as a mom, that’s the kind of pain I can’t fix.

The bitter pain of disappointment and the grief of having your plans disrupted by something totally outside of your control.

It’s a theme that has come up a lot this week.

This past week I’ve heard from so many readers who are in the midst of really stressful, life-altering circumstances, and just trying to figure out how to navigate a new normal.

A parent’s health crisis. A spouse’s surgery. Your own body giving out. Burnout. Family falling apart at the seams. Job loss. A massive financial hit.

So many of the things people are carrying right now aren’t just inconvenient. They’re genuinely, breathtakingly hard. But what came up over and over again wasn’t that they didn’t know how to deal with the crisis, but how to maintain momentum when it feels like life has just thrown you a curveball.

One person summed it up this way:

“The thing I need help with is learning how to not feel guilty about focusing on my plan when unpredictable and urgent demands come up, and then how to maintain consistency once I get started again. I get derailed and then I can’t seem to get back on track.”

And I felt that deeply.

Because I’ll be honest–that’s the thought that crept in for me this week too.

That feeling of why does it always feel like we can’t quite get ahead?

We were just starting to feel like we were finally making progress on multiple fronts.

And now boom. A broken ankle. Doctor’s appointments. Physical therapy. Medical bills. A wedding we’re supposed to leave for Thursday, suddenly up in the air. The mental load of figuring out next steps when you don’t have any answers yet.

It’s not catastrophic. Just enough to knock the wind out of your sails.

And if you don’t have systems in place that allow you to adjust when life happens, those wrinkles and hiccups and bumps along the way can end up totally derailing you.

Because the truth is that unexpected crises are not actually the problem. The problem is that we expect progress to happen in a straight line.

Mike Tyson once famously said, “Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the mouth.” Along those same lines, Vince Lombardi put it this way: “It’s not whether you get knocked down, it’s whether you get up.”

In other words? The only thing predictable about life is that it is totally unpredictable.

So what’s the solution?

I think for me, it’s realizing that life is simply a constant process of getting yourself back on track. That’s it. That’s the whole game.

This is exactly why I plan the way I do. Not because my system prevents all the life disruptions from happening, but because it’s built for real life.

The recalibration isn’t an afterthought. It’s the whole point.

Quarterly sprints. Monthly check-ins. Weekly planning. Daily intentions. Always asking what’s most important right now? How do I want to show up? Not perfectly. Just intentionally.

And then coming back to it tomorrow. And the next day. And the next day after that.

Because every day is a chance to start fresh.

And honestly it’s really easy to forget that. Instead, we make the mistake of believing that derailment equals failure. So instead of recalibrating, we quit.

But progress doesn’t happen in a straight line, and big goals don’t happen all at once. It’s only the result of small steps taken consistently over time. And sometimes it’s two steps forward and one step back.

All that to say, if you feel like you’ve been derailed by life lately, you’re definitely not alone.

But use that as a reason to recalibrate, not as an excuse to quit.

And if you want help recalibrating, then consider joining me for The Spring Reset. It’s one focused planning day to look inward, get clear about what matters most right now, then walk away with a focused plan for the next 90 days. It’s going to be an awesome day..

In the meantime, my challenge for you this week is simple. Don’t try to catch up on everything you’ve missed. Just pick one thing — one small, concrete action toward a goal that got derailed — and do it today. Write it down. Put it on your calendar. Show up for it.

That’s it. One thing. Because momentum isn’t built by avoiding disruption. It’s built by returning after it.

Live with purpose, friend, and have a joy-filled week!

xoxo, Ruth

P.S. I’m still in the process of transferring newsletter platforms from Beehiiv to Substack.

It will still come directly to your inbox on Tuesday evenings, just like always, but once the transfer is complete, you’ll also be able to read it (and share it) directly on Substack. There is no action required–your subscription will transfer to the new platform, but I just wanted to let you know what’s happening, since the full transfer will take a couple of weeks to complete, and in the midst of this switch, you may be receiving emails from both platforms.

If you received this newsletter from Substack for the first time, could you please take a moment to do me a huge favor, and respond to the Substack email to let me know you got it?

Just another one of those half-teasing, half-true moments that happen in every marriage.

Are you talking to Heather again? How come you always have time to talk to her about everything, but no time to talk to me?

