Today, I complete year 28 in education. WOW! Where has the time gone? When I started teaching in 1997, I knew teaching would be hard. I knew I would grade papers late at night. I knew I would bring work home. I knew I would deal with difficult students, parent phone calls, changing expectations, and the occasional copier jam that could take down an entire school day. What I did not know was that almost thirty years later, teaching would become a profession where educators are asked to be...

We have all worn our mistakes like scars. And not all of those scars came from mistakes. Some came from what we survived. Some came from what was done to us. Some came from what we had to carry too young. Some came from heartbreak, loss, abandonment, disappointment, betrayal, trauma, or seasons of life we never would have chosen. Some of them are visible in the way we hesitate. Some show up in the way we apologize too much, love too hard, stay too long, or question whether we are still...

Nobody really prepares you for Life 2.0. We are taught to go to college, get the “dream” career, get married, build a family, work hard, and call that success. That is the script. That is the path. That is the life plan we are handed before we are old enough to even ask whether it truly fits us. And for a while, many of us follow it because it is what we were shown. It is what was celebrated. It is what made us feel safe, accepted, and like we were doing life “right.” But what happens when...