I have this gorgeous little tea set that my son gifted me with years ago. One of the sweet little cups suffered a catastrophic break, and I couldn’t part with it. I glued the pieces back in place, and held onto it for years. It traveled with me through 3 moves, and when I settled in here I knew I wanted to do something special with it. Adopting (and adapting) the tradition of Kintsugi, I wanted to elevate its cracks and imperfections, so that my once broken little cup could live on as a whole vessel, a visual reminder that…
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The biggest difference between Transformational Positivity and toxic positivity is that the latter doesn’t invite or encourage you to fully express the difficult feelings of heartache, anger & pain when you’re suffering from the very real life experiences of disappointment, betrayal, abuse and generally shitty behavior from other hurt, angry, unhappy humans. That’s not Transformation- that’s just bypassing. As a writer and speaker who values telling the truth AND is driven by a desire to ease our suffering, I often find myself in the sticky space of highlighting the transformation while still trying to honor the struggle. The struggle isn’t…
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The thing with Affirmations is that there’s a helpful way to use them & a harmful way. Helpful: recognition of old patterns, Love for & healing of old wounds, and finding the wisdom & strength to recalibrate your life in a way that serves you better and brings you Joy. Harmful: bypassing difficult emotions, triggering trauma without offering healing & perspective, and ignoring the true lived experiences that you have as valid. So please know this: when I share, I am sharing from a place of some level of my own healing. And I have come a hell of a…
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Ohhhh my goodness! Have you ever found yourself swept up in the painful and confusing feeling that someone else’s mess [shit] is being personally directed at you? I’ve seen this show up as people seemingly (or even actually) ignoring you, flaking out on their agreements, passive-aggressiveness, or even with rude/angry/abusive comments. Any or all of these things can be hurtful to you as an individual, and damaging to your relationship with the other person. For empathetic people this is especially challenging. You’re just trying to get through the day with a positive attitude but keep feeling bummed out by people…
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One of my favorite things about our new house (besides everything!) is the luxury of having a nice big open kitchen. I LOVE to cook, and bake, and get creative with food. The washing and chopping is a Meditation. The interplay of textures and flavors is Alchemy. The successes are glorious, and failures? Often quite spectacular. Life lessons abound. Sometimes, still, though not nearly as often as when I first started cooking as a young girl- my culinary disasters are so embarrassing that I cry and rage and sulk, angrily dumping the mess in the trash with SUCH scorn for…
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How many times have you been going through a difficult or stressful time in your life, and some (hopefully well-meaning) person comes along with advice like this: “Fake it ’til you make it!” “Just be more positive!” “No bad vibes!” “Smile, things could be worse!” UGH. That’s just really NOT helpful! I have been so frustrated with the fake positivity like this that permeates social media and the damage it creates in it’s wake. Humans, even the most enlightened, awakened, spiritual among us all still experience the very real, very human emotions that constantly get labeled as “negative” [read: BAD].…
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(i double-dog dare you to keep reading): Hi! I am Michelle Lewis, and I am so in Love with the most wonderful person! Truly, madly, deeply, beautifully in Love… and oh my goodness, it’s actually mutual. Reciprocal. Magical! It makes me giddy, and it makes me believe in miracles. I spent waaaayyyy too many years in shitty relationships, settling for scraps and normalizing bad behavior. Accepting the unacceptable. Suffering abuse, betrayal, and a long list of other foolishness. And yes, there were a couple of good guys along the way, but heartbreak was my normal so cue the self-sabotage. Right?…
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My fiancé and I don’t plan to have any kids together by mutual choice (I am a 1-and-done momma of a grown ass human, thank you very much). We don’t have pets (he’s terribly allergic, and when my last two kitties finally crossed the rainbow bridge, I needed a break. Also we travel ALOT). What we do have is an abundance of stuffed animals, some from childhood but mostly collected from our 6 years of dating. Some are tiny. Some are HUGE. Some help us sleep. Some help us manage days when our hearts are broken open (death of a…
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My Mom always used to tell me that I am a Dreamer. She would say it with a mixture of fear for her baby and a knowing twinkle in her eye. My Dad always used to tell me that Dreams won’t pay the rent. He would say it with a mixture of fear for his baby and the sadness of dreams long since left behind. But as for Me, I’ve always been one to embrace my Dreams, to dive into them, to play with complete abandon in them, to be swept up in the intoxication of them. I follow them,…
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When I was a young girl, I thought Passion was embodied by the rough embrace of Rhett Butler and Scarlett O’Hara. As I grew, and stretched, and spread my wings, however, I soon discovered that Passion is a whole other animal. It’s an untamable spirit that drives us towards greatness, towards freedom, towards the deepest levels of Love. It is an unquenchable fire in the belly that lights us UP and drives us through our darkest nights of the soul with the promise of hope on the other side of our chasm. It is the essence of our magic that…
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