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When the Road Disappeared
I thought we were going scouting for a fishing spot. We packed our fishing rods, just in case we found a place worth casting a line. Mostly, though, it was an excuse for a drive. Those have become some of my favourite days. We drove for what felt like forever down lease roads that wound through the Alberta bush. The farther we went, the quieter everything became. I noticed something that would have been impossible a few years ago. I was enjoying the drive. Not trying to make it productive. Not thinking about what I should be doing instead. Just looking out the window. The trees. The changing light. The…
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I Went Fishing to See If I Actually Liked It
Sometimes the biggest catch isn’t the one at the end of your line. One of the questions I’ve been asking myself during my Joy Quest is surprisingly simple. Do I actually like this? It sounds like an easy question. For me, it isn’t. Fishing was something my family did while I was growing up. For years, I assumed I liked fishing because… well… I went fishing. But after realizing how much of my life had been shaped by survival mode, I started wondering how many of my preferences were actually mine. How many things had I carried into adulthood simply because they belonged to the people around me? So when…
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The Quiet Grief of Waking Up at Fifty
Realizing how much life was spent surviving. No one tells you that healing comes with grief. They talk about hope. Freedom. Growth. They talk about becoming stronger. They don’t talk much about mourning. Not the obvious kind. The quieter kind. The grief that arrives when you finally realize how much of your life you weren’t actually living. A few years ago, therapy gave me words for something I had never been able to explain. I had spent more than forty-five years living in survival mode. It had started when I was about four years old. Every trauma after that pushed me a little farther into it. Survival slowly became the…
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Why Curiosity Is Becoming My New Religion
A couple of years ago, if you had asked me what I believed about healing, I could have given you an answer. Actually, I could have given you several. I had spent years reading the books. Taking the courses. Collecting certifications. Learning the language. Like so many women searching for healing, I wanted to believe there was a path. If I learned enough, practiced enough, understood enough, eventually I would arrive somewhere called “healed.” I wasn’t trying to fool anyone. I genuinely believed I had found something worth sharing. But underneath all of that certainty was a woman who was barely holding herself together. I just didn’t know it yet.…
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The Apple Fritter Worth Driving Two Hours For
A few years ago, I don’t think I would have driven two hours for a cinnamon bun. Not because I didn’t enjoy cinnamon buns. Because I couldn’t have justified it. There was always something more practical to do. Laundry. Groceries. Work. Emails. A house to take care of. Someone who needed something. A day spent driving for the simple pleasure of trying a bakery felt… unnecessary. Maybe even a little irresponsible. At the time, I thought that was just who I was. Practical. Responsible. Efficient. I didn’t realize I had spent most of my life measuring every decision by its usefulness. That realization didn’t come until much later. It came…
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I Didn’t Need Another Morning Routine. I Needed to Feel Safe.
There was a season of my life when I believed the answer was one more practice. One more morning routine. One more certification. One more course. One more way to become the kind of person who finally felt okay. It sounds obvious now, but at the time it never occurred to me that I wasn’t searching for a better routine. I was searching for safety. In 2019, after years of being harassed at work, my nervous system finally gave out. For five years I had managed to keep showing up. I did what I had always done. I worked harder. I stayed capable. I stayed productive. From the outside, I…
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The Day I Realized Survival Had Become My Personality
For most of my life, I thought I knew exactly who I was. Responsible. Reliable. Independent. Calm under pressure. The person who could figure things out. The one people called when everything was falling apart. I wore those descriptions like medals. They felt earned. It never occurred to me that they might also be symptoms. Who I Thought I Was People often talk about trauma as though it is obvious. They imagine panic attacks, flashbacks, or lives that cannot function. That wasn’t my story. My story looked successful. I built businesses. Managed teams. Worked in emergency response and security. Made difficult decisions without falling apart. People described me as steady.…
