6 Lessons I Am Still Learning About Loving Myself Better
"I'm learning — slowly — to spread my elbows. To take up the space I'm actually allowed to take up."
Living in a right-handed world…
I'm left-handed. Which means that for most of my life, I've been doing a quiet, unconscious calculation every time I sit down at a table — scanning for the corner seat, the end of the booth, any spot where my elbow won't collide with the person next to me. And when I couldn't find one, I learned to tuck in. Wings folded. Taking up as little space as possible.
1. Don't make yourself small.
The elbow thing wasn't just about seating charts. It was a habit of mind. How many times have I held my tongue when I had something real to say? How many times have I softened an opinion, apologized unnecessarily, downplayed something I made because I didn't want to seem like too much? I'm learning — slowly — to spread my elbows. To take up the space I'm actually allowed to take up. It doesn't come naturally. But I'm practicing.
2. It's okay to feel deeply.
I've always felt things in waves — other people's emotions especially. As a kid, I didn't know what to do with all of it, so I learned to manage it, keep it contained, make it more palatable. For a long time I worried my emotional depth made me too much. What I understand now is that it's the same thing that makes me a better maker. When I stop judging what I'm feeling and just let it move through me, it comes out in the work. The colors, the textures, the shapes — they all carry something. That's not a liability. It's actually the whole point.
3. Find your voice.
I got detention in third grade for talking. My kindergarten teacher — who knew the silent, terrified little girl I'd been — heard about it and smiled like she'd just gotten the best news. I didn't understand why at the time. Now I do. She knew what I didn't yet: that the shy kid finding her voice is a genuinely good thing, worth celebrating.
I'm still finding mine. Public speaking still makes me sweat. But when I know a subject, when I care about something — jewelry, cooking, dance, the people I love — I can talk until the cows come home. Anam Cara Clay Goods exists, in large part, because I finally believed I had something worth saying.
4. Be gentle with yourself.
In 2017, I had emergency surgery for endometriosis. I couldn't dress myself. Couldn't get off the couch without help. For someone who prides herself on doing things the right way and handling things herself, it was humbling in ways I hadn't anticipated. Josh cared for me without hesitation — physically, emotionally, in every way — and watching that, I realized I had no practice receiving that kind of care. Not from him, and certainly not from myself.
Healing — physical or otherwise — demands gentleness. I keep relearning this. The perfectionist in me wants to power through, check boxes, get back to full speed. But healing doesn't work on that schedule. And neither, it turns out, does creativity. The best things I've made have come from days when I stopped demanding perfection from myself and just let the process be what it was.
5. Believe in yourself.
First grade. I drew Frog and Toad — my favorite characters — for a school art contest. My parents were both artists, so I knew enough about watercolor to feel frustrated when it didn't come out the way I pictured it in my head. I entered it anyway. I placed second in my age group.
A couple of years ago, my mom found that painting in storage and had it framed. It hangs in my home now. A reminder that when I let myself try — when I put something I made out into the world without knowing how it would land — something good happened. That's still true. I still have to remind myself of it regularly.
6. Make mistakes.
I spent years dreaming about starting a business and not doing it. A restaurant. A pie shop. An herb and spice company. Pages of notebooks full of ideas I never acted on, because what if I did it wrong? What if I failed so badly it ruined everything?
The pandemic, oddly, helped. When the world stopped in 2020, I had time I'd never had before — and a block of polymer clay and nowhere to be. So I started. Not perfectly, not with a plan, not knowing what I was doing. Two years of experimenting and learning and getting it wrong before Anam Cara Clay Goods launched in 2022.
Failure turned out to be a much better teacher than fear. It's still hard — I still spiral when things don't go the way I pictured. But I've learned to ask what can I do differently instead of why am I so bad at this. That single shift has changed everything.
These six lessons aren't finished.
I don't think they ever will be. But I'm showing up for them — imperfectly, inconsistently, and with a lot more self-compassion than I used to think I deserved.
If you're in the middle of your own version of any of these, I hope it helps to know you're not alone in it.
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