Miriam Verheyden

Loving and trusting men has always come easy to me, but loving women? It scares the shit out of me.

Being aware of my surroundings and bodily sensations is giving me newfound joy countless times every day.

Women in particular get so many rules, it takes a lifetime to learn them all, and because new ones are added all the time, we will never catch up.

It’s been the most unusual, unsettling year in most of our lives. And we’ve all been struggling to find ways to survive. 

Stop feeling guilty for being human and flawed and a work in progress.

What has become clear to me over the last year is that we have more control over our life than we think we do. Not about what happens to us (that one is random and crazy), but what we do with it.  

Some days the little things that annoy you are all you can see.

We are complicated, contradictory beings, and we don’t always make sense (some of us rarely make sense), but accepting that about ourselves is the biggest step toward happiness.

Don’t beat yourself up if you are not productive or don’t have energy or don’t feel like doing much. It’s okay. We’re hibernating. Nature is resting, and so can you. 

You have 95 unfinished, half-finished or barley started articles in your drafts folder.

Nature dies in fall, sleeps in winter, and awakens in the spring. Nothing blooms forever, and neither can we. 

All I know is this: Losing two people to the same disease you have hit close to home.