This is something I didn’t want to write. In fact, I’ve started and stopped it many times. But over and over it comes back, compelling me to put these words to paper. I am aware it will sound ugly—and you might find reason to judge me. But I’m okay with that. I’m not sharing this because I am worried about me. I’m sharing because I care about people who are hurting, and I don’t want them to be alone or make the same mistakes I made. So here is the ugly truth: I am not who you think I am. I have failed so many—and especially myself.

I just about die of guilt when I worry I’ve enjoyed the day too much. I’ve been trying to come to terms with a slower pace of life for a while now, but I still get bogged down with a near-weekly sense of dread that I haven’t accomplished enough. That I haven’t proven my worth and the world is scowling at me for not meeting its expectations.  A year ago, I left my job as a classroom teacher. I packed up my books and my heirloom wooden pointer, loaded down the car with plants and all the residual candy from my desk drawers, and said to my lovely little school, “Goodbye for now. I don’t know if I’ll be back.” 

The Way Back to Ourselves is proud to announce our FIRST poetry workshop ENCORE! Come join us for a night of community and poetry, as we learn to nurture our artist selves and improve our poetry craft and voice. Register NOW! Seats are limited. Questions? Email us thewayback2ourselves@gmail.com. We’d love to hear from you!

The words are spoken so assuredly by the content marketing specialist who is repeating them to me through her podcast: “Only you can know what is best for you.” … But the words ring hollow... 

Something about the wilderness always captured my gaze. The sprawling plants and towering trees called to me. They spoke of new paths and adventure, of deep mysteries and exploration. The same feeling of excitement washed over me whenever I thought about my faith journey.

The Way Back to Ourselves is excited to present our NEW series, The Artist’s Interview. Each month, we will be talking with amazing creatives about life, faith, art, and everything in between. Check out this interview with Christian recording artist Joshua Leventhal, whose music is full of poetic determination and unflinching honesty. Just the way we at The Way Back to Ourselves like it! So, click, read, listen, share, and enjoy!

So, something bad happened. It doesn’t matter what it was, but it will give some context for the story I need to tell you. As some of you know, I have struggled with clinical depression and anxiety for most of my adult life. Throw in some trauma, a highly sensitive nervous system, chronic health problems, and an engine of a mind that won’t let me rest, and you have yourself the perfect concoction for mental health struggles.

I am a gold digger's great-great-granddaughter. Between 1938 and 1956, my ancestor Noble Getchell pulled two-million dollars in silver and gold from the Betty O'Neal mine in Berlin, Nevada. Now an official ghost town, he acquired the deserted mine in 1922 after it had seemingly failed to make good on its promises of treasure. Noble saw something others did not.

I was seventeen with my nose to the glass of my plane window looking out over the glorious sun-streaked Andes as I made my way homeward after nearly three months living in Cuzco, Peru. Streaming through my headphones, the voice of Michael Card washed over a weary heart: “Though you are homeless, though you’re alone, I will be your home. Whatever’s the matter, whatever’s been done, I will be your home.”

When I started The Way Back to Ourselves in August of last year, I had a vision for a NEW kind of community—a place full of believers and seekers who were yearning for more and looking to find themselves and their faith again in a world that has forgotten how—a place to help us become more whole, so we could love, lead, and live better for our families and communities…

The Way Back to Ourselves is proud to announce our FIRST poetry contest! Submissions open May 1, 2023. Can’t wait to see what you can do! Click here to find out about the exciting details! Winner gets a cash prize. Winner and runner-up get publication and promotion!

We are on the eve of our precious daughter’s sixth birthday, and I can’t help but to be overwhelmed with unbelievable gratitude. She is the daughter we weren’t supposed to have. And here she is. She is the child we learned to let go of after ten years of infertility and loss. Yet here she is. Quite simply put, she is the impossible staring us in the face. She is God on display. She is the child breathed to life by our prayers—made room for in my broken womb.

Some seasons feel so heavy that they become like burdens—or like 10-pound weights attached to the wings of a butterfly (I’ll get to the butterflies later). For my family, and many others more, life since 2020 has felt this way. From Covid-19 and quarantines to political strife and economic instability, in every way life has felt harder. And adding an additional health trauma to the list also showed us that my illness-turned-disability has a way of seeping into every aspect of our lives, leaving nothing untouched: work, family planning, schooling, friends, social outings, transportation, access, opportunities, and reputation.

I don’t know about you, but I still love a good old-fashioned handwritten letter. What can I say? I’m an old soul, and letter-writing is still—in my humble opinion—one of the truest ways to tell someone that they mean something to you.

In 2020, when the world was shutting down from COVID, I was shutting down too, as I battled an insidious autoimmune disease, multiple surgeries, and sepsis. So, it feels rather silly to state the obvious: the past two years have been the most difficult years of our lives. Overnight, everything we thought we knew was flipped upside down. And to be honest, that kind of life-shattering change brings even the strongest of faith to their knees. I know this because it happened to me.

Some seasons in life are bleaker than others. Some places you’re called to are harder than others, and some people you know will hurt you more than others. We’ve all been there before. The terrain is arid and untilled. Even downright hostile. In fact, the gossip and suspicion can last so long that you swear it’s going to be the end of you.

As you might have guessed, I have a mild obsession with words. Okay, scratch that. I am obsessed with words, and I love nothing more than to learn a new word—especially so, if that word becomes a part of me or seems as if it’s a word I have always known.

We are committed to finding a way back to ourselves, so that we can be WHOLE, and in turn, love, lead, and live better for our families and communities. And why not?