Roots and Roadmaps
The Journal Of Becoming
Deeply rooted. Delightfully curious. Always, braving the wilderness.
Welcome to Roots & Roadmaps.
This is where I share the wild, wonderful, messy, and wholehearted journey of being human. Here you’ll find my stories of healing, courage, faith, nature, becoming—and the everyday magic I collect along the way. I write from the place Brené Brown calls “the wilderness”—that brave, sacred space where we choose authenticity over approval and belonging over fitting in.
I am endlessly curious about life—about what strengthens us, what softens us, what breaks us open in the best ways, and what helps us rise again. This space is where I honor that curiosity, follow the threads of wonder, and tell the truth about the beautiful work of becoming. I have done some deep and hard work on this journey of healing. Now, I will be brave and share some of it with you.
So step into the wilderness with me.
Let’s wander. Let’s grow. Let’s be brave.
And let’s remember, always:
We are better together.
Braving the Wilderness: Bravery Was Never Meant to Be Solo-The Women Who Walked Me Home
Christmas came not long after my world fell apart, when the world still did not know. When I was sitting in the dark, but not alone, because I had a few amazing women sitting in it with me. This is the story of women, from everywhere, who walked me home. I would not be where I am today without them. If you are reading this and you are one of them, thank you. You were my greatest gift then, now, and every year in between.
Braving the Wilderness: Surviving Before I Could Heal — The Empty Nest, Relocation, Career Change, and a Pandemic
There comes a moment in every journey of rebuilding when you realize you are no longer looking at life through the same eyes.
Grief changes your vision. Truth sharpens it. Courage reframes it.
After the storm… after the dark night of the soul… after hearing the words that split your life into the Before and After…
you begin to see everything through a new lens, not the one you hoped and prayed for, but the one you must grow into.
Braving the Wilderness: The Dark Night of the Soul-Worship Is My Weapon
My pastor used to say, “It’s not if a storm will come, but when.”
The words resonated, but I did not yet understand them.
I was not in a storm—but I also knew I was not immune.
None of us are.
Braving the Wilderness: Joy Comes in the Morning - A Personal Story of Courage, Belonging, and Becoming
I woke up that morning knowing something in me had shifted.
It had been a few months since that fateful night when everything fell apart with one simple question.
That story is for another time. This story is about me—the moment I realized I would survive what had been my biggest fear come true.