With his cancer in remission for five years, no one knew anything was wrong with my dad until twelve hours before he passed away. Halfway between his regular checkups, a tumor grew, puncturing an artery that caused him to internally bleed to death. As horrible as it sounds, I’m fortunate.

Twelve hours is an eternity while you’re waiting in the unknown, but it was enough time for my family to say our goodbyes and allowed my mom to hold his hand until the very end. His pain lasted hours, not days, months, or heaven forbid, years.

I’ve learned being thankful…

For some people, the concept of mindfulness is filed as “hippy-dippy nonsense” in their minds. As in, a ridiculous waste of time that serves no real purpose in everyday life. They may assume self-awareness is a natural part of being human, and therefore, there's no need to give it any thought. At least, that’s how I used to think.

Tips like, “focus on your breathing,” and, “find a quiet place to sit and observe your thoughts,” sounded like a bunch of baloney to me. At least until I actually learned what it means to be mindful. …

You probably think you know yourself pretty well. Why wouldn’t you? You’ve spent your whole life as you. You know when you like something and when you don’t. You’re aware when someone rubs you the wrong way. You notice when someone else’s presence fills you with warmth and joy. Perhaps you’ll even insist you know what will make you happy.

But do you know why you like something or not? What about why you become annoyed or elated by specific people? Are the things you claim will make you happy what you want, or what you’ve been influenced to want…

I had a thought while watching New Girl on Netflix. If you haven’t seen it, New Girl is about an awkward, quirky, but lovable Millennial named Jess, played by Zooey Deschanel, who moves into an apartment with three guy roommates.

I find it hilarious and enjoy how light and easy it is to watch, I never feel depressed or sad at the end of an episode. Each character is very much their own person, with their own unique interests, triggers, and boundaries yet they’re like a family. …

In the last few decades, we’ve all witnessed a pretty remarkable transformation in social awareness. Our society has plenty of issues to be sure but people are finally talking, or at least, starting to, on a scale never seen before thanks to technology.

More and more of us are speaking out about inequalities and injustice. We’re sharing our stories and experiences. Discrimination isn’t hiding in the shadows anymore, it’s everywhere we look.

Having your blindfold pulled off horrifying for sure, but I gotta say, I’m excited for where all this talk is headed and have a feeling it’s just the…

There’s a lot of talk right now about violence against women. I see the continued debate between women trying to be heard and men saying #NotAllMen, which is completely beside the point and shows they really don’t understand and don’t want to.

I see statistics floating around in an attempt to express the seriousness of the situation.

One out of six women is a victim of rape or attempted rape.

Nine out of ten rape victims are female.

One out of three female rape victims experience rape or sexual assault between the ages of eleven and seventeen.

These facts should…

I laid reclined in a chair wearing awesomely terrible sunglasses which covered a third of my face. The light shined in my eyes while the dentist picked and scraped my teeth from behind a face shield. She complimented my tattoos and in an attempt at small talk, she asked how old I am and if I have any kids.

I told her I’m thirty-four and no, I don’t have kids. I hoped we’d fall into a comfortable silence where she worked on my teeth and I’d try to think of anything but her hands in my mouth. Though, my experience…

Earlier this week, I noticed a post by an acquaintance of mine on Facebook saying she’s confused and annoyed with people claiming to be Empaths. She conceded she believes there are many talents and skills which can make someone unique, but she doesn’t believe feeling empathy is one of them.

According to her, everyone (except psychopaths and various other personality disorders) feels empathy and therefore everyone is an Empath. She went on to say, people who label themselves as Empaths believe they’re, “unique and fairy-like and require a lot of woo-woo things like extra self-care and spiritual protection’’.

I rarely…