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Continue reading →: Why Your Self-Care Routine is Exhausting YouThe performance of rest and what it costs us I used to think I was bad at resting. Not in the literal sense—I could sit on a couch with the best of them. However, the quality of my rest always felt inadequate, as if I were doing it wrong. I’d…
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Continue reading →: Economic Mobility in 21st Century LiteratureThere’s something disorienting about realizing the rules have changed in the middle of the game. For millions of Americans coming of age after 2008, this became a defining experience—graduating into a recession, watching “entry-level” jobs require years of experience, and discovering that doing everything “right” no longer guaranteed stability. The…
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Continue reading →: Recovery and Resilience in Women’s WritingThere’s a kind of honesty that comes after the worst has happened—when you’ve survived what you thought might kill you. It’s not the wisdom of greeting cards or the neat arc of Hollywood redemption stories. It’s messier, more complicated, and more real. This is the honesty that drives the most…
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Continue reading →: Understanding PTSD Narratives in LiteratureThere’s a moment in Tim O’Brien’s “The Things They Carried,” when the narrator stops mid-sentence, unable to continue describing a particular memory. The page seems to hold its breath. As readers, we feel that pause—the weight of what cannot be said, the story that refuses to be straightforward. When we…
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Continue reading →: Learning to Like Yourself (Not Just Love Yourself)The difference between self-acceptance and self-romance We’ve all been told we need to love ourselves more. Stand in front of the mirror and feel overwhelming affection for what you see. Write yourself love letters. Plan romantic dates with yourself. Feel the kind of warm, protective, “I would do anything for…
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Continue reading →: The Imposter in the MirrorWhy self-recognition feels impossible sometimes Have you ever looked in the mirror and felt like you were seeing a stranger? Not in the physical sense—thought that happens too—but in the deeper sense of not recognizing the person staring back at you. Like you’re wearing a life that doesn’t quite fit,…
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Continue reading →: Why Women Are Reclaiming the Essay Form“To essay is to try – and what greater act of courage is there than a woman trying to name her truth in a world that has silenced her?” – Anonymous The essay form is having a feminist renaissance. But this resurgence isn’t about the stiff academic compositions we learned…
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Continue reading →: When Magic Lives in the MarginsBook Review: Weyward by Emilia Hart Have you ever felt like there was something wild and untamed inside you that the world kept trying to contain? Something that whispered of older ways, deeper knowledge, power that didn’t fit neatly into the boxes of society built for you? If so, Emilia…
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Continue reading →: The Exhaustion of Being FineWhy emotional labor and performed wellness are draining us “How are you?” my coworker asked as we passed in the hallway, and without thinking, I responded with my automatic “I’m good, thanks!” while my internal monologue was running something more like: I’m overwhelmed by deadlines, my anxiety is through the…
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Continue reading →: Book Review: The Mountain is You by Brianna WiestI picked up The Mountain is You during one of those periods when I was clearly getting in my own way but couldn’t quite figure out how to stop. You know the feeling—you want something, you have the capacity to get it, but somehow you keep creating obstacles that prevent…
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Kat McAdaragh 