As a child, I had no right to be angry because that meant I was selfish or ungrateful, and as a “Christian” it was just… unbecoming of a godly woman to ever show anger.

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Never let the sun set on your anger and all that.

A lot of people thought I was bipolar (and had somehow been able to just mask it for 31 years) during my divorce because soooo much anger exploded out of me — after years and years of bottling it up.

High-pressure suppression situations are a perfect catalyst for an emotional explosion.

I felt so much relief when I realized I didn’t have to be stuck with my ex-husband anymore — the joy was pouring out of me seemingly uncontrollably.

I didn’t care at all what anyone thought about it.

That’s how all my years of unconscious people-pleasing finally came back to bite me.

People were concerned because it “wasn’t like me” to be that emotional.

Turns out I’d finally let myself stop performing after my nearly 10-year-long relationship ended.

I didn’t need to keep my ex or his parents happy anymore — and I was so elated to be free of that perceived burden.

The intense anger rage came when I learned that my ex husband had told our inner circle, without copying me, that I was “probably schizophrenic” (despite never receiving such a diagnosis).

It felt like a power play to me, like he wanted to keep me suppressed so he’d continue to benefit from my work (and look good to everyone) in spite of his “crazy” wife.

I’ve made LOTS of peace with all the emotions I allowed to explode unencumbered during my divorce in 2019. I see how it was a very natural response to many years of unexpressed emotion and people-pleasing/performance.

Fast forward to today…

For the last two years or so, I’ve been yelling out “I’M SO ANGRY!!!” into the ether when I’m alone.

(Not all the time, just when I’m actually angry — lol)

Usually it’s while I’m driving (when no one can hear me). I sometimes scream at the top of my lungs!

And it does help me feel better.

Is it “healthy”? I always thought so. It might be. It allows the uncomfortable emotions to come out instead of just… suppressing them like I used to do.

But it also gets “the conversation” started.

That’s probably the best part. After I yell or scream how angry I am, I take some deep breaths and ask myself questions that help me get more specific about why I’m feeling angry.

Name it to tame it.

Once I understand why, I validate the experience for myself, and I start asking what I can do about it.

(This is a large part of how I’ve been “reparenting” myself in the last decade, too!)

I’m allowed to say anything at this point.

Even if it makes no sense.

Even if it’s “I’m gonna ask ChatGPT to draft an annulment agreement!!!”

Anything to get the anger out — without hurting anyone — is allowed.

I don’t have to worry about getting in trouble for my emotions when I’m the parent in the room :)

All jokes aside, what I’ve discovered is that most of the time I’m angry because of how I’ve been living. Choices I’ve been making it what I allow or tolerate — from others or myself.

So when I arrived at a new camping spot in a quiet rage today… instead of doing something destructive, I immediately started cleaning.

I was angry at Edward, and I decided I never wanted to see that much dust all over my dashboard ever again.

Dirt fanned that angry flame enough for me to actually do something about it.

Was it a distraction? Maybe. But if it gives me dopamine and improves my self-esteem (when all I want to do is eat my feelings or worse, suppress them entirely), I’ll take it.

Spoiler alert: I felt much better after cleaning.

It was an area of my van (“the cockpit”) that had been neglected for quite some time.

I’d sneezed ferociously while driving often enough that I’d become veeeery suspicious that dust had settled not just onto my dashboard but into my fuzzy wool seat covers.

(Vacuuming = immediate gratification and dopamine. It’s so satisfying!)

Within a few hours, the whole place was sparkling. I’d not only cleaned the whole cockpit … I’d cleaned the rest of the van.

I even hand-washed the floors underneath the rugs.

Since realizing that the majority of my anger comes from how I’m treating myself, what I’m tolerating, and how I’m allowing other people’s emotions to affect me, channeling that anger into doing something FOR myself is ::: chef’s kiss ::: where it’s at, my friend.

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Because who wins when you’re screaming at the top of your lungs while driving down the interstate? Certainly not your throat.

Who wins when you keep it all inside or hide from the world? Not you.

Who wins when you rage clean? YOU DO!!

I can’t remember ever rage cleaning before today. In some ways, I feel I’ve turned a new leaf. I’ve long been a proponent of the idea “Everything happens FOR me, not TO me” and this experience is no different.

Maybe I was so angry today SO THAT I could channel that anger into a cleaner space that would make me feel better.

Which isn’t that far-fetched.

It makes sense because your outer world is a reflection of your inner world. I can say with confidence (and zero shame) that my inner world has been a liiiittle dusty lately too — so it makes total sense that my living (and driving) spaces were dusty too.

After I finished cleaning, I sat down to write.

One “right” action pushes down the next domino… and before you know it, you’re out of the funk entirely.

The worst thing to do when you don’t like where you are is to stay where you are — whether it’s out of fear, people-pleasing or whatever reason.

Know that you’ve got everything you need to take the next right step. Always.

Sometimes that next right step is to scream or cry or have a conversation with yourself like the human being you are.

But there’s aways another step after that, and that’s to do something even more directly beneficial for yourself. Because if all I do is yell and scream and pout, what’s that accomplishing, exactly?

What’s my expectation? That I’ll just magically feel better someday?

A lot of people with suppressed anger self sabotage. I know this from firsthand experience.

You live in victim mode. You don’t think your problems have a solution because you don’t believe you are the source of your problems (or the source of the solution).

Once you realize you are the source of your perceived problems — by how you are reacting/responding to or just passively allowing them — everything changes.

This is a key motivator in awakening for many of us.

Like, “Ohhhh I was only a victim because I continued to accept X thing from Y person!”

or “Ohhh I felt stuck in my life because I was just doing the same thing every day… and didn’t do anything different to get a different result!”

It’s the realization that there were always other options available, even if you didn’t see them. Sometimes that realization results in shame. It did for me. But emotions like shame only come up so you can acknowledge and release it — not so you can wallow in it.

YOU are the root cause of your perceived reality.

Who you are BEING creates the reality you perceive.

If you believe you are a victim, you’ll perceive all kinds of shit in your reality that confirms that exact belief.

On the other hand, if you believe you are in control of your experience and perception, you’re far, far more likely to take actions that result in a life you actually enjoy — and you’re also far more likely to become a Self you love and appreciate.

Too often we think it’s life that sucks — or that we’re just “unlucky” — when it’s actually our choices and what we’re allowing/accepting for ourselves.

That doesn’t mean that luck doesn’t play a role or that nothing happens that really sucks. It’s just that most of the time, when people think their lives are terrible, it’s because they’ve simply forgotten their role in their own life.

They don’t remember their own creative power (because we’ve been taught to suppress it!!! … I’ll save that for another post :)).

Just because you perceive something is real doesn’t make it real.

And we can’t find what we’re not looking for.

Life is all about perceptions.

That means if we’re being a victim of our circumstances AND we don’t believe there’s anything to be done about it, we won’t even look for a solution.

The solution could be staring you square in the face… and you wouldn’t be able to see it.

Why? Because you’re already convinced it doesn’t exist.

Ooof. Been there.

But I’m at a place now where I allow myself to feel anger and express it in a healthy way (most of the time).

Hence, rage cleaning.

I’d been so angry at Edward’s confusing behavior (details are irrelevant) that I decided that instead of trying to fix it or understand it or even talk to Grok about it, I’d clean my living space instead.

Because why was I allowing myself to live in such clutter (and actual filth)? No wonder my mood had been affected. Plus, you show people what you’re willing to accept. If I’m treating myself poorly, can I be all that surprised when it’s reflected back at me?

Some personal growth can only be done inside of a relationship… and this is part of that work for me: not allowing other people’s actions or emotions determine how I feel about myself.

Codependent no more, as it were.

And the anger? Done and dusted.

xoxo,
C

I’m about to tell you all the juicy details on how I got scammed out of over $100k by a shady, underqualified interior designer in Orlando (and what I’m doing about it).

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But first… a little background.

I love vacation rentals.

A good vacation rental is THE vacation, in my opinion.

Why should all the fun be at the tourist attractions and restaurants? Why not make the accommodation fun, too, right? It just makes sense. I want to look forward to every part of the trip!

Plus, with how heavily saturated the vacation rental market is, it’s a challenge to stand out — and the best vacation rental owners do what the rest of vacation rental owners won’t.

We’ll get to that :)

Some of All of my fondest memories from childhood are from the handful of times we went on vacation.

We really didn’t go on vacation much. In fact, it wasn’t until I was in my late teens, early 20s that my mom and dad even wanted to go on vacation.

We went to Steinhatchee, Florida, which is a cute little coastal town where my late paternal grandmother use to live but now… it’s basically a fishing town with a drinking problem.

All the rentals we stayed in were… sub-par. Boring hotel rooms or old houses with nappy furniture and bedding, not much to do, and questionable cleanliness.

Here’s a photo I took of my sister, my grandma, and my dad watching TV in the living room of one of the rentals back in 2006. Watching re-runs of Reba, no doubt!

We made it work, but there was always a lot to be desired.

So when I had the opportunity to buy two old A-frame houses in a vintage holiday park back in 2020, I took it. Both houses cost about $220,000, but they needed some work.

I spent about $25,000 to spruce the both of them up and started renting them on Airbnb.

Fast forward to 2024, bookings had been consistent but low value ($200 for a weekend, minus the cleaning fee of $80 so I’d net $140, which was less than what local hotels were charging per night!), and there wasn’t really much to make them stand out.

They were drowning in a sea of mediocrity.

One of them, called Mermaid Haus, was lightly themed with mermaid/beach decor, and the other I called Retro Lounge, since it had vintage-inspired furniture and decor but… I didn’t want to stay in these houses!

And if you don’t want to stay in your own place, what does that say about the place, right?!

I also didn’t want to share to my network that I had these Airbnbs because there was some part of me that was embarrassed by them. They were just “meh.” Again, lost in a sea of mediocrity.

Priceless business advice: To really stand out in any industry, you need to be willing to do what the “average” person in that industry isn’t willing to do. Most people are fine filling their Airbnbs with cheap Walmart or IKEA furniture and polyester bedding. I was not fine with that!

So I hired a gal named Erica from a company called Magic Interiors who claimed she could gut renovate and remodel both of my houses in 2-3 months.

She’d done some light work at my primary residence the year before that turned out pretty good (albeit very expensive for what I got in the end), and we’d become friends, so I trusted her when she told me she could do it.

Despite never sending me a contract, she collected the first $50k and went to work demolishing the interiors of two perfectly mediocre but profitable rentals.

She never asked for my approval on any work before doing it. She spray painted every inch of Retro Lounge this god-awful aqua color. Even my smoke alarms were painted (and rendered unusable).

Spent money on dozens of things that were never invoiced, leaving no money left for what I’d actually paid for.

Long story short, one reason after another popped up as to why the houses couldn’t be done on time.

Her main guy Douglas allegedly “developed a drug problem and was stealing” — I later spoke with him on Zoom and she’d not only lied about the drugs and stealing, she had refused to paid him $23,000 for work he’d completed simply because she thought his prices were too high.

Even though she’d approved the estimates.

I can’t make this stuff up!

The biggest excuse was that she talked me into doing custom augmented reality video games for both houses, at a cost of $40,000 plus tax, but it would apparently take a long time before the company had availability to go out to the houses and “map” them. According to her, house-mapping needed to be done before anything else could be done to the house.

