Sometimes the scariest thing is acknowledging just how much power we do have, and what actions we can actually take. Because then, we’d have no reason not to do it.

Death was impersonal to Lady. Sickness was also impersonal to her. She lived like she had chosen it, without complaint, only an unflappable conviction that hers was the best life. We watched her slow throughout the years. She watched us do the same. In the last year of Lady’s life, there was a sense of peace about her that radiated throughout the household. A sense of acceptance, of something resembling laziness, but maybe really just a savoring of each second, the wisdom of knowing that to rush is a fool’s errand.

Self-hatred, destructive thoughts, insecurity, blame, doubt, all the cards we keep shuffling over and over from hand to hand as if this pain is meant to be carried. It’s not. Allow your fingers to release its grip on this collection of hurt. Our beautiful, intricate hands and bodies were meant to create, to touch, to heal and discover and move like nothing else on earth. They are not meant for this game of self-destruction; rather, the work and art of reinvention, and resurrection.

When we sit in silence we can feel the vibrations of everyone going through the same thing. Reminders that we are not alone is everywhere. The human experience hasn’t changed. We still struggle in the same ways in our minds, in our hearts. Suffering is universal. It is the one language we can all understand. We don’t need to believe this, we simply know it.

My attachment to anxiety is what I always thought was my “drive”. It was the motivation behind most of my actions. My anxiety of other people suffering drove the codependent tendencies in me. My anxiety of not being perfect drove me to never allow rest, or silence in my life. And the only way to detach from anxiety, I’ve learned, is to allow it.

Things present themselves and your view is no longer blurred, the sound is no longer dulled, the blows are no longer soft. And alcohol is very good at postponing things we actually should have dealt with years ago. So here I am, dealing with years of back taxes in emotional management.

Who would I be without these things that had always offered me comfort, no matter how short-lived? The answer is who I’ve always been, before I was told not to be. And if we are to share the love that we’ve always craved, we have to start with coming back to ourselves. The only home that ever mattered.

When I love someone, I value them so much, I absorb their words and opinions too much. Words become ideas. Ideas become our reality. It’s a scary thing when something so easily put out into the world can venture and change so much of our internal world. And once it’s in there, it’s so hard to get out.

Fear is restrictive. Love is expansive. And what that means is, to love someone well, is to provide a really big space, a giant football field-sized space, for them to learn and grow.

Sometimes, thoughts can creep up on you. Like me on my sister. Here’s what you can do with them.

She asked us what Lady’s favorite things were. The answer was simple, and not too far from my own: Noah and food.

Where would we be without them?

Luckily for us, both are inescapable!

Shit I ask myself when I’m pissed off.

No, it doesn’t always look like this

Lady enjoying her 37th savasana of the day

Addictive personalities, anyone?

Can you spot the fake tooth?