May 2026

I don’t have any groundbreaking thoughts about humanity these days, but what I’ve been learning lately is: something healing happens in my own heart and mind when I intentionally look for the best in people - the same way I hope people will look for the best in me.

This year has been messy for me.

While I’m generally independent, strong, and grounded in my faith, I’ve been an emotional roller coaster. For a while, I was giving a disclaimer to anyone who called me or asked me to hang out: “Just so you know, there’s a very real chance I’m going to cry.”

I felt like people needed a warning label before interacting with me. It annoyed me, honestly. I kept feeling like I needed to apologize to people for not being at my best. Like, “Sorry you’re catching me in this version of myself.”

But strangely enough, some of the deepest strength I found this year came through those honest, raw, vulnerable moments, when so many of those friends said “give yourself some grace.”

At a ladies event I was invited to recently, I prayed about which songs to share, and each time I rehearsed them, I couldn't make it through without crying because the words were so real to me. I was grateful the Lord led me and gave me strength to minister when I felt so weak and unworthy. A sweet girl came up to me afterward and said, “I needed that today.” She hugged me so tightly that it instantly brought tears to my eyes. Then she looked at me, still holding my arms, and she was crying too. We both just kind of laughed through tears and said, “I’m struggling, but it’s okay.” Then we shared our hearts for a minute, promised to pray for each other, and went our separate ways.

Y’all, I can’t even describe how beautiful and powerful that moment felt to me. Let the mascara run, ladies. And men - tears are never a sign of weakness!

Sometimes we just need to give ourselves a little grace.

AND,

Sometimes we need to meet people where they are in life, instead of wishing they were, or thinking they should be, somewhere else.

I saw a post online recently that has stuck with me. It said:

“Don’t forget to be a
‘I need to work on that’ kind of person
in a world full of
‘that’s just how I am’ people.”

That hit me hard.

Because I think most of us really are trying. Most of us are working on something internally. We're growing, healing, learning, and showing up to our worlds in the best ways we know how. There’s something powerful that happens when we open our hearts to each other with a posture of: “Yeah… I’ve been there too.”

I think it’s when we stop believing we have room to grow, when we make excuses for ourselves and our behavior, or decide we have nothing left to give, that we become the worst versions of ourselves: cold, indifferent, judgmental, critical, selfish, and disconnected from other people. But we NEED people to help us be better.

The truth is, we all carry things about ourselves that we’re not proud of. We all have rough edges and walls around our hearts built from hurt, broken trust, failure, poor decisions, grief… There will always be things that disappoint us, or annoy us, things we wish looked different, in others, and honestly, even more in ourselves.

But I think that is what God’s grace does for us: sees the best in us. God doesn’t leave us in our mess, He walks with us while we learn and grow and change.

Maybe part of becoming better people is learning to accept God’s grace, extending some grace to ourselves, and then giving even more of it to those around us!

Maybe when someone says, “I need to work on that,” the most loving response isn’t, “Well, you should,” or “here’s how I think you should.”

Maybe it’s simply:
“I’ll be here with you while you do.”

Thank you for visiting! Cheers!

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