It’s very clear to me now that this was a huge lie. It was just her way of passing the buck/responsibility to an anonymous vendor to avoid taking responsibility for her own failures. Failures that cost me thousands and thousands and thousands of dollars.

It’s been almost two years since I paid her for those video games, and I still don’t have those games in my possession. I’m not even sure they exist at this point.

“It’ll be worth it” she said. I trusted her. Little did I know that these custom games would not move the needle at all in terms of rental revenue. They’re not a huge selling point. People are just as happy if they have access to a Nintendo Switch.

By September 2025, she’d told me multiple times the house would be done by a certain time, times which came and went.

Some verbatim text messages I received:

May 16, Erica texted, “We will have the Nintendo house done around the end of the month and the mermaid house shortly after”

June 3, Erica texted, “We’re almost done with 73! The loft bed is delayed 😒 but scheduled for the 16th. So we will be done done done on the 16 or 17”

July 1st, Erica texted, “We’re alllllmost done”

It’s obvious to me now that ALL OF THESE TEXTS WERE LIES.

Edward and I walked into the Nintendo house January 5 this year and were met with a mountain of empty Amazon boxes, all with dates on the labels from September and October. The house hadn’t been touched in months.

We asked Erica come over to get answers; she apparently thought she was coming over to hang out as friends and do some touch-up painting. She even said she thought we’d already started renting the place out!

We requested records of exactly how my $193,000+ was allocated/spent on both houses, since neither of them were done, and she assured me she’d get us that info, but to this day I still don’t have any information. All she gave me was more excuses (or ghosting).

I ended up having to hire my van builders, Bobby and Chris, to come down from North Carolina to finish the house. They had a great time on the project and did a fantastic, quality job.

More than two years after I took the listings down for renovation, I was finally able to re-list one of them last week.

The “Mario House” — officially named Mario’s Mini Mansion — is officially live (and accepting bookings directly, saving 15% off of Airbnb prices)!

After another $60,000+ on top of what I paid Erica… I’m finally back in business.

(I hired another theming company to do my other house, and they’re still hard at work. It will have an underwater/mermaid/shipwreck theme :))

Yes, I’ve absolutely hired an attorney.

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I’ve had a love/hate relationship with my body (and food) for most of my life.

I remember thinking I was fat as early as second grade.

I’d started reading Teen and Seventeen magazines by age 12, not realizing I was allowing unrealistic beauty standards to be programmed into my very impressionable brain.

I was borderline anorexic in middle school. I’d throw away my lunch sometimes. Joined the track team just for the exercise. Even passed out from low blood sugar during chorus practice one afternoon!

My happiness with myself heavily depended on how thin I perceived myself to be.

When I studied abroad in Germany during college, I taught myself to cook. I lived in a dorm with the tiniest little efficiency kitchen. It had a 2-burner cooktop, mini fridge, and sink… with a 6-inch wide area to set dishes to dry.

It was my first kitchen away from my parents’ house. I remember LOVING going shopping for groceries for the first time. I was amazed at what $20 purchased me (or 13 Euros at the time — it was 2007).

I also thought I needed to lose weight… pretty much the whole time. I look back at photos of myself — clearly not fat, like… at all — wearing size 6 jeans, but wanted to be size 2 or 4. Six was too large.

I worked out for sometimes 2 hours a day, every day. I ate like crap, though, and I’d go for happy hours with friends at least once a week. It wasn’t until my mid 20s that I’d figure out the nutrition stuff and make some changes to my diet!

In late 2011, I became a Certified Personal Trainer after a four-month long full-time tuition program at the National Personal Training Institute. I had a handful of private clients and also taught spinning, water fitness, and circuit training classes.

I was obsessed and highly insecure with my weight for nearly all of my 20s and wouldn’t even wear a bikini in front of my family.

Fast forward to age 39, I’m living in my van, married to a wonderful, scrappy (SUPER capable) and handsome man, 30 whole pounds heavier than I was five years ago, and infinitely happier too.

How did that happen?! I never thought I’d be this weight and completely unhorrified by it.

My husband Edward and I eat at restaurants frequently since we’re always traveling through new cities. We love local vegan restaurants the most, but we’ll also hit up a Yard House or Cheesecake Factory from time to time.

I have a full kitchen in my van with all the essentials, but we don’t always feel like turning my van into a food truck when we’re just overnighting somewhere, like at a truck stop. It’s more fun to cook when we’re parked in a cool spot for a few days.

Still, cooking “at home” — even if home is on the road — makes it way easier to count calories.

And since I do find myself wanting to shed some excess weight, I need to know how many calories I get to eat while also creating the environment my body needs to let go of it.

You know EXACTLY what is in the food you make for yourself (at least you should, anyway)!

You give yourself the most control over your health when you make your own food.

You can never really know what’s in restaurant food, either.

Restaurant food is FULL of extras. Extra sugar, extra oil, extra salt, extra everything that makes food addictive… and large portions encourage extra bites that don’t seem like much.

Restaurant food is delicious. It’s also expensive. You can save a lot of money cooking for yourself compared to Door Dashing or going to restaurants. I know there have been times where me and Edward have spent more on Door Dash in a week than we would’ve spent for a month’s worth of food at Costco!

So… saving money AND calories? I’m SO here for it!!

Before I do something — even start a calorie deficit — I have to see the reward in it.

Because I’m HAPPY right now, even though I’m slightly overweight. Why should I disrupt my peace by going into a calorie deficit for months in order to slowly shed unnecessary pounds? That sounds… boring, difficult, uninteresting…

Eureka!

If I’m telling myself that it’s gonna be boring, difficult, and uninteresting, it makes it far less likely that I’ll even start the process, much less follow through.

Maybe I’ve been negatively influenced by years of marketing and messaging about how hard it is to lose weight. What if none of it’s true and it’s actually easy (even fun) to lose weight?

If I can make going into a calorie deficit interesting and easy, then it logically becomes more fun.

Dropping extra pounds can even be a game. You get to make the rules!

How can I make 1450 calories (or whatever your number is) delicious, satisfying, and nutritious?

The irony of this is that I used to cook delicious, satisfying meals a lot. I was slim, then… even though I was afraid of being fat.

(I know, it’s insane. It was my biggest fear at the time)

I had somewhere between 50-100 cookbooks at one time. Mostly vegetarian and vegan ones. Maybe I was a little obsessed.

Many of those cookbooks are on the shelf in my pantry at home in Florida.

But I rarely if ever use them now. These days, when I want to make a meal, I choose from what’s right in front of me. It makes sense that I hadn’t been making many meals lately, since I didn’t have a good plan to keep things on hand/stocked in the van that I could use to make meals.

I was usually just flying by the seat of my pants with some random hodgepodge of ingredients I didn’t know what to do with.

There wasn’t much intention in elevating my nutrition experience. It was just basic “I’m hungry, let’s eat…” and then I’d proceed to eat more than what I needed. Repeat. Do that lots of times — like I did — and it’s very easy to slowly put on weight without even noticing.

So how do we make the calorie deficit easier and less of a grind, more fun and less tedious, and most importantly… how do we make it delicious?

I thought to myself if I had 10-12 “staple” DELICIOUS yet healthy recipes (including desserts!) that I can make within 10-15 minutes, then I could program those into Chronometer really easily and be able to stay in a calorie deficit with a lot less math and guesswork.

One thing I loved about being a personal trainer and nutritionist for several years was inviting people over for 3-course dinners or potlucks where ALL the food was plant-based.

A lot of people I invited didn’t know my mac n’ cheese was dairy-free or had SQUASH in it. I loved the look of surprise on their faces when they tasted it and loved it! It was delicious even though it wasn’t covered in cheese or full of oil and salt.

So when I had the idea of 10-12 recipes on rotation to help me lose weight, I also thought about how I’d always “healthify” previously unhealthy foods. I’d still make pizza, but I’d leave off [most of] the cheese… and get creative with toppings and drizzles.

Think kale, white beans, garlic, barbeque sauce, a squeeze lemon juice, and some black pepper. Possibly a tiny bit of shaved parmesan, just for flavor.

On a delicious homemade crust? Or even a “clean” storebought one? YUM!

The last two mornings, we’ve had homemade waffles!

We got the “organic classic” Birch Bender’s pancake and waffle mix from Safeway last week, so it’s not technically homemade, but I’m using this mix up before switching back to my go-to (and gluten-free!) waffle mix. I also swapped the oil for applesauce and couldn’t tell any difference.

We added some organic blueberry jam, banana slices, and this spectacular Madagascar vanilla-infused organic maple syrup (in a GLASS bottle) from Costco… this big ol’ waffle has just 2g of fat, 5g protein, and 513 calories:

It’s been two and a half hours and I’m still satisfied from breakfast. Satisfaction is as much psychological as it is physical. I want to enjoy my food!!

(Oh, and if you’re wondering what kind of waffle iron I use, it’s this one that has ZERO forever chemicals in it! And I NEVER need to spray it with oil. And it’s easy to store in the van.)

I weighed the waffle and all the toppings so I could add them into Chronometer.

How delicious can I make my calorie deficit?

How healthy can I make delicious food?

It seems like a fun challenge to me.

The best part is the amount I am getting to practice not judging myself. Like yesterday, I was SOOOO hungry and wanted to eat constantly all day. I allowed myself to eat when I was hungry and my deficit ended up only being -200 calories. But I still ate way less than I had been eating, so it was still a win.

Often times when I’d wanted to lose weight in the past, I’d get consumed by perfectionism. If i didn’t have the biggest possible deficit, if I didn’t know exactly how many calories were in something, or I forgot to measure what I ate before i ate it… I’d start telling myself that tracking calories was too tedious and “not sustainable.”

And I’d quit within weeks. Just fell off the wagon and never got back on.

But for something to be sustainable, it needs to be enjoyable.

And if something is too tedious, there’s got to be a way to systematize it to remove the tedium.

Enter Grok and Chronometer.

I tell Grok what I’m eating, how I prepared it, how much of everything I used, and it tells me how many calories it is. I then log it into Chronometer. You could totally skip Grok if you want, and just input everything into Chronometer, but I find Grok helpful to keep track of everything as I go along, then when I’m relaxing after the meal I can add it in.

Grok is also great for brainstorming those 10-12 staple meals and even offering you recipe links to what you’re looking for! You can import those recipes it finds into Chronometer or another calorie-counting app. It’s like a coach or assistant.

Do whatever works and that you’ll do consistently!

And LOG IT ALL! Even if I’m just drinking a Spindrift for 3 calories, it’s getting logged.

We just need awareness of what’s going into our bodies… so we can make sense of what’s going on with our bodies.

I can admit it: I’ve definitely been eating more calories than I’ve been burning over the last 3-4 years especially.

And y’all, I don’t know if you’ve noticed this, but it is way easier to eat 500 calories than it is to burn it.

It’s also easier to eat 500 calories less… than it is to burn 500 calories more!

In many ways, I was making “weight release” harder because I was telling myself it was too hard, tedious, etc. when the truth is it’s just input manipulation. No need to add emotion into it. We can math-and-science this.

