For the Ones Who Hide Away When They’re Struggling
“Hi friend, how are you doing today? Thinking of you and sending love your way.” I press send on the text, then click my phone screen off. I know better than to expect an immediate response from friends who hide away when they’re struggling. My friend deals with depression and anxiety, and I know that this is a challenging time for her. I also know that when things get tough she tends to go dark. Still I send the message and the love anyway. I pray that it can help her to defy the voices that tell her that she’s...
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Set Boundaries and Declare Dominion: You Need to Read with Anna Kunnecke (Plus a Book Giveaway!)
Let’s start our conversation about how to set boundaries and declare dominion in the most logical place: with the dream I had the other night about owning a living, breathing miniature elephant. (We’re going somewhere with this, I promise.) I’d had the tiny elephant for a few days, and I’d thought that I was taking pretty good care of it. But then I placed a container of water down on the floor where the elephant lived, and the little guy went crazy. Within seconds it was splashing and guzzling water, equal parts desperate with thirst and wild with joy. That...
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When You Want to Apologize for Existing
“I say ‘I’m sorry’ a LOT, usually when it’s not necessary. I apologize for existing.” “I’m so tired of fighting myself … For the last 17 years I spend my days in service to precious elders and give all that I can, yet inside me I feel like I am never, ever enough. The perfectionist in me doesn’t seem to be silenced.” “I’m so very, very, very tired Caroline! …. I’m at war with myself and know deep down I don’t have to be.”* …
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What Happens When You Surrender to Stillness: A Story
It was the best birthday present I could have given myself: an hour to just be. There I was in restorative yoga, lying on my purple mat, posed to surrender to stillness. In case you haven’t tried it, restorative yoga is a sublime form of deep rest that releases tension on every level. I love my local studio’s class, but I don’t go much. The poses are deceptively simple, so often I convince myself I could do them at home. But of course I am a recovering perfectionist and workaholic, so you can imagine the result of that rationalization. …
The Truth About Time Management: You Need to Read with Laura Vanderkam (Plus a Book Giveaway!)
All of us have the same 24 hours in a day, 168 hours in a week. But why do some of us feel overwhelmed and overburdened, while others feel focused and relaxed? What’s an empowering, realistic way for recovering perfectionists to approach time management? In this edition of our ongoing You Need to Read Video Series, I address these questions and more with writer, author, and speaker Laura Vanderkam. Laura is the author of several time management and productivity books, including I Know How She Does It (one lucky commenter will win a copy!), What the Most Successful People Do...
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Want To Feel Less Anxious? Reconnect with Your Inner Child
Dear friend, it’s hard to admit that anxiety is a struggle for you, isn’t it? Your experience of life has been tense and fraught for so long that it seems normal. You want to feel less anxious, but it seems like an impossible dream. I get it, I really do. I started twirling my hair compulsively when I was in kindergarten. At school there were so many things to learn, so many people to please. When all of that felt hard to handle, I’d wrap strands of my brown hair around my fingers. I’d twirl my hair up tight and...
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Can’t Stop Striving? Your Free Perfectionist Recovery Toolkit Is Here!
I knew I was a perfectionist the day I got into a car crash on the way to high school. The accident totaled our family’s pretty blue Chrysler Concorde, and I wasn’t in great shape either. Thankfully I didn’t sustain significant physical injuries, but I was hyperventilating, trembling, and generally traumatized. Still, my tears were barely dry when I insisted on going straight to school. Why? Well, I thought that since I’d already screwed up by getting into the accident and missing two classes, taking a day off was out of the question. Though I would never have asked a...
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Writing as a Road to Healing: You Need to Read with Addie Zierman (Plus a Night Driving Book Giveaway!)
“Begin not where you think you should be or with what you ought to feel. Begin where you are.” That’s the healing invitation extended by our next guest in the You Need to Read video interview series, Addie Zierman! Addie is one of my all-time favorite writers. She’s the author of two rave-reviewed memoirs about letting go of religious baggage and walking her own faith journey, When We Were on Fire and Night Driving. She’s also a speaker and a blogger who writes about faith reimagined at AddieZierman.com and she writes the “Ask Addie” advice column at Off the Page....
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Exhausted from Being The Good Girl? Read This.
“I’ve always been the good girl. I try so hard to do everything right and not screw up. Caroline, do you know how exhausting that is? I think you do; that’s why I’m writing to you. I’m a grand perfectionist; I’m never worthy enough. I am super hard on myself, with very high expectations. I feel guilty about so much of what I do and say. All my life I’ve been good at offering help to others, but I don’t want to ask for or accept help myself. If I am able to do it on my own, then I...
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The Story You’re Not Telling: You Need to Read with Laura Parrott Perry (Plus a Love Warrior Book Giveaway!)
Do you have a shame story that you’re afraid to tell? Do you have a secret narrative that’s running the show of your day-to-day life? If so, you are not the only one. Let me tell you a story about a time when an untold shame story hijacked my day a few years ago. It started with a bunch of ripe avocados on our kitchen counter one morning. …
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