petal on a string

The importance of saying no

As women, we're taught to be yielding. As women, we're taught to make space. As women, we're taught to stay quiet.

All of this comes at an expense. All of this leads us down a path of self-doubt, self-criticism, and self-censorship. All of this is in an effort to make others feel comfortable. To prioritize their convenience over our own. To crown and serve an other Master.

We are like this little petal-- hanging on by a thread and spinning out of control. The more we move away from our inner space and our inner voice, the more we divorce from what gives us life. From what guides us. Our Spirit. Our core.

Fuck. That. Shit.

We need to allow our selves the space to figure out our "no" and our "yes". To breathe into those boundaries. To understand what feels good and what feels bad. We need to say NO to the things that don't feel right. We need to see our selves for what we want, what we need, and what we will fight for.

We need to not wait for permission (no one will give it to us better than we can). We need to take responsibility for making our selves whole (no one will help us better than we can). We need to see the light at our core, the thing that makes us who we are, the Spirit emanating through (no one will show us to us better than we can). Stand up. Dig deep. Rage against the injustices in your life. Facing all the anger and fear will allow you to soften and accept the most hidden part of your being. The parts that we're most ashamed of.

Not everyone is Mother Mary.

A lot of us are Goddess Pele-- consuming everything and burning shit down. And, in that space, of creating hard boundaries (as simple and complex as life and death) she makes room for the new. She gives growth. She gives life. But she needs to take too.

Follow Pele to the depth of your fire and fall in love with what you find. Her dance is an absolute destroyer.

on marriage

Four years ago 🌿❤ about marriage: all I wanted was to find my own way toward love and marriage.

Every thing I tried on, didn't fit. All those culturally imposed ideas about what love and marriage is: how it's supposed to look, how we're thought to act, the tight gendered roles we're taught to play, what we're meant to sacrifice, what we're told to hide... none of it sat right with me.

For years I let that uneasy path send me to a dark and bitter place. I could never see that version of marriage as a future for myself. I wholly (and vehemently) rejected it. I wanted rapture, I wanted union, I wanted partnership, but I really wanted the freedom to find my own voice within a marriage. I had not seen that model within my own life so I had no idea how to achieve it.

Most of us are equipped with dysfunctional relationships. They're put on our path to teach us and to grow us the fuck up. We learn to open ourselves. To work together. To set boundaries. To take care of one another. But mostly: to love ourselves MORE. And giving ourselves what we need when faced with all that we have to be for our partners is really difficult territory to navigate.

After my dad died, I was forced to let my mind untwist. To give a little breathing room to love. In those days I saw that our shared pain and love could recover and heal heartbreak. I took a backseat and let my heart lead the way.

And then, I had a dream of an unstructured marriage. Just a little seed sprout when it started, but it grew inside me for years. It was a dream where we could both be who we needed to be without being bound to expectation.

I saw a simple ceremony in the forests of Oahu. Just a little lei exchange. Two souls, among their aumakua and ancestors, honoring what they've built, committing to what will continue and will fall away. @brandon.of.bjerke
chose his own way of doing things: handmade rings, ceremony at Sandy's, two of us sitting at the ocean, balanced by the setting moon and the rising sun, making simple promises.

So to you: thank you for helping me find love in all areas of my life and for giving me the space over these 15 and a half years to find myself/prioritize myself/love myself😍

death sweeps in

Death sweeps in like a massive flood and shifts every single thing She touches. She does not discriminate. She is indifferent to your journey. She doesn't care about your past struggles or those hard-won triumphs-- any of the things you've built. She certainly doesn't give a shit about how "good of a person" you think you are. You are left wrecked in Her wake. You are left ravaged. You are left empty.

Hoping to put all the pieces back together, you come to realize the release Death brings. The pieces are not meant to fit anymore. You are meant to rebuild, repurpose, and grow beyond what you once were. Grow beyond your own limitations-- mental, physical, emotional, and spiritual, cultural. You are meant to love deeper. To care more genuinely. To dig deep and fight to the absolute fucking end. All because you know the greatest lesson of life: Death is what awaits us all. Woman. Man. Elder. Baby. She will come. She is training you for what comes.

And here we are, after our losses, attempting to make sense of the most natural process on the planet.

My lesson over this year: honor Her. Be grateful for Her touch. Understand that you have been touched by grace. By the hand of God. The only way for me to heal is to put our loss in that context.

