The best antidote for loneliness, hopelessness, and fear is vulnerability: sharing your secrets and talking about what shames you, what you fear.

I've had mentors who were kind of the troubadour singer-songwriters, like Merle Haggard, Loretta Lynn, Joni Mitchell, Bob Dylan and Neil Young, and that's just what I've always liked - people who would talk real honestly about their lives and their circumstance.

To shut down the ability to feel pain means you shut down all emotions, joy included. It makes our hearts feel small, it robs us of our joy, and really keeps us no safer.

You have to be an ally in a difficult time and not turn on yourself with self-shaming thoughts, which makes facing pain intolerable.

I say to myself, sometimes the tide is just out. But it always comes back in again.

I try to give myself permission to be a work-in-progress and not have everything figured out at once. It's more manageable and takes some of the pressure off of feeling like I have to have everything right all the time.

All things change. Cultivate flexibility rather than perfection.