Here's the truth about progress: It's more like a zigzag than a straight line. Some days you'll feel like you're crushing your goals, while other days might have you wondering if you've lost ground. This isn't a sign that you're doing something wrong – it's actually how meaningful change happens.

As writers juggling day jobs, family life, and self-care, burnout can sneak up faster than a snowmageddon-style blizzard in February. In this post, I'm sharing the common pitfalls that drain our creative energy, and the practical strategies I've learned to keep the writing flame alive without burning out.

Interview with the inner critic: Recognizing the inner critic is working for you and trying to help you (you being “the CEO”), acknowledging the hard work they have been doing, and finding a way to work with them rather than against them can boost your motivation and bring more ease and joy to your writing and wellness journey.

Your timeline is your own. Society loves to tell us we have to have it all figured out right after college, but this simply isn’t true. 

Self-compassion helps mitigate the impact of setbacks, reduces performance anxiety, and fosters resilience in the face of rejection or creative blocks. This kinder, more understanding relationship with oneself can lead to increased productivity, enhanced creativity, and a greater sense of fulfillment in the writing journey.

Turns out, it’s not just writers who benefit from taking time to be creative. A Drexel University pilot study found coloring, doodling, and free drawing activate the reward pathways of the brain, which can help improve mental health and creativity for lots of folks.

Habit stacking is a simple but effective hack to jump start your wellness without feeling overwhelmed. In this post, I’ll explore the power of habit stacking and how it can be enhanced by having a wellness vision.

What makes up the perfect morning routine? I’m the kinda person who has to ease into the world each day, and my morning routine has become super important to that process.

Friends don’t let friends get sunburns. Learn from my mistakes, and protect that beautiful skin, lovelies!

Eye strain can slow your writing progress, but it doesn’t have to do so. Below are six tips to remedy this issue. If it persists, be sure to see your eye doctor.

Whether you're hitting the beach, going for a hike, or simply enjoying a picnic in the park, having a positive attitude toward your body and your health and wellness can make all the difference.

Perhaps body doubling is a way we can weave a thicker social network and feel supported while accomplishing our health and wellness goals.

This is the tricky stage of recovery from illness: Those early jolts of energy tempting you to charge back into life, the return of the obligations you had to ignore because you felt too crummy to lift your head off the pillow. It’s hard not to get swept back up in the grind again. But I know if I do, I’ll overdo it and end up fighting this virus longer than I need to.

I’m happy to report I’ve learned some things recently that I plan to continue. Why? Because an occasional less-than-ideal meal here and there is fine, but I feel crummy if I’m not regularly eating fruits, veggies, and quality grains and proteins. My energy wanes, my stomach feels weird, and I get crabby. 

Several of my coworkers invited me to alpaca yoga at Eagle Eye Farm — a lovely expanse of green grass, white picket fences, friendly staff and the cutest little farm animals. I had a smile on my face the whole time, whether I was releasing muscle tension through down dog or petting Pearl, one of many alpacas on the farm.

Mood-boosting foods can help support your overall wellness and might make winter a little easier to tolerate.

While it might not be possible to have “perfect” sleep all the time, sometimes it helps to think about our routines to see if we are maximizing them. What does your ideal sleep routine look like?

Author Jane McGonigal, in her book “SuperBetter: The Power of Living Gamefully,” writes that gamification of real-world goals can help us tap into strengths like creativity, focused attention, determination and optimism.

For me, planning a successful vacation means identifying what’s important to me and my husband, choosing our priorities, and making sure we have time along the way to actually process and enjoy what we are seeing and doing instead of rushing from one thing to the next.

Lately, I’ve been experimenting with this mindset: Asking my body what it needs today and then doing some type of exercise in line with that.