It hurts. Like hell. It feels. Like hell. But encourage yourself to enter that fire. Keep the knowing in your heart: She is guiding you. She is waking beside you. She is helping you when you fall because this is NOT YOUR TIME. You are meant to go through this fire. You are meant to burn off all the things that do not serve you. You are meant to emerge completely changed. Resurrected. Purified. Unbroken.

You are meant to Birth yourself in Death.

Walk with Death. Speak with Her. She will teach many lessons over this life. She is the most graceful and compassionate of all of our Angels.

So to my Babies: you have only experienced love. The greatest love that I could ever conjure, from the depths of me. In my pain, my sadness, my fight, you experienced it all. My warrior Babies. You both chose the incredible task of holding my hand through this massive shift to help me birth the woman I will become. My loves ❤

let's talk about anger

Let's talk about anger:

So its probably the most misunderstood feeling we deal with on the regular. We're living in a time where emotions are encouraged to be sanitized-- too much "focus on the positive", "power of attraction", "love and light" bullshit. I fell victim to the good vibe tribe for a really long time. These concepts enslaved me, divorced me from myself, and kept me from feeling my humanity. I couldn't hold that space for myself-- that deep understanding and compassion for whichever way I showed up. And, in turn, I was unable to hold that space for others.

Those phrases keep us in line, encouraging us to suppress our more complicated feelings in an effort to stay calm and peaceful and joyous. It's a fucking lie.

Fear, shame, guilt, anger, embarrassment, and disgust... are all emotions we're taught to stay above. Taught to be better than. Taught to imprison. Our society chooses to not teach productive pathways to express our anger. We are shown that it's too heavy to externalize-- inevitably leading to internalization, repression, and shame. It's not something we are comfortable working with, sitting in, and getting to know.

After losing Callum, years of anger rose to the surface. Because my emotions were all too strong to "manage" I just let them come. I allowed myself to be wild and untamed. To scream and rage (thank you Brandon🙏). All with an unabiding trust. In a hope that I would get to its source and to its truth. Getting to that place, seeing it as a protective measure, helped me make peace with this most complicated emotion.

Anger is a fire. Anger is a response. Anger is a motivator. Anger is an honest and true experience of perceived injustice and disrespect. It is the strong and valid response to a personal and/or a collective violation.

It is the spirit within us that speaks wisdom and digs in and screams "NO". That spirit will endlessly fight to protect our sovereignty. That spirit knows wrong from right and will stand beside their morals. That spirit is angry. She will be listened to and respected, honored and loved. She is a part of our story and the clearest vision for our future. She is ready to be heard. Are you angry?

A quick PSA: anger and aggression are typically conflated, however they are wholly different. One is an emotion, one is a behavior. One can be constructive, the other can be destructive. When aggression is turned on ourselves and others it is abuse. Do not stand for abuse. Love yourself more and do the work is requires to get right with yourself.

a love that lasts forever

❤a love that lasts forever: 21 years ago today my sweet Papa took his journey to the other side❤

I can remember the last Valentine's Day we celebrated with him. All of us gathered around his bed trying to make things feel normal while knowing his life (our life) was coming to an end. Being on hospice, he asked my mom to go to Hallmark to get everyone gifts and cards since he couldn't. These little figurines are his last gift to me. They are treasured memories from the most caring and compassionate man I knew. A man who comforted me and helped me feel at home everyday of my 12 years with him. Things have not been the same since❤

This year has been the first year that I really got into processing his death. Allowing myself to feel the wake of his loss. Losing Callum opened me up to seeing that the death of our loved ones will keep unveiling and reshaping our lives. I lost a lot of my support when I lost him. I grew up so much when I lost him. I lost part of me when I lost him❤

I remember a few weeks before Callum died I went to a group meditation. During the meditation I followed a rainbow path into the past. At the end of the road was my Grandfather. I watched his face react and respond to me. Joy, bliss, pride, amazement. All because of the love I showered on him. He told me to see myself the way he saw me and I would find endless self love. I've been holding this memory close and I've been thanking him more than ever for saving me, for sending me both my babies, and strengthening my relationships with the people in my life❤

There was immense selflessness in our relationship. Just two souls fully in love with each other and enjoying our time together. I cannot wait to experience this innocence for myself and my life with our baby❤