You get out what you put in. If I’m not willing to become mindful of the amount of energy I’m consuming, then I can’t be surprised if that lack of mindfulness results in weight gain.

It makes sense that if I do become more mindful, though, that the mindfulness would result in weight loss.

Mindfulness is non-negotiable. So much of eating has become mindless and pop-culturey.

Like how you’re supposed to buy half-gallon plastic jugs of this liquid called “egg nog” around Christmas time. Peppermint tea would be just as satisfying!

You’re supposed to buy a bucket of popcorn covered in fake butter when you go to the movies.

And it doesn’t help that sooooo much food out there isn’t really food. It’s been engineered to be addictive. It’s “dead” food.

Packaged, preserved food of any kind is dead. Kombucha is dead. Even Spindrift in its aluminum, plastic-lined can isn’t alive. Yes, they used fresh fruit juice when they first made it, but it ain’t fresh anymore!

The more meals made of whole foods, the better. Last night I made us steamed potato bowls with baked beans and garlicky kale drizzled with truffle hot sauce. It was divine!!!

(There are no photos of this dish — it was gone FAST!)

Whole foods are best because they are nutrient dense. Processing changes the nutrient content and absorbability. There are more vitamins in fresh-pressed orange juice than the pasteurized/homogenized kind in the plastic bottles or cartons in the grocery store. WAY more vitamins.

It’s not always practical, though. Fresh isn’t always available. In the van, we usually have a bag or two of frozen organic veggies that are quick/easy to make into a dinner.

I’m hopeful that if I can teach myself to be more present, find the joy and fun in any “mission” I set upon in life — like weight loss — that it pretty much guarantees my success.

For any change to be permanent, it has to be sustainable, enjoyable, and self-initiated. That’s why so many fad weight loss programs don’t work long term, because if you rely on factory-made food (e.g. Nutrisystem) or a weight loss shot, you depend on those items being available for your weight loss to continue (or to maintain).

Cooking puts the power in your hands. I hate it when people say “calories in, calories out” is all that matters when it comes to weight loss, too. That’s a separate soapbox, but you could eat 1500 calories of Oreos and still be starving because none of the “food” you ate had any nutrients. Your body is hungry not for calories but for nutrients.

The more nutrient-dense your food is, the more your hunger can be tamed. It’s not JUST calories your body needs to lose weight — because it’s not just calories your body needs to function.

Liver health is also key to weight loss. If the liver is overburdened by processed food, prescription drugs, and additives in our skin and personal care products, it will have fewer resources available to process the weight loss.

Weight loss is just one function the liver helps with — it has over 900 more known functions. Some say there are over 2,000 functions (many that science has yet to discover).

(Read the book Liver Rescue for more on the fascinating liver and its role in weight gain/loss).

Trendy high-fat diets promote liver sluggishness over time. It may appear to work initially for weight loss, but over the long term, it strains the liver (one of whose job it is to process fat). Fun fact: If the liver is unwell, it can be a root cause of unexplained weight gain and inability to lose weight.

Reducing fat (and increasing hydration) just gives the liver a break.

In my case, the reason for my 30-lb weight gain was threefold: getting divorced/healing from burnout + eating too much, too often and… falling in love.

I call the extra weight “love fluff” — because in the time I gained it, I really learned to love myself in a way I never had before. Plus, meeting Edward and being so comfortable and cozy in our little love bubble did NOT help at all in keeping extra pounds from creeping on :) He’s a big dude and needs more calories than I do, but I’d often find us splitting meals down the middle and, instead of saving some for later, I’d eat the exact same amount of food as my 6’1” husband!

It’s easy to see how the extra pounds came on.

My habits of daily workouts + home cooking most of the time went out the window probably in the first 1000 miles I was on the road in my van!

I find it sooo much easier to create habits when I’m not driving around the country in a van.

When I lived in a house, I had a dedicated workout space. I could wake up, get ready, have a small snack and start a workout. Here in the van, every space is used for 1-3 other things at the same time. I can’t get to my Instant Pot or juicer if I’m walking on my treadmill. There are often ants outside that make rolling out my yoga mat in a random campsite a liiiittle risky.

Part of the role of the extra weight, I’ve discovered, is to face it head on and accept myself.

Not judge myself or disrespect myself because of my size or how my clothes fit.

I used to be terrified of being this weight. Of being “this big.”

(I’m a size 10! LOL)

I do feel slightly uncomfortable at this size — and a bit heavy for my height — but none of that is an emergency. Yet for most of my life, “feeling fat” WAS an emergency.

It would quite literally consume my every thought.

So when I’m tracking my calories today, there’s some part of me who remembers that… and fears it.

It’s me that’s been making it hard.

Not wanting to fall back into those extremes, the obsession, the secret shame, the imbalance of it, I swung like a pendulum to the other side of the spectrum… where I’m not wanting to “go there” at all.

But losing weight is actually easy when you intentionally create an environment (and a system!) where you 1) don’t feel deprived, 2) can eat delicious, filling food, and 3) you can seek out awareness, joy, and gratitude in the process too.

I find that being more aware of what I’m eating not only makes it easier to be in a calorie deficit, it also gives me an opportunity to feel grateful: for the ingredients, the people I’m eating with, the ability and time it took to make it, how delicious it is without being a detriment to my health… the gratitude list goes on and on.

It’s so important to take care of ourselves. The quality of our instrument (body) affects the quality of our entire lives.

Here’s a question I like to ask myself too: If I feel like crap because I’ve been eating dead, processed, manipulated food-for-profit for a long time, what would happen if I ate more homemade and living foods instead?

Logical reasoning points to me feeling a whole lot better, and probably dropping some of my love fluff easily… without obsessing over it this time!

I’ll let it be experimental. I’ll just take a few consistent actions every day that I suspect might make me feel better and release some weight… and see if I’m right.

Spoiler alert: My husband says I’m right a lot.

Happy Sunday,
Cait

I knew when I posted my last entry totally impromptu (without looking at the schedule to see when I was already emailing something I had pre-planned with the team) that I had to not care about the outcome because the outcome was the joy of expression in itself.

It wasn’t “make sure there aren’t other emails going out today first!”

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It wasn’t “what if they didn’t need to hear that today?”

It wasn’t “nobody cares, Cait!”

or

“you’re SO annoying!”

It was “this is what I’m thinking right now and I’m gonna start blogging about it to people who’ve expressed interest in hearing what I have to say.”

Because I always feel way better when I write.

I hadn’t realized how much I got out of writing until a thought came to mind, as I was reading someone else’s Substack, that it didn’t have to be perfect to be good. It could still be interesting or helpful or funny, even if it was imperfect.

(And what is “imperfect” anyway?)

So I wrote and published the last article without “getting approval” or checking in with anyone first, and (GASP!!!!) without having “a second set of eyes” coughcough:aproofreader:coughcough to spot errosr and improve things.

I broke ALL of my old “rules” for how “writing” must be done.

One of those rules? “NEVER think of yourself first.”

Suuuch bad advice!

Better advice? It is by loving and taking great care of oneself that we are best equipped to improve the lives of others.

Others’ lives are improved by default when we take the best possible care of ourselves first.

The more love and care I give to myself, the happier I am and the more benefit others receive from me. It overflows. That’s true abundance.

Anyway, I explained to my two team members that it was part of the “rip off the Band-Aid” compulsion I had to dramatically re-enter the blogosphere. I have missed the blogosphere, and I am loving all of this fresh, new-ish not caring at all what people think of me (for real this time) energy.

From now on, I’ll post on Sundays.

At least one free post a month, with more goodies for contributing subscribers. You also have the option of being on two Zoom calls a month with me + being in my mentorship community on the Skool platform.

The community is called Conscious Rebels Network, and I totally think Jesus would be a member, ha!

Not the white Christian worship-me Jesus, the "follow me” Jesus.

Dude was SUCH a rebel.

Sunday posts seem the most special to me because I used to force myself to go to church. I liked it at first, because my youth group was super fun, but as I progressed into adulthood, it started to feel like suuuuuch a chore.

And there was just that constant low-hum undercurrent of shame that never goes away.

I used to talk my ex-husband into staying home and watching the church service online while I jumped on my trampoline instead. It felt more productive that way because I loved the way jumping on my trampoline made me feel. I did not love the way church made me feel. I didn’t even like it.

And I felt like something was wrong with me because I didn’t seem to feel like I belonged with a bunch of people crying and dancing because they were covered by the blood of Jesus.

Thankfully, it didn’t take much convincing for us to stay home. It got to the point where we only went to church when we were on the volunteer calendar. He helped usher in the congregation, whereas I wo-manned the “Welcome” table at the front of the auditorium at the local high school where we gathered.

When my then-husband and I left for South America for a year in 2015, we stopped going to church altogether.

A new adventure I could feel guilty about because it wasn’t Jesus-centric! YAY!

VERY IMPORTANT SIDENOTE: It wasn’t just Christianity, by the way, that made me slowly die inside. It was all forms of people-pleasing.

My former in-laws are a good example.

They did not initially like “our” decision to go live in South America for a year. My former father-in-law literally told us “if you want to go waste a year of your life down there, that’s up to you” — implying living abroad would be a waste. I will never understand that perspective. I still laugh about it because that trip is now such a MILESTONE in my life … I’ll never regret the time I “wasted” down there.

My inlaws also “knew” it was ME who had hatched such an outrageous “plan.” I was the mastermind behind the idea for their son to quit his “stable” $34,000 per year job in financial aid for a for-profit “university” in the Orlando area and go live in South America for a year instead.

I was clearly the worst influence on him.

My income could more than cover us living abroad in South America. He wanted to start his own business anyway, and I thought I’d be a “good wife” by supporting him while he built his dream.

I would’ve been fine with that too… if he’d actually built his dream. Instead, I built a new business. It became the business that supported him hopping from idea to idea with “nothing panning out”… the one that ran without the constant dependence on ME having enough freelance clients to pay the bills.

I built that. He benefited from it. These days, I find peace in knowing I made such a huge difference in his life. I’m also happy to not be part of his life anymore, ha! Both can be true at the same time, and they are.

That business grew and grew, into the millions per year, and that version of Cait also grew increasingly resentful toward my then-husband for not contributing the same as what I was contributing to the relationship (financially).

It was a LOT of pressure and pretty exhausting.

By April 2016 I had gained quite a bit of weight and was quite depressed. I was drinking a lot of wine, too.

I didn’t want to be doing what I was doing, but I kept doing it anyway, and I used substances like wine to make it more bearable.

I’d dreamed of more adventure than sitting in a hot downtown Santiago apartment with no air conditioning, writing a blog post about proofreading when I didn’t want to do that for the rest of my life.

Where was the space for that conversation?

It was a conversation I wasn’t quite ready to have with myself.

In my world, I’d made a decision to get married… to be someone’s wife… and I had to figure out a way to make peace with that decision because I’d told this guy in my wedding vows that I’d never leave him.

I NEEDED life to be interesting. Adventure was the way to do that. I was spending all my time trying to make money to support him building his dream, when what I really wanted was to spend my time doing what made me feel great.

The masculine/feminine balance was nonexistent.

I was very much “in my masculine” in my first marriage.

We had a very exciting life, though. Lots of adventures that would never have happened had I not insisted on them.