At first I just rolled my eyes. Because–as my husband Chuck is well aware–Heather is my Number Two, or as I like to call her, the other half of my brain. She was the first person I ever hired, way back in 2010, and we’ve worked together ever since.

So every Thursday at 7am, we have our scheduled weekly call while we’re each walking our dogs.

And while we do mostly talk about business stuff during these calls, usually by the time I come back inside, we’ve drifted fully into friend mode, talking about the kids and life and all the things.

Even so, his complaint caught me a little off guard.

Why does she get that time and I don’t?

It wasn’t a contentious thing. But it did make me pause.

Because when it comes to my work schedule, I tend to live and die by my calendar. I time block everything, but especially my recurring tasks and meetings. Which means that if something is on the calendar, it happens. If it’s not, well, then it doesn’t.

Heather gets Thursday mornings because she’s on the calendar.

So asked, half-joking, “well, do you want me to put you on the calendar too?”

It sounded so silly. Because it’s not like we don’t spend plenty of time together. We’re both home all day, we eat dinner together, and in the evening we either play games or watch TV. Honestly, sometimes it feels like we’re together all the time.

But he still said yes.

So I added a new time block to my schedule. Coffeetime with Chuck. 8am to 9am, every day.

That’s it. No grand plan, no big emotional expectation. Just a simple time block.

And yet, two months later, I honestly can’t believe the difference such a tiny shift has made.

It’s not like we have some big heart-to-heart conversation every day.

Sometimes we do Wordle. Sometimes we talk about what’s on our plates for the day. Sometimes we talk about the kids or the dogs or current events or what’s happening with our friends.

But sometimes that turns into bigger conversations, about projects we’ve been avoiding, things that have been quietly stressing us out, or ideas we’ve been too busy to land on together.

But little by little, this daily coffee hour has somehow led to bigger changes.

We’ve made more progress in the last two months than we had in the previous two years, on a variety of fronts, just from actually talking about it.

We feel more connected. We fight less (not that we fought a lot before, but there’s just less room for misunderstanding when you actually know what’s going on in each other’s head).

We’ve started being more intentional about having people over, hosting little dinner parties, reaching out to friends we’ve been meaning to see.

It’s like the intentionality in one area quietly spilled over into everything else.

I didn’t expect any of that. Because we weren’t really trying to fix anything.

Annie Dillard once wrote “how we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives.” My friend Michael Hyatt put it a little more succinctly when he said “what gets scheduled gets done.”

In other words? Sometimes it’s the tiny changes to your rhythm that shape everything.

We often think change has to come from big sweeping gestures or dramatic life overhauls, but that’s not always true. Sometimes it’s just the quiet, ordinary, on-purpose moments you show up for every single day.

I’ve spent the last sixteen years being incredibly intentional about my work time. About protecting my focus and building systems that make the important things happen whether I feel like it or not. And somehow it never occurred to me to apply that same logic to my personal time.

Not because I didn’t care. But because it felt fine.

Yet it only took one small tweak to make it so much better than fine.

So I guess that’s my challenge for you this week, too. To ask yourself whether there might be something in your life right that’s fine, whether it’s a relationship, a friendship, your health, your faith, your finances, or anything else. But something that you’ve just been assuming doesn’t need any extra effort right now.

Then ask yourself what might happen if you made one small tweak to make it better.

Not because it’s broken. But because it matters.

Live with purpose, friend, and have a wonderful week!

xoxo, Ruth

P.S. I am still in the process of transferring newsletter platforms from Beehiiv to Substack. There is no action required–your subscription will transfer to the new platform, but I just wanted to let you know what’s happening, since the full transfer will take a couple of weeks to complete, and in the midst of this switch, you may end up getting emails from both platforms.

If you received this newsletter from an email sent through Substack, could you please take a moment to do me a huge favor and hit reply to let me know you got it? Thank you!

Which, if you know me at all, is wildly out of character.

Because I’m the girl who always has a plan. Who prioritizes her to-do list. Who sets big goals and crushes them. Who gets up at 4am everyday without an alarm clock, ready to tackle the world.

But for almost two weeks straight, I had zero motivation to do anything.

I didn’t want to work. Or cook dinner. Or talk to anyone.

