Mindfulness Practice

The real meaning of Christmas has been drowned out by noise. Too many lists. Too many expectations. Too much pressure to make it special, magical, memorable. Somewhere along the way, Christmas stopped being a day and turned into a test. Of generosity. Of happiness. Of how well you’re holding it together. By the time it arrives, a lot of us are already tired. We’re told Christmas is about joy, but joy doesn’t switch on just because the calendar says so. Not when the year has been heavy. Not when there are empty chairs at the table. Not when family is complicated, money is tight, or grief is sitting quietly in the corner waiting to be noticed. And still, we’re expected to smile. To be grateful. To play along. That version of Christmas has never worked for everyone. Strip it back and the original story is small and simple. At its heart, Christmas is a religious celebration. It’s about the birth of Jesus—God coming into the world as something vulnerable, fragile, and human. A quiet a...

There’s a quiet heaviness today. Like my heart is trying to breathe through a memory. I cried this morning. Not loudly — just the kind of tears that slip out when love and loss live too close together. I thought of her — my mom. How we sat beside her when she took her last breath. How beautiful she looked, even in goodbye. How the world felt both completely still and impossibly broken all at once. She used to play “I Hope You Dance” for us — her favourite song, the one she dedicated to her children. “ I hope you never lose your sense of wonder… ” Even now, those words feel like a whisper from her. A reminder to keep going. To keep feeling. To keep dancing, even when the music hurts. And I thought of my own children. Of all the ways I wish I could be the kind of mother they deserve. Of how much I miss them — in the ordinary, everyday ways. Their voices. Their hugs. The way they still see me with hope in their eyes, even when I struggle to see myself the same way. It’s the...