(For example, we cruised to St. Petersburg, Russia in 2017!)

All that fun was an attempt to drown out the emotional monotony I felt in my inner world. Relationally, too. I hardly knew myself! How could I know someone else enough to want to partner with them for life? I didn’t know what that meant.

Doing it all for myself sucked the life right out of me. Forcing myself to stay when I would’ve been happier alone… was exhausting.

But there was the version of me I felt I needed to be so God would accept and love me.

And there was the version of me who made me feel the most alive.

The truly authentic, unwatered-down version of me.

I genuinely thought I was doing the “right” thing by honoring my wedding vows, but I was actually self-abandoning in a most spectacular way.

I felt my lack of authenticity in my first marriage. I couldn’t articulate that that’s what it was, but I always knew something wasn’t quite right. I’d often blame myself instead of understanding the true causes.

Christian doctrine and purity culture installed in me the belief that serving a man is a role of such high honor. Being someone’s wife was the highest aspiration

In stark contrast, my husband now is obsessed with me, and I with him. He’s the best. I get to “me” all day, whatever that entails — a podcast, a CRN meetup, making videos, Instagram live, playing Dreamlight Valley, a spa day — and he is working to make sure I will always be able to do that. Soon, he’ll be able to do it too. He has such an incredible work ethic.

But I digress :)

Back to blurting it out and not caring what anybody thinks — and since it’s Sunday!! — something that feels really good to say out loud (because I genuinely believe it with all my heart and when I started saying it out loud I connected with a lot of others who needed to hear it and it helped them find more freedom):

Jesus “dying for us” is a LIE.

…and most of what I say after such a bold statement isn’t a direct defense of the assertion I made, it’s a bunch of questions instead.

Questions that the average Bible-believing Christian has likely never asked themselves.

Questions like... who/what decided someone had to die for us to be forgiven? That BLOOD was the currency necessary?

And why was there a price or a transaction necessary first? It makes no sense.

God is love and love keeps NO RECORDS of wrong, yet Jesus is paying for my sin, which God remembers until blood erases it?

Also, who sent the bill? Jesus paid it but Jesus IS God so God paid himself to protect us/save us from himself?

Seriously though. The more comfortable you get asking questions like these (and not getting attached to needing a right answer), the better.

Often, just the thinking about it is enough to indirectly help someone start a new leg of their faith journey because Christians have been taught they need to be able to defend their faith. So the way I see it, they need to know the answers to these questions.

I’m literally helping them grow in their faith by asking them. That’s why it’s so interesting when Christians find my videos offensive.

The offended ones feel uncomfortable and blame me for their discomfort… instead of listening and thinking about what I’m saying. It’s more important to defend one’s long-held beliefs than to know why you believe them in the first place.

The exciting part, the “Trojan Horse,” hidden benefit aspect of it is this: it’s in asking new questions — seeking — that these people (who are already totally convinced that “Jesus” is the answer to every question and have stopped asking questions) may just stumble upon a truth that actually sets them free.

Seek and you shall find. But you won’t find anything you’re not looking for.

Questions from people like me (in my videos, articles, etc.) give Christians a reason to start thinking in a new way.

I left the Christian religion because there were no answers for the questions like “Who’s demanding a payment for sin?” No one was even asking the questions.

But because Christians do feel the need to defend their faith. Let them “defend it” from people like me. I am not scared of their hurt feelings.

It’s not my job to protect their religion. It’s my job to scrutinize it and guide people to a more fulfilling, connected way of living that is free of unnecessary guilt, shame, and fear.

My goal isn’t to destroy anyone’s faith, but to expand it. To show Christians (deconstructing or not) more of who Jesus actually is/was… and challenge them to see more of what’s happening around them. I want to help people see that their “faith” is actually a well-designed trap that keeps them oblivious to the truth… a trap that lulls them to sleep and deprives them of the Heaven (freedom) they could be experiencing instead.

That’s all for today <3

C

PS — I launched a free 10-day Deconstruction Crash Course. Access it here.

I especially resonated with Jordan’s stories of being on AOL Instant Messenger (AIM!!) and in chat rooms from a young age, her stream of consciousness style of writing and I honestly felt a little homesick in a way I couldn’t describe.

I used to do that, too.

I used to do it, but why did I stop?

I got married. Became “more” Christian. More suppressed and cautious about saying the “wrong” thing and getting chastised by people more Christian than me.

The last time I wrote a post on my old stream-of-consciousness blog was November 29, 2009.

It was right after I started dating my now ex-husband, who used to be in an ultra fundamentalist “Christian” sect in the UK (for FIVE YEARS!).

Basically, he was in a cult.

(Again, FIVE YEARS!)

I was fascinated by that, too.

I was an evangelical but had no idea I was also in a cult. I felt different than my friends though. They bought in to the “go out into all the world” missionary side of things.

I didn’t.

Couldn’t, rather.

I wanted to see the world and explore, fall in love, feel alive, breathe deeply and eat amazing food in new places.

Often.

I needed adventure. I needed excitement. And I needed it OFTEN.

Because I’d been so, so bored, yet so anxious and — at times — secretly ashamed.

There was always something about the Christian doctrine that didn’t make sense to me.

I came to Jesus through people-pleasing. At the Baptist revival I went to at age 13 with my dad, Mitma (what I called our grandma), and Aunt Norma where I “gave my life to Christ”… I prayed the prayer because the hellfire and brimstone preaching worked. I was scared of hell.

I also knew that the adults in the room would be happy if I went forward during the altar call. I wanted them to approve of me. That’s how you got things as a kid! Whether it was attention, a new toy, permission to go to a friend’s house over the weekend… if your parents approved of and liked you, if you made them happy, life was pretty good.

I had no idea that was people pleasing.

So I did it… for years. The youth pastors had to be smarter than me because they were pastors, after all! If they thought you were awesome, everything was good. Nothing needed to change.

But at the same time, I “knew” my heart was untrustworthy and sinful. My desires were something to be suppressed, not fulfilled or acted upon. They were of the carnal mind.

And humans deserve hell, after all.

What they thought mattered to me. A lot.

That was the real hell. That prison of approving myself only to the extent I perceived they approved of me.

Although I wanted them to like me and approve of me, it did have limits. If getting their approval required doing something I didn’t want to do (like fundraise for a mission trip to a place I didn’t want to go to “evangelize” and bring people the “good news of Jesus Christ”) or NOT doing what I did want to do (study abroad, travel, etc.)… I wasn’t cool with that.

I did what I wanted to do… and just felt guilty about it the whole time.

My friends went on mission trips or had become teachers in Christian schools overseas in countries like China and Japan… they were doing “Christian” things with their lives versus doing “adventure” things like what I wanted to do.

In 2007, I enrolled in a study abroad program in Germany and LOVED IT but the whole time I had this constant undercurrent of anxiety that my “Christian” friends wouldn’t approve of my life choices while I was there.

My “trip” to Germany as a college student and weekend adventurer wasn’t Jesus-centric at all, and I felt secret shame about that.

Especially when I fell in love and gasp had sex before marriage!!!!!!

Oh, the SHAME! Premarital sex was the worst if you grew up surrounded by various purity culture narratives… like True Love Waits and Josh Harris’ I Kissed Dating Goodbye”.

It was these narratives that pushed me toward getting married way too early. At barely 24 years old. Two years before my brain finished developing.

Because I thought any relationship outside a government-sanctioned and approved piece of paper “legal” MARRIAGE couldn’t be part of a “godly” life of a Christian woman.

Instead of nonjudgment and acceptance and genuine freedom found in adventuring through Europe as a college-age young adult… I judged myself and felt shame because I’d accepted as truth that expressing myself sexually with a safe person I enjoyed being with was bad. Sinful, even!

Shame about my sexual experience as a college student in Germany (I was 20 and 21) was ever present. Like, the whole time I was there.

It was always on my mind in some way, at least a little bit. It clouded my subconscious. This general uneasiness about who I was and how I was choosing to express myself and with whom.

Funny thing is, now I can look back and see how not concerned my friends were.

You know that saying, “Nobody thinks about you as much as you imagine they do”? Most of the time they’re actually thinking about themselves and not you at all. So why care what they think?

It’s highly likely that I was imagining most of their attention. I was not actually at the top of their prayer list due to my insanely interesting life of abject and unbridled sin.

I called it adventure. And without the layer of judgment I got from religion, that’s exactly what it was. The whole time.

I was learning and growing through every single one of those experiences and had no reason to feel any shame about them.

Christianity caused me to hide and suppress myself in so many areas of my life that suffered because of the shame.

I hid who I was out of fear it would be labeled “heretical” or “worldly.”

No more :)

The fact was, they hardly thought of me. Although I was so insecure about myself and was seeking what I perceived as their approval, their opinion held a lot of weight. My opinion didn’t seem to hold much weight with them, although I seldom shared my opinions with them… so I don’t have a lot of data to confirm that bias or test that theory.

I just wanted them to like me. So I completely hid the parts of myself I thought they wouldn’t like. I watered down many others.

In some ways, I hid mostly from myself.

A lot of the shame I felt, came from me shaming myself. Where did I learn to shame myself?

I’ll have to do some thinking about that.

Anyway, I’d been in Germany for three months already without a peep from any of them, when one afternoon I received a piece of mail from one of my Christian friends back home.

I was so excited! Mail at my cool new German university dorm… from home in Florida!

But when I opened it, it wasn’t what I hoped it would be. I guess I didn’t hope for anything in particular, though. I was just surprised.

Caught off guard in a way.

Because it was a “cookie cutter” letter… that had been sent to dozens of other people… from my Christian/college classmate friend… who was asking for a donation to her planned 3-month long mission trip to the “10-40” window, which was this so-called very dangerous area for Christian missionaries, but that’s also what made it a VERY important place to evangelize.

You know, because there are so many unreached people groups.

It was all very serious, you see.

Since, after all, if these people didn’t believe in Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior, they might be cast into the lake of fire and would never get to be with God in Heaven after they die … and it would be your fault, kinda.

But really it was their choice, because of their sin of unbelief in Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior, since he died for them as a sacrifice to himself to cleanse their sins with his blood.

And they never sought him out.

How would they know Jesus died for their sins if you don’t go out and tell them?

All very, very serious!!

Truth be told? I was miffed at receiving that “give me money” letter from my missionary-minded friend from UCF/church back home in Florida.

Absolutely miffed.

I was telling myself a story, making myself a victim.

I knew she knew that I “had” money. I wasn’t rich, but it was true that I had gone to college and studied abroad on full and/or partial scholarships and grants, didn’t have any student loan debt (or debt at all), and was able to self-finance a lot of my stay in Germany…

… I was convinced that was why I got that piece of mail. I was a means to an end.

Maybe I was. Who knows?

She didn’t ask how I was, nothin’. We hadn’t talked since before i left. I was there living a totally different life, speaking another language, perceiving a different world entirely and she. was. not. interested.

Instead of realizing that, though, and just ignoring the letter, I guiltily sent her $100.

I felt guilty for only giving her $100 for her trip when I could’ve easily given more. I could have ignored it altogether (and been entirely within my right to do so), but I didn’t want to. Giving her something felt necessary since, well… she knew I had money, after all.