I laid on the couch. I doom-scrolled. I read Harry Potter fan fiction.

It all started with what I thought would be a pretty straightforward behind-the-scenes business project—getting clear on my overarching Ruth Soukup brand and messaging. I wanted to update my website and make it easier for my clients & prospective clients to find my programs and products. (There are a lot of them!)

Because for the past six months, I’ve been spending a lot more of my time connecting directly with clients across all our different programs. I’ve done more live teaching and coaching than ever before, which I love.

But what I’ve noticed is how much overlap there actually is. My clients aren’t neatly divided by brand the way I always assumed they were. They’re there because they like how I think. How I teach. How my brain works.

Which sounds like a good thing, right?

It is.

But somewhere along the way, as I started pulling on that thread, I realized that despite having done this work for 16 years, despite creating all of these different brands, I’ve never really sat down and defined my personal brand in a clear, intentional way.

Because those are big, hard questions.

Who am I? What do I do, really? Why am I here? And how do I want to show up? What do I want people to know me for?

And once I opened that door, my brain went absolutely feral.

Suddenly I was questioning everything I’ve ever done. The decisions I’ve made. The pivots. The fact that I’ve built multiple brands instead of just one. The fact that I’ve focused on building a business, rather than being a stay-at-home mom. Am I just scattered? Or flaky? Would be “further along” if I had just focused harder, sooner, better?

You get the drift.

And once that spiral started, it didn’t stop.

Because the story my brain kept playing on repeat was brutal. You should be further along. You screwed this up. Maybe it’s too late. Maybe none of it even mattered.

So what finally pulled me out of my doom loop?

Ironically enough, it was one of my own tools that finally broke me out of my funk.

It’s called the Resistance Repair, and it helped me to take a step back and actually examine my thoughts, and to actually listen to the story my brain was telling me.

I realized how much power I’d handed over to a narrative that wasn’t serving me at all.

Because those stories weren’t facts. They were just thoughts. Loud ones. Convincing ones.

But not necessarily true.

So I chose some new thoughts to practice instead.

I get to choose how I show up today.

I am not the sum of my mistakes.

My story isn’t over yet. This is just a hard chapter.

And one phrase I kept coming back to, over and over again, was something my sister told me many years ago.

It was right after I had my first baby. We were living in this tiny furnished apartment in Jupiter, Florida, far away from everyone we knew. My husband was working insane hours as a contractor—six days a week, twelve to fifteen hours a day. I was alone all day with a colicky newborn, wearing the same sweatpants, hating my body, counting down time in a place that didn’t feel like home and didn’t feel permanent.

I was miserable. And I felt completely stuck.

My sister flew out to visit because she could hear it in my voice when we talked on the phone. And one day, right in the middle of all my complaining, she looked at me and said, “Ruth, you have to bloom where you are.”

Not when things get easier.

Not when the baby finally sleeps through the night.

Not when you feel like yourself again.

Bloom where you are.

Those simple words of advice changed everything for me back then.

I stopped waiting for the circumstances to improve and started making the best of what I had . We went shopping and she helped me find clothes that made me feel good (even if they weren’t in the size I wanted to be wearing forever). I got a gym membership. I took long walks on the beach every day.

Shakespeare once wrote, “There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.“ And along the same lines, Viktor Frankl said, “Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response.”

In other words? We can’t always control our circumstances, but we can control how we choose to think about those circumstances.

We get to choose how we show up.

And I realized, in the middle of this recent spiral, that I needed that same reminder now.

Bloom where you are.

Even when it’s messy.

Even when it’s uncomfortable.

Even when you’re questioning yourself and wondering if you’ve screwed it all up.

Because waiting for perfect conditions to show up as yourself is just another way we give our power away.

And I guess that’s my challenge for you this week. To take a step back and ask yourself where you are letting your imperfect circumstances dictate your thoughts, or hold you back from blooming where you are right now. What story is your brain telling you that might not actually be true?

And then–and this is the hard part–change the script. Find a new story.

Bloom where you are.

Live with purpose, friend, and have an amazing week.

xoxo, Ruth

P.S. If this one hit home, I’d love to hear about it. Hit reply and tell me where you’re trying to bloom right now, even if it feels messy.