cultivating the beautiful ordinary by sharing our tales and our tables
Lying on a yoga mat, cued by the voice on the recording, I slowly inhale and exhale. I draw my attention to my body, reorienting my mind from a multitude of swirling thoughts to focused attention on my body, my breath, and this moment. Recently I’ve been taking a Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction course, created…
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Everyone envisions a family. For some it is a picket fence, three kids, and a collie. My vision was a rowdy tribe, living one wild adventure after another.
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I take a good hard look in the mirror and suck in a huge gulp of air. I am getting ready to step into the shower and have just stepped off the scale. The chaos of bed hair and a NyQuil-induced sleep blink back at me underneath the glow of the unforgiving bathroom lights. My…
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In my 20s, when I was part of a “soft complementarian” church that did not quite believe in women’s leadership—one that put gendered limitations, sometimes explicit and sometimes just quietly understood, on the roles women were expected to play and the gifts women were (or were not) expected to offer—I spent so much time unsure…
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Heresy. This word is terrifying for those of us raised within strict religious environments, where straying from traditional doctrine can lead to judgment, suspicion, and even abandonment. I risk this everyday…all for the “sin” of trusting myself.
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“I hate my life,” I cried to my husband. “How can this be my life? How did I get here?” He, in his kindness, began to make suggestions: “Why don’t you go on a trip? Or why don’t you go on a drive? Book a massage?” But inside, there was an inner knowing. I love…
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My third daughter asked me to be on standby to attend the delivery of her first child, mostly because she was worried about her husband, and his ability to remain upright. As a newborn nurse, she’s seen plenty of greenish fathers-to-be, so my husband and I parked ourselves in the nondescript hospital labor waiting room…
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A long time ago, there was a prophet named Elisha, who had his bald head so far up into heaven that he was able to perform many miracles. This is not about him. He had a servant named Gehazi, who had his head so firmly fixed on this earth that he was shrewdly able to…
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When I was a girl, my grandmother used to buy me the most beautiful books. I’d sit and study them. I’d weave myself into their magical illustrations and storylines—the heroes within, the longings of main characters, the mythical power of nature’s forces—and I’d get lost in the rhythm of beginning, middle, and end. I’d imagine…
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Much of my adult life has felt like a walking billboard for a “Never Say Never!” campaign. Whether it’s going back to school to get my Master’s degree, having two kids under two, living in the state of Ohio, or becoming a person who runs outdoors on a regular basis by choice, I’ve learned that…
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