She needed my help.

Jesus needed my help.

Jesus wants to save everyone, but he can only save them if they believe in him. And my friend needs ME to give HER money so she can go tell them about Jesus so they can choose to believe in him before it’s too late and they die and go to hell.

One hundred of my dollars went to that objective.

I was a part of that in the summer of 2008 for my friend who went to that area in North Africa.

(Oh, this feels so good to express :))

Christianity never made sense to me, but I thought I was the problem. It was so easy. Just believe. Then go out and help others become believers to so they can go to Heaven when we die.

What’s Heaven? And what’s this place? Why is it like this? Who was Jesus, what was he actually doing?

What exactly do I need to believe to be saved?

that the blood of Jesus is what saves you? If so, how? What is it about blood that is “saving” you? Who asked for this blood? Who received this payment? Who set the price? What are we paying for? Why does it have a cost? What is the nature of this transaction? Is it love? I thought love kept no record of wrongs?

Church people could never answer those questions, and I took that to mean they were bad questions. “Jesus” was the answer to every question I had, even if it didn’t make sense.

Jesus died on the cross for your sins?

Jesus is knocking at the door of your heart, he wants to be Lord of your life, and all you have to do is

let

him

in.

That’s it. The whole point of life.

And if you don’t “get it” and can’t believe in it (perhaps due to it not making sense and you know this because you thought about it critically), then that’s unfortunate because now God rejects you and you’re choosing to go to hell.

That’s legitimately what people write on my Instagram comments. They believe it is their job to admonish me for the truth I am speaking from my heart. It is incorrect because it doesn’t deify or center Jesus enough for them. If Jesus is not being praised and worshipped first and foremost in your life, if you are not spending hours in prayer and meditation thanking him profusely for paying for your sins, then you are not a Christian and you will not be saved.

If you say you believe it, like many do, just ‘cause they’re afraid of what happens if they don’t, though… it’s ok. You’re still saved.

Maybe. Because after all, God is the final judge. He could decide you didn’t live “for him” enough.

Because God is Love, yes… but he’s still a judge, right?

*****

GOD IS NOT A JUDGE, YOU ARE.

I don’t think “God is a judge” is true anymore.

God doesn’t judge, and I think that’s what makes him God, which is love.

Unconditional acceptance requires non-judgment. Demands it.

I’ve been VERY challenged lately to not judge myself.

We mostly judge ourselves, don’t we?

I had no idea how much I had been judging myself until after a recent therapeutic psilocybin session.

I entered into it mindfully and with several intentions to reconnect with what’s important + cultivate self love and confidence.

It worked!

It was me who had been throttling the flow, the authenticity that was much more present back in my OG blogging days.

Still, I remember how much I held back, even then.

Now, here I am at 39, looking back at a 20-something-year-old’s blog from the mid/late 2000s… which reminds me of the Teen Open Diary account I had, the Xanga, the myspace, the paper journals I’ve kept over the years, the long-form Facebook posts I’d write before my divorce…

I USED TO WRITE A LOT. Even in a held-back kind of way, I wrote.

And I want to write (probably a lot) again.

What was holding me back was me, telling me things about what had to be true about my writing for it to be acceptable.

it had to make sense

be free of typos

BE INTERESTING ENOUGH that people would like it

not be annoying

not be too short or long

not be controversial or offend anyone

But now I just don’t care about offending anyone.

I finally realize that my truest intention here is authenticity. it’s freedom of expression. Uncovering the windows to your soul, your innermost musings that other people need to hear. That’s the nature of our expression. It’s all art when it’s from the heart.

That’s why I don’t care about offending Christians. This is my art — writing — and I’m not seeking “Christian” approval of it anymore.

Looking back, I see how wanting to be a “good Christian” and fit into the mold I thought Jesus wanted me to fit into, by checking all the boxes of “right” doctrine and activity, like mission trips (even if it was just to hand out green beans or meat loaf at the local homeless coalition for an evening) and “quiet time” with the Lord in “his Word” early in the morning before I did anything else… fed into me being even more of a performer and people pleaser than I already was.

I’d already figured out how to keep my parents happy. Never expressing any “negative” emotion whatsoever. And never reacting to their emotions.

(They were always allowed to express themselves fully, but I was not.)

I was scared to tell my mom I wanted to go to youth group.

I was scared to tell her I wanted to go study abroad in Germany.

I was afraid she’d disapprove, even if she technically couldn’t disapprove. I was an adult, after all — and I had the money to do it on my own, and I had a passport. I could do it.

So I did it.

I knew if I didn’t do it, I’d regret it the rest of my life, and I was right.

I WENT TO GERMANY from October 2007 to July 2008. I was also there for 5 weeks in summer of 2007. My minor was German at university, and I spoke it fluently by the end of my time abroad. It was awesome!

My Germany blog had exactly 1 reader most of the time, and it was my mom.

A few times, my friends would leave comments on my Facebook photos, but for the most part I was alone over there. Everyone else’s lives continued without me, just like mine continued without them.

They weren’t even there… yet I still cared greatly what they thought about what I was doing, even though they had no idea what I was doing because I didn’t tell them much about it, and they didn’t read my blog.

Who cares, right?

But I cared… a lot. There was so much to say and share but I censored myself so heavily for fear of criticism.

I have a lot more to say now that I’m 39, married for the second time, openly NON Christian… yet still following Jesus in that I am trying to live my life and speak my truth authentically and non fearfully. I do not give much attention to the government and now openly criticize it (along with Christianity).

It feels so good to say what I’m thinking again, in a way that I used to but better now, since I have more experience now.

I’ve traveled a ton. All through Germany (13 countries total in that time abroad alone).

And my next adventure would start with lots of writing too.

In 2014, I started blogging again!

Proofreading. I taught people how to start proofreading businesses from home.

Pre-AI.

It was awesome. I made a LOT of money between 2014 and 2022, but I lost myself in it in a way.

Because nobody cared about my personal life or my thoughts outside of what would help them in their proofreading endeavors.

I get it. They “paid for a course” and not for all the “other stuff” — like what I was learning traveling South America, building the business that had sold an online course to them, the consumer.

I had nothing else of value to offer these people as long as that’s what they wanted me to give them. I felt like a prisoner to my work in a whole new way.

Basically, I internalized that I was only valuable for what other people could immediately use. ONLY the proofreading side of me was valuable. Everything else was just “junk” or “noise” — but I was afraid of sharing it, too, because I was afraid of rejection. I was still just that little girl who wanted to be liked more than anything.

Liking myself felt wrong somehow. Wouldn’t want it to go to my head, expect too much from myself or actually start believing that I had something to offer people. That’d be weird.

Almost didn’t start my proofreading blog for that exact reason. I didn’t think anyone would want to learn from me and I didn’t think I had anything valuable to offer.

I wonder where that came from.

Growing up, I heard “shut up, Cait” a lot from my fraternal twin sister a lot. Or, “nobody cares, Cait.”

or “You’re so annoying”

That got internalized too.

(I know I said things to her out of sheer ignorance as well, and that maybe she internalized some of those things too. I’d love to talk about it all with her to see what we can learn about each other, but her inner child might not feel safe with me yet and that’s ok!)

If what you were doing wasn’t Jesus-centered, nobody in church actually understood why you’d want to do it, either.

“Why are you going to South America? Is it a mission trip?” it was BIZARRE to people why one would choose to travel. Going “just for the experience of it” seemed frivolous, I guess.

And “just for the experience” — just to see what happens — that’s why I went.

That’s reason enough.

I wanted to go because it was one of those things in life I knew would make me better. Like… there was no way i could do the thing (live abroad in Germany, South America, get the van, make the documentary, etc) AND NOT BECOME BETTER because of it.

What do I mean by better?

Better = more expanded

more patient

more resilient and resourceful

more courageous

more present

and more grateful.

I also knew there was no way I could not do the thing. My inner child, as it were, would not allow that. “No” was not an acceptable answer.

She’d be constantly restless, wondering when we were gonna get to go do something fun and exciting, impatiently poking me over and over, NEVER letting me forget that this thing she really wanted to do was not only possible, but I was the only thing standing in her way of getting to do it.

So I had to give in or I’d ruin her life. My inner teen would experience me as an overprotective parent if I didn’t just relax and let her go do something cool on her own.

Why not let my inner child live out her dream?

What I didn’t expect was that all new experiences do that thing of making us better versions of ourselves. That’s where we get wisdom, is through experience.

Doing the thing you’ve never done before, even if it’s scary, makes us better too.

For me, one of the things I’d never done before was making videos about what does not make sense to me about Christianity, out loud. It was scary at first, but now it feels SO GOOD, like something I can’t not do.

I finally no longer care about what the Christians in my life think about me and my “walk with the Lord.”

It was Christianity I walked away from, not Jesus.

So in making my videos, I removed a “stopper” to my most authentic self.

The stopper, again, was just me. I got out of my own way.

The stopper was my own fears, internalized nonsense from yesteryear, childhood, church times + friend groups that are no longer relevant because the belief I have in myself is what I was searching for all along. It’s what jesus wanted me to find.

(The real Jesus, that is — not the commercialized evangelical one)

Being more accepting and less judging of myself FEELS better too. Imagine that!

Loving yourself is supposed to feel good, yet I am still surprised by the joy of it.

Nothing is wrong, there isn’t another shoe that’s going to drop. I’m back with me and I’ve got me.

The only one I need to impress now is me. The only one to “compete” with now is me.

And I don’t want to compete. I just want to blossom.

(I also want to just stay in bed sometimes, especially on a snowy or rainy day!)

Blossoming starts with removing all the stoppers that, well… stop blossoming.

The fear of “what will they think”

The anxiety of “what will they say?”

The compulsion to care about how you look to others.

And cancel culture!!! (which is a culture of nonacceptance and labeling, othering, excluding. Hypocrisy.)

It feels way better to speak from the heart and say what’s actually going on in my head instead.

Random yet kinda related thought: I think instead of expressing my feelings, I was eating them.

I’m 30 pounds heavier now than I was when my awakening started.

"I’m in my chubby potato era,” as I like to say, and I have no problem removing the stoppers there, but emotional eating is real. We do it for a feeling. We do everything for a feeling.

But there are other ways to feel free and happy than eating — and one of them is writing. Authentic self expression. Describing your surroundings in a way that, in feeling heard by yourself, you also help others feel seen and less alone.

I have a hunch based on many social media comments that people want AND need to hear what I have to say, and I need to say what I’m thinking. So it works out.

A win win. It’s also mega efficient, which I love.

By the way, a lot of my posts will be free, but a good chunk will be paid, too, since there are different (deeper) levels of safety from an emotional standpoint and some things are better said on the other side of a paywall.

But just know that I’m about freedom. Creating freedom starts with setting yourself free, so that’s what these writings are primarily about. Allowing myself and my words to soar and reach whomever they will, observing the ripples they make and enjoying myself along the way.

Until next time

C

Rob’s awakening started long before his heart attack six years ago, but that experience cracked something open in a new way, exposing the limits of conventional medicine and sending him deeper into energy healing, past life regression, astral travel, and learning to work with the different energies and entities that move through us.

In this conversation they get into the programming installed in us from family, religion, and society before we’re old enough to question it, what it actually looks like to alchemize dark experiences into something that serves your growth, and why the work we do on ourselves is never just for ourselves.

Caitlin also gets real about her own recent journey and what it revealed about the ways she had been unknowingly holding herself back from showing up fully in the world.

This one went places neither of them planned. The best ones always do. 🙏

Connect with Rob: 🌐 consciousalchemistcoach.com

Want to be in the room for the full conversation including the exclusive member Q&A that never gets posted publicly? That’s what Conscious Rebels Network is.

[Join Conscious Rebels Network]

Okay so Easter is today and I have some thoughts. 😅

For a long time after I left Christianity I just kind of avoided it. Like, that’s a church holiday, I don’t do church anymore, so I guess I just don’t do that.

I’d see everyone posting their family photos in their pastel outfits and feel this weird mix of relief that I wasn’t doing that anymore and also kind of... sad? Nostalgic for something I couldn’t quite put my finger on?

And then at some point I realized I was being kind of ridiculous about it.

Not every tradition has to go in the trash just because the belief system it came wrapped in did. That’s a perfect example of throwing the baby out with the bathwater because you’re mad at the bathwater. Which honestly I get! The bathwater was pretty bad! But still.

Easter never belonged to Christianity to begin with.

The word Easter most likely comes from Eostre, a Germanic goddess of spring and dawn. The eggs, the rabbits, the whole vibe of it, these things are ancient. They predate Jesus by a long shot. They’re about spring, the earth coming back to life, and light returning after a long dark stretch.

The early church basically just... plopped their resurrection story on top of an existing spring festival because it made conversion easier. Which, now that I know that, is so on brand for them. 😂

So when (if!) I show up to an Easter dinner now, it’s not because I believe Jesus rose from the dead. It’s because I love the people at the table. Because spring genuinely makes me happy. Because the food is good and the flowers are out and… something about this time of year just feels like things are starting again.

And that feeling, that new beginning, that thawing out energy, that’s actually a pretty perfect metaphor for what a lot of us are going through in deconstruction now that I think about it.

So here’s what nobody really talks about when it comes to navigating holidays post-deconstruction.

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The short version is: fifteen years inside evangelical Christianity, a marriage I stayed in longer than I should’ve, a company I built while slowly falling apart inside, forced hospitalizations I never saw coming, and a collection of haphazard psychiatric diagnoses that kept shifting depending on who I was sitting in front of that week.

What I want to talk about here is what actually happens inside a person when they spend years inside a fear-based belief system… and then try to find their way out of it.

Because I’ve now talked to enough people going through this to know that “the details” are different but the architecture is almost always the same.

And nobody is mapping that architecture out honestly.

So let’s do that.

First you have to understand what the religious framework actually installed into you.

Not the surface stuff like “I went to church and now I feel guilty sometimes.” I mean the deep structural stuff that got in before you were old enough to question it.

Evangelical Christianity, at its doctrinal core, teaches that you were born cosmically wrong.

Fundamentally, irreparably wrong. So wrong, in fact, that a perfectly loving God couldn’t even tolerate your existence without someone being violently executed sacrificed on your behalf first.

And even after the execution, even after you’ve accepted the “gift” of it, you’re still being watched. Your thoughts can be sinful. Your desires are suspect. Your heart is, as the scripture goes, deceitful above all things.

God loves you infinitely… but you deserve death. God forgives you, sure. But only because of the blood.

Washed in the blood. Covered by the blood. Saved by the blood of the lamb. (so. much. blood 🤢)

When you step outside of it for a second, start actually hearing what the words are saying and notice how violent and visceral it actually is.

The central story of the “faith” of Christianity is a brutal execution… an outpouring of blood that a loving God allegedly required in order to tolerate you. That’s the foundation that everything else is built on.

For a sensitive, perfectionistic person who takes things seriously and actually tries to be good, that foundation creates effectively zero peace. It just creates a gnarly thought-loop.

Guilt. Repentance. Temporary relief. Repeat.

What about the minor detail of I don’t want to be covered in blood?!

With the baseline always being you are not enough (and you never will be!) on your own.

That loop runs silently in the background for years. Decades sometimes. And because it’s been there since before you had the language to describe it, it stops feeling like fear and starts feeling like just… you. It’s just your “personality.” Like the way you are.

Joe Dispenza in his book Breaking the Habit of Being Yourself talks about how you become addicted to the emotions and state of being “you.” It’s familiar and it’s what we’re used to feeling.

But none of that default anxiety is actually the way you are!!! It’s just what got programmed in by religion.

The question that cracked it open for me was simple.

If God is love, and love keeps no record of wrongs, why would God require a blood payment for a debt he’s not keeping a record of?

(Unless it’s not actually God who’s demanding payment?)

I sat with that question for a long time before I let myself actually think freely about it. And once I did I couldn’t un-think it. The God I’d experienced didn’t match the God I’d been taught to fear at all.

That gap became impossible to close.

I want to be really clear here because I know how easy it is to misread what I’m saying. I’m not sitting here thinking everyone who believes this is wrong or deluded or damaged (although it’s definitely possible and even likely based on my experience). I believed it for over a decade. Most people inside it are sincere. Many find real comfort in the community and the structure. I understand why.

But the question that matters isn’t whether the people inside it are good people. Most of them are. The question is what the psychological structure of the doctrine itself does to the nervous system over time.

And the answer, for a lot of us, is: a lot. It does a lot.

Pssssst! The remainder of this essay is for paying subscribers.

The rest goes into the parts nobody talks about: what deconstruction actually feels like from the inside, why the grief hits harder than the anger, what the identity excavation really involves, and the practical roadmap for where to actually start when everything you were handed falls apart.

This is exactly the kind of conversation that belongs somewhere private.

Upgrading allows me to keep writing essays like these.

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They get into how fear of hell pulled Steven into evangelical Christianity after the military, how that framework quietly stunts your growth, his experience with hospitalization and being cycled through psychiatric medications, and the healing modalities that actually moved the needle for him.

They also talk about outgrowing your community after deconstruction, the grief that comes with it, and why pulling away from people who no longer resonate isn’t something to feel guilty about.

Want to hear what happened after we stopped recording? Members of Conscious Rebels Network got access to the full live Q&A with Steven, plus replays of every guest conversation we’ve ever had.

Contact Steven:
Email: healingrootsonup@gmail.com

Instagram: @HealingRootsOnUp

Books referenced + links:
[Steven’s book] From A**Hole to Alright: https://amzn.to/4bkCKX1

No Bad Parts (book on Internal Family Systems therapy modality): https://amzn.to/4rw9d2O
A Liberated Mind: https://amzn.to/47Gzggx

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And I’m not making it because it’s a trending topic or because I think it’ll do well on social media, but because I lived it – it almost took me out! – and because I know I’m not the only one.

I’ve been sitting with this project for a long time, turning it over, wondering if I was ready to “go there” publicly in this kind of format. A documentary means cameras and interviews. It means I can’t dance around the topic semi-vaguely anymore.

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I’ll be sharing other people’s stories alongside my own. But before I ask anyone else to show up and tell their truth, I want to tell mine.

I grew up inside evangelical Christianity, from age 13-28. And what that did, slowly and thoroughly and over a very long period of time, was convince me that I was fundamentally dangerous to myself.

My thoughts could be sinful and doubt was seen as rebellion or “falling away.” My heart, I was told, was deceitful above all things – and what I wanted to do with my life had to be some kind of wrong unless it was heading out on a mission trip overseas.

God was watching and Hell was real. And the only thing standing between me and annihilation was a perfect blood payment from someone else on my behalf.

Really think about what that does to a developing nervous system 😅it’s not good.

When you grow up believing your own mind is a deceiver, you don’t learn to trust yourself. You learn to police yourself and perform goodness. People please. You learn to interpret your own suffering as the consequences of spiritual failure. And you get very, very good at endurance because endurance is what God requires of you.

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It happens to the best of ‘em, right?

That was the operating system I was running on by the time I hit my twenties.

I got married inside that framework 🤢I stayed in it longer than I should’ve, not because anyone was holding a gun to my head but because the voice inside my own head was doing a thorough enough job on its own.

God hates divorce. Marriage is a CoVeNanT. A good wife never leaves, especially if she promised she never would. Just pray and lean on your faith when things get hard.

So I “leaned in” and I endured. And I kept building my company on the outside while silently falling apart on the inside, because that’s what you do when you’ve been taught that struggle is sanctified… and rest is laziness.

The burnout didn’t show up all at once. It crept in the way it always does, slowly at first and then all at once. But by the time I couldn’t ignore it anymore, I wasn’t just burned out. I was also in a marriage that wasn’t working, deconstructing a faith that had been my entire framework for reality, and watching the version of myself I had performed for years start to crack in ways I couldn’t hide anymore, even if I wanted to.

Everything collapsed and/or exploded at the same time… because everything had been held together by the same thing.

That’s when the hospitalizations started…

I was admitted more than once. Always against my will, since no one around me recognized what was actually happening – and I lacked the language and awareness to explain it. Every single time I came out with a new label to add to the collection. Major depressive disorder. Generalized anxiety. Bipolar disorder. OCD. CPTSD… just to name a few.. The diagnoses shifted depending on who I was sitting in front of, which I now understand tells you more about the limits of the framework of a “science” called “psychiatry” than it does about what was actually going on with me.

What nobody in any of those rooms ever asked me…

… is about the belief system I’d been living inside since childhood.

Nobody asked about the shame that had been instilled in me before I was old enough to question it.

Nobody asked what it does to a person to spend years forcing yourself into a life that doesn’t fit because “God” said so.

Nobody asked about the burnout or the nervous system or what happens when a high-achieving, perfectionistic person runs on adrenaline and spiritual obligation for a decade straight.

Nope. They just subjectively looked at my symptoms and decided on a label. And then they told me this was probably just who I was now.

Adjust your expectations for your life, they said.

I was in my early thirties, and I was being told to make peace with being broken for the rest of my life.

I refused to accept that. The shift happened gradually.

It started with one question I was almost afraid to ask: what if I’m not broken? What if everything that happened to me was actually my body and brain’s completely predictable response to a stressful environment… and an impossible amount of internal pressure? 🤯

That question changed everything.

Because when I looked at my life through that lens, the hospitalizations didn’t look like proof of a permanently defective brain anymore. They looked like the inevitable outcome of chronic burnout layered on top of spiritual terror layered on top of an identity built entirely on performance and obligation and the fear of divine punishment.

My system didn’t malfunction. It had collapsed under the weight of what it had been carrying.

That’s not a mental disorder. That’s just a human being who was never given permission to just… be a human being.

I want to be really clear about something because I know how easy it is to misread what I’m saying here.

I am not saying Christianity destroys everyone who touches it. I’m not demonizing the mental health industry as a whole. That is not what this documentary is about.

What I am saying is that fear-based theology is psychologically volatile. Especially for sensitive, high-achieving, perfectionistic people who internalize everything and perform their way through life because that’s what they were taught “God” required of them. And when that person eventually breaks down (and they will break down) the current system isn’t set up to ask the right questions. It’s set up to name the symptoms and manage them.

The root cause stays buried. And the person stays stuck.

That’s the conversation I want to have on camera.

I’m looking for a small number of people who’ve also lived at this intersection. Who grew up inside evangelical culture and came out of it with a diagnosis (and possibly a prescription or two)… but no real answers. Who were told their suffering was either a lack of faith or a “chemical imbalance,” and who eventually started wondering if the real answer was somewhere neither of those systems was willing to look.

I want to sit across from those people and let them tell the truth. The whole truth. Not the version that’s been edited down to protect other people’s feelings or avoid controversy.

This film isn’t about revenge and it isn’t about tearing anything down. It’s about finally having a conversation that is honest enough to actually help someone.

If that someone is you, or if you know someone whose story belongs in this film, the casting call is open. It takes about twenty to thirty minutes to complete. There are no right answers. Just your story, told as honestly as you can tell it.

I can’t wait to see who shows up. 🙏

Apply here

I’m about to say something that’ll irritate almost everyone on every “side.”

Arguing online isn’t changing the world. It feels like it is. It looks like it is. It gives you that dopamine rush that fools you into believing you’re “doing something.”

But most of what passes for “activism” right now is performance inside a machine that was literally built to harvest your attention. And attention is currency.

The loudest people online think they’re resisting corruption. In reality, though, they’re feeding the very same system they claim to oppose.

Let’s talk about why, shall we?

The Outrage Economy

Social media doesn’t reward nuance, deep thought, or peace. It rewards anger.

Why is that?

Because anger, fear, and division spread much faster than love and unity… which grow slower but stronger. More like a mighty oak tree than a thick patch of parasitic weeds.

The algorithm just amplifies whatever keeps you hooked. If we’re enraged, then we keep scrolling. When we’re fearful, then we’ll keep checking for updates. If we’re arguing, then we’ll stay on the app and keep commenting.

Every reaction is engagement. All engagement is data. And all that data? That’s what gets monetized.

The machine doesn’t care which “side” we’re on. It cares that we’re emotionally activated… because that’s what generates what they want: money.

Think about it:

If the media actually wanted resolution, they wouldn’t structure every story purposely to inflame us. They’d slow it down. Present multiple perspectives (calmly). Maybe encourage critical thinking instead of emotional reaction.

But outrage is profitable. Peaceful self-control isn’t.

You ARE Being Played (from Every Angle)

Left. Right. Red. Blue. Conservative. Progressive. Donkey. Elephant.

None of it actually matters 😅

As long as we’re glued to our screens reacting to headlines, we’re pawns on the board.

Corporate media survives on advertising revenue. Advertising revenue requires viewership. Viewership thrives on emotional intensity.

So what do they sell to get more of what pays? Crisis.

Every week there’s a new catastrophe. Every day a new villain. Every hour a new “thing” you’re supposed to be just furious about. And if you zoom out for even a millisecond, you’ll notice something…

Most of these “emergencies” silently disappear as soon as the next one drops. Because again… the goal isn’t resolution. It’s rotation. It’s to make sure we never stop spinning and arguing… and to make sure we stay divided.

All while the same institutions expand their power, print money, consolidate their control, and rewrite the rules (to later gaslight us on) in the background. You’re busy fighting your neighbor while they’re busy redesigning the board.

Why “Speaking Up” Can Become a Trap

Before anyone misquotes me, let’s clarify something. Truth matters. Speaking truth matters even more.

But just screaming into a digital void designed to fragment consciousness is not the same thing as embodied leadership. There’s a difference between reactive outrage and grounded conviction. One is impulsive. The other is integrated.

It’s why I started the Conscious Rebels Network as a place to respond (and expand ourselves) instead of react (and exhaust ourselves).

Subscribe now

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Chris shares his personal story, how he got into this work, and what most people misunderstand about taxpayer status in the first place. They discuss the difference between what people assume is mandatory versus what is actually elected, how enforcement typically unfolds, and why so many people comply without ever examining the structure they’re participating in.

If you’ve ever felt confused about “tacos”, forced contributions, or whether participation is truly voluntary, this episode will give you a new lens to look through.

The second half of this conversation includes an extended Q&A that is available exclusively inside Conscious Rebels Network.

If you want access to the full replay and future live calls, you can join here:👉 https://consciousrebelsnetwork.com/crn-membership

To learn more about Freedom Law Group and Chris Hughes, visit: https://freedomlawgroup.us/

As always, this episode is for educational and informational purposes only. Do your own research. Ask better questions. Stay grounded.

And decide consciously.

This is something I don’t talk about lightly. I don’t even like talking about it 😅

There was a period in my life where I made money faster than my nervous system could register it. My business took off. The numbers climbed. From the outside, it looked like success… but on the inside, I was unraveling.

I worked myself into the ground, telling myself it was all temporary. I told myself this is what ambition and hustling look like. I told myself rest could come later. By the time I bought the house, the cars, the clothes, the beauty upgrades (all the proof that I had “made it”) I was more miserable than I had ever been in my life.

I had so much money and zero capacity to actually enjoy it.

My marriage fell apart, which was actually a blessing in disguise, but the divorce process wiped me out both emotionally and financially. I lost way more than assets. I lost pieces of myself I didn’t even realize I had handed over to the grind.

Eventually, I sold the business and everything stopped. And then I did something I had never done before.

Read more

One of the most frustrating things I hear from people goes something like this: “I did everything I was supposed to do, so why does money still feel so hard?”

This question matters because it pokes at a lie a lot of us were raised with. The idea that intelligence, education, and effort automatically lead to an easy financial life. They don’t. And when they don’t, people usually start to blame themselves. They assume something must be “wrong” with them.

Intelligence doesn’t override conditioning

You can be the smartest, most educated, emotionally intelligent, and highly capable kid on the block and still struggle with money. Why? Because decisions about money are rarely made from logic alone. They are made from identity, nervous system wiring, and subconscious beliefs that were formed waaay before you ever chose a career or opened a bank account.

This is why someone can understand money intellectually… yet still avoid looking at their finances. It’s also why someone can be a high earner but feel constant anxiety, or why someone can work nonstop and still feel constantly behind.

The brain doesn’t default to what’s logical. It defaults to what feels familiar. So if your system learned early on that money = stress, instability, control, or pressure, then your behavior will reflect that… even when you “know better.”

Doing everything right doesn’t mean the system works for you

There’s another piece here that seldom gets acknowledged. The “system” isn’t designed to create financial freedom for the average bear like you and me. It’s designed to create compliance, dependency, and predictability… and keep power in the hands of the few.

You can:
• go to the “best” college
• get the “right” degree
• follow the “rules”
• be a hard worker
• stay loyal to your employer for decades
• avoid risk entirely…

And still struggle.

That doesn’t mean you failed, though. All it means is the path you were taught to travel was never built with sovereignty in mind. That’s why so many of us feel like we’re running as fast as we can and not really getting anywhere, like there’s invisible chains keeping us from gaining any real ground. The system rewards your participation, not independence. Most of us play by the rules because we’re afraid of what’ll happen if we don’t.

Understanding this isn’t about blaming the system, yourself, or other people. It’s just about awareness.

The #1 belief that blocks progress

Most people aren’t blocked because they lack skill. They’re blocked by an invisible belief they’ve never questioned.

Some common ones:
• “People like me don’t make real money.”
• “If it were possible, I’d already be doing it.”
• “I’m not the kind of person who spots opportunities.”
• “Money comes from jobs, not creativity.”
• “I have to choose between security and freedom.”

These beliefs feel like facts because they’ve been reinforced over time. But they are assumptions… and assumptions shape the things you notice, the things you dismiss, and the things you never even consider. If your mind is trained to look for limits (why something isn’t possible), it’ll miss opportunities every time. You’ll never find what you’re not looking for.

Shifting from survival to value

One of the most important mindset shifts around money is moving from “How do I make more?” to “How do I create value?” Value isn’t reserved just for entrepreneurs or influencers or people with fancy resumes.

You have value.

Most people don’t struggle because they lack value, they struggle because they were trained to trade time for security instead of developing leverage, creativity, and awareness of opportunity.

You won’t magically be able to quit your job tomorrow, BUT if you want to start shifting your financial reality, you must change how you see yourself, money, and the world.

One thing you can do right now

Ask yourself this and write down the answer.

“If I stopped trying to survive, what would I actually notice?”

Opportunities aren’t hiding from you. They’re just filtered out by your belief. When your identity shifts from “I follow the path” to “I look for possibilities,” the world starts to look veeeerrrry different.

That shift isn’t instant, but it is learnable.

Where this work goes deeper

I’m teaching a money masterclass!!! It’s happening next week, Monday January 26th.

In it, I’m not teaching you to hustle harder. Or pretending the system is fair. Or bypassing reality with positive thinking.

I’m helping smart, capable people untangle the beliefs, conditioning, and identity patterns that keep them stuck even when they’re “doing everything right.”

If you’re ready to stop assuming the problem is you and start building a relationship with money that actually supports your life, this is where that begins.

Join the FREE Money Awareness Masterclass.

See you in there? <3

Subscribe now

For a long time, I believed the solution to my money stress was simple: make more money.

And to be fair, making more money does help. Bills get paid. Pressure lets up. Options expand.

But here’s what surprised me, and what I see over and over again with clients and students.

More money does not automatically create ease. More money does not automatically create safety. And more money does not automatically change your relationship with money.

In fact, for a lot of people, nothing really changes at all 😅

They get a raise, land a better client, hit a new income level. And somehow, a few months later, they’re right back where they started. The cushion is gone. The stress is back. The feeling of “why does it always feel this way?” creeps in again.

Your brain cares more about familiarity than wealth

Most people think money problems are external issues. Not enough income. Bad timing. Rising costs. A broken system. And some of that is true, but it’s not the whole picture. Your brain is wired for familiarity, not abundance.

If your nervous system is used to stress, urgency, or barely keeping up, it’ll unconsciously recreate that same experience over and over again, even when circumstances improve.

This is why someone gets more money and suddenly:
• a “surprise” expense appears
• spending increases without noticing
• lifestyle creep sneaks in
• financial decisions get rushed
• the extra disappears

It looks like bad luck. It feels unfair. But often, it’s the subconscious pulling things back to what feels normal. More money can feel unfamiliar. Unfamiliar can feel unsafe. So the system corrects. It’s not your fault, either, because you were conditioned to be this way from a very young age.

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Money alone does not change money patterns

This is why strategy by itself doesn’t work long term.

You can learn how to budget, invest, negotiate, or earn more. Those things matter. But if your internal response to money is still anxiety, avoidance, shame, or urgency, the behavior will eventually follow that internal state.

People assume they need more discipline. But what they usually need is better awareness. Until you see how you actually relate to money in real time, nothing sticks.

What awareness actually looks like

Awareness isn’t positive thinking. It isn’t affirmations. It isn’t pretending you feel abundant when you don’t. Awareness is noticing what happens inside you when money comes and goes from your life.

Here’s a simple exercise that’ll start shifting things immediately:

For the next week, don’t try to fix your money habits. Don’t cut spending or create new “rules.” Instead, observe.

Every time money comes in or goes out, pause for a second and just notice:
• what you feel in your body
• what thought shows up automatically
• what action(s) you feel pulled toward

That’s it. No judgment or correction. Just pure and simple observation.

You might notice things like:
“I avoid looking at my bank account.”
“I rush financial decisions when I feel external pressure.”
“I tense up even when there’s enough.”

This is where change actually begins. When you bring awareness to the internal pattern, the nervous system starts to relax. The urgency dissipates. The reaction softens up. You create space between the trigger and the behavior.

That space is where new choices become possible.

This is why money feels so personal

Money is not just math.
It is memory.
It is emotion.
It is identity.
It is safety.
It is worth.
It is fear.
It is freedom.

If your past taught you that money disappears, creates conflict, controls people, or determines your value, those beliefs live in your body, not just your mind. Until you work with that layer, more money just magnifies what is already there 😬

This is why some people make more and feel calmer, while others make more and feel more stressed than ever. The difference isn’t income but relationship.

If you want this to actually change…

This work is exactly why I’m teaching Transform Your Money this year.

Not to teach hustle/grind culture or gimmicky shortcuts. Not to sell some “do this and you’ll be rich” formula. But to help people understand and shift the internal patterns that decide whether money supports your life or controls it. It’s practical work – and it works, if you do it.

Transform Your Money is a live workshop series that begins January 29 and will be taught inside the Conscious Rebels Network mentorship community.

If you want more money to actually stick, feel usable, and support your freedom instead of running your nervous system ragged, this is where the real work happens. You can learn more and join CRN before the price increases here.

Transforming your relationship with money isn’t about becoming someone else. It’s about shedding all the layers of beliefs that aren’t you… and finally working in harmony with money, the way you were always meant to.

See you in class! 🙌

I want to talk about something that keeps coming up in the comments on my money videos.

Any time I talk about money, value, or building financial support, there are a few responses that always appear. They usually sound something like this:

• “Being wealthy isn’t Christ-like.”

• “God doesn’t want us focused on money.”

• “If you were really spiritual, you wouldn’t care about making money at all.”

I understand why people say this. Most of us were taught some version of it. I was too.

But this belief causes more harm than people realize, especially for people who genuinely want to live with integrity, faith, and freedom.

So let’s slow down and actually look at it.

The core assumption underneath those comments

The real belief hiding under all of those statements is this:

Wanting money is morally or spiritually wrong.

Once that idea gets lodged in your system, it sneakily shapes everything you do with money.

You might say you want more ease, more support, or more freedom, but another part of you feels conflicted as soon as money starts to come in. You hesitate, downplay your value, or somehow pull back without even realizing you’re doing it.

That is NOT God blocking abundance.

That is your internal resistance.

You can’t build something you believe you aren’t supposed to have.

Why this belief doesn’t actually hold up

Jesus talked about provision constantly.

He talked about stewardship, responsibility, and using what you have wisely. He talked about not being dependent on systems or rulers for survival. He talked about multiplication, not lack.

What he warned against was attachment, fear, and our identity getting tangled up in money. NOT money itself.

Lack was never the goal.

Poverty was never the ideal to emulate.

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How this assumption keeps people stuck

When someone believes that wanting money is wrong, it often shows up like this:

• They undercharge or avoid asking for fair compensation

• They avoid learning new skills because it feels “selfish”

• They stay in situations that drain them and believe it’s humility

• They feel guilty for wanting ease or support

• They wait for someone to rescue them instead of expanding their capacity for abundance

All of this is self-abandonment… not faith or virtue.

Other common money assumptions that keep people broke

These come up all the time, and you mistake them as facts:

• “I’m just not good with money.”

• “I don’t have anything valuable to offer.”

• “Only certain people can make real money.”

• “If I make more, I’ll become greedy.”

• “Money changes people for the worse.”

• “I should be grateful and stop wanting more.”

These are not facts. They are inherited beliefs.

And beliefs run behavior.

A simple shift you can make right now

Instead of asking, “How do I make more money?”

Try asking this:

What value am I already providing that I’ve been taught to overlook?

If you have ever:

• Written an email

• Organized information

• Solved a problem

• Raised a child

• Managed a household

• Edited, researched, taught, built, planned, or supported others

You have marketable (sellable, VALUABLE!) skills.

They are just so familiar to you that you probably don’t see them as valuable.

Money does not come from worthiness… it comes from value exchange and awareness.

And awareness can be learned.

This is exactly what we’ll work on during the LIVE Transform Your Money program

Not about hustling harder or “manifesting” checks out of thin air. And it’s definitely not about shaming yourself into “better habits.”

Transform Your Money begins January 29, and it’s a brand new program included inside Conscious Rebels Network.

This work is about:

• Identifying the assumptions running in the background of your financial life

• Untangling spirituality from scarcity

• Learning how money actually works (when fear isn’t steering)

• Seeing your value clearly instead of minimizing it

• Building support in your life without burning yourself out

This is the work I’ve done personally.
It’s the work I’ve done privately with clients.
And it’s the work I’ve wanted to teach publicly for a long time (I had to wait for the non-compete with my former company to expire before I started teaching about making money again 🤓).

If money never seems to stick around for you, it’s usually not because you’re irresponsible, lazy, or “not disciplined enough.”

It’s because your nervous system, beliefs, and identity were trained in an environment where wanting more felt unsafe or wrong.

That can be changed.

If this post rustled up something inside you, don’t ignore it!!

If you felt relief reading this, or a little discomfort, or a quiet “oh… heh… that’s me,” that’s your sign, my friend.

Transform Your Money starts January 29 inside Conscious Rebels Network.

When you join CRN, you get access to the full program plus the entire library of conversations, calls, on-demand courses, and the vibrant community already inside the network.

This is deep, practical work.
It’s also very human work… and you don’t have to figure it out alone anymore.

If you’re ready to stop fighting money and start understanding it, this is your invitation.

You don’t need to become someone else to change your financial reality. You just need to stop believing the things that were never true in the first place 🙌

New Year’s Eve always puts me in a reflective mood.

It’s like a quiet pause before the calendar flips. That strange moment where you can still feel the year you’re leaving, but you haven’t stepped into the next one yet.

I just wanted to say hi.

And thank you for being here.

Whether you’ve been reading along for a while or you just found your way here recently, I don’t take that for granted. I talk about some big, uncomfortable things. Money. Beliefs. Conditioning. Power. Freedom. And the fact that you’re willing to sit with those conversations means a lot to me.

As we head into January, I want to let you know what I’m focusing on here next.

All of January’s Substack posts will be free, and the theme for the month is money.

Not in a loud, flashy, hustle-y way. Not advice you’ve heard a thousand times before. And definitely not shame-based.

I want to talk about money the way it actually shows up in our lives. The emotions tied to it. The stories we learned about it. The assumptions we’ve been carrying around without realizing it. The ways it can feel heavy, stressful, confusing, or charged, even when the numbers look “fine.”

So many people think their money problems are about discipline or intelligence or effort. In my experience, they’re almost never about that.

They’re about awareness.

January will be about slowing down and looking honestly at our relationship with money. Where it came from. How it’s shaped us. And how changing the way we see money can quietly change everything else.

No pressure. No resolutions required. Just conversations that I think matter.

For today, though, you don’t need to fix anything.

Let the year land.
Let yourself rest.
And step into the next one a little more awake than before.

Happy New Year.
I’m really glad you’re here.

Caitlin

I grew up hearing a line that every Christian seems to have memorized: “The greatest lie Satan ever told was that he doesn’t exist.”

This is one of those phrases church people love because it feels so clever and mysterious, like they know something the rest of the world doesn’t.

But the older I got, the more I realized something wasn’t adding up. The biggest lie was not that Satan hid himself. It was that he disguised himself as God.

And I don’t mean that metaphorically. I mean it historically, psychologically, and spiritually.

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When I started deconstructing a few years ago, this idea kept tugging at me. Why did the God of the Old Testament behave like every abusive authority figure I had ever escaped from? Why did the God I met in prayer feel like love, peace, and expansion, but the God I grew up fearing felt like a dictator? Why did the version of God taught in most churches look more like a jealous king demanding tribute than the infinite Source of creation?

It made no sense. Not until I started studying the history behind it all.

Here’s the thing about deception… a conman would never introduce himself as a conman. He shows up wearing a suit and a friendly smile. He says, “Trust me with your money,” and then he drains your account dry. You never suspect him because he blends in with the people who seem trustworthy.

And if you look at the evolution of religion, you see the exact same pattern. Power doesn’t always show up as evil. It often shows up claiming to protect you. It tells you to fear the right things, obey the right rules, submit to the right authority. It tells you you’re sinful, broken, unworthy, powerless, and that your only hope is devotion to the very system that made you feel small in the first place.

That is how control works. It’s how it has always worked.

When Christianity became an institution under Rome, the image of God shifted dramatically. Suddenly God needed sacrifice. Suddenly God required obedience. Suddenly God demanded worship or punishment. Suddenly God was less like a loving creator and more like an emperor with cosmic authority.

But that is not who God is. That is who empire is.

And as someone who spent most of her life terrified of hell, terrified of disappointing God, terrified my thoughts could send me into eternal torment, I understand how effective this lie has been. Fear was my first religion. Shame was my second. I obeyed long before I ever learned how to love.

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Lisa spent over twenty years working deep inside Washington DC alongside major democratic leaders, agencies, and nonprofits. She wasn’t on the outside throwing stones. She was fully inside the machine. And then something shifted.

This conversation explores the quiet unraveling that happens when intuition starts speaking louder than institutional narratives. Not through debate or opposition, but through an internal knowing that something no longer adds up.

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👉 Join Conscious Rebels Network

Connect with Lisa Ekman: https://deprogrammingdemocrats.com/

Connect with Caitlin:

Instagram — https://www.instagram.com/thecaitawakening/

TikTok — https://www.instagram.com/thecaitawakening/

There are certain insults Christians love to throw at me. “Heretic.” “False teacher.” “Dangerous.” “Deceived.”

I used to flinch when I heard those words. They triggered the old childhood fear that anything outside the narrow Christian box would land me in hell. I spent years being terrified of even thinking the wrong thoughts, let alone speaking them out loud.

But now? When someone calls me a heretic, I smile a little. Not because I’m trying to be edgy, but because I finally understand where that word came from and what it originally meant. And spoiler alert, it did not mean “evil” or “rebellious” or “misleading people away from God.”

It meant choice.

That is literally what the original Greek word hairesis meant: choice, opinion, school of thought. Nothing sinister or demonic. It was just the freedom to choose what you believed.

In ancient Greece, people followed different haireses the same way we follow different thinkers or authors today. One teacher emphasized virtue, another emphasized reason, while another emphasized the soul. Everyone thought for themselves and no one was threatened by the diversity of ideas.

Heresy only became a problem when Christianity became a system. Heresy is a social construct. It’s an entirely manmade concept!

What comes next is for paid subscribers.

Not because I want to hide anything. If I could publish every truth I know on the front page of the internet, I would. But I have been censored, flagged, shadowbanned, and threatened enough times to know I cannot share everything publicly. Platforms are not neutral. They are controlled. And the people who control them do not want these conversations happening out loud.

Paid Substack allows me to go deeper without worrying about trolls, censorship, or automated systems deciding what you are “allowed” to hear. If you are a paid subscriber, keep reading. If not, you can upgrade and unlock the rest instantly.

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