The Slow Revolution

Following a period of high stress, I hadn’t realised quite how much delight had quietly disappeared from my life.

Not happiness.
Not gratitude.

Delight 🤩

The kind that makes you laugh out loud.
That catches you by surprise.
That makes your heart feel a little lighter.

Bear has brought that back.

Watching him throw himself into life with such enthusiasm, watching him make complete strangers smile, watching him discover who he gets to be now… it’s reminded me that delight isn’t frivolous.

It’s medicine.

When we’re living in survival mode, delight is often one of the first things to disappear.

And one of the last things we expect to return.

Maybe today, instead of asking yourself what’s wrong…

Ask yourself:

“What still delights me?”

You might be surprised by the answer.

Tara ♥️

Following a highly stressful period of my life, I hadn’t realised quite how much delight had quietly disappeared from my life.

Not happiness.
Not gratitude.

Delight.

The kind that makes you laugh out loud.
That catches you by surprise.
That makes your heart feel a little lighter.

Bear has brought that back.

Watching him throw himself into life with such enthusiasm, watching him make complete strangers smile, watching him discover who he gets to be now… it’s reminded me that delight isn’t frivolous.

It’s medicine.

When we’re living in survival mode, delight is often one of the first things to disappear.

And one of the last things we expect to return.

Maybe today, instead of asking yourself what’s wrong…

Ask yourself:

“What still delights me?”

You might be surprised by the answer.

Tara ♥️

A little reminder…

Life is far messier than Instagram would have us believe.

Behind every beautifully curated square is a real human being trying to navigate life in the best way they know how.

So this weekend, I invite you to stop trying to tidy yourself up.

Be gloriously human.

Cry if you need to.
Laugh until your belly aches.
Have the wobble.
Take the nap.
Dance in the kitchen.
Ask for a hug.
Take yourself outside.
Be quiet.
Be playful.

Your life doesn’t have to look good from the outside to be deeply meaningful on the inside.

There’s something incredibly freeing about dropping the performance and simply being.

Messy.
Beautiful.
Wonderfully, imperfectly… you.

And if no one else has given you permission lately, I will.

Go and live your real life.

It’s far more interesting than the edited version.

Tara ♥️

People often come to me saying,

“I’m just stressed.”

But stress is rarely just stress.

Underneath there can be shame.

Fear.

Pressure.

Grief.

Loneliness.

The feeling that you have to do it all on your own.

When those deeper layers are gently seen and supported, something shifts.

The stress doesn’t always need managing more.

Supported in the right way, sometimes it simply begins to dissolve.

Tara ♥️

One of the cruellest things about stress…

…is that after a while, you stop questioning the stress.

You start questioning yourself.

“Maybe I’m not cut out for this.”

“Why can’t I cope like everyone else?”

“What’s wrong with me?”

Stress quietly changes the story you tell yourself.

It convinces you that you are the problem.

More often than not…

You’re not.

Tara ♥️

Stress has a funny way of finding your edge.

You can be managing.

Holding it together.

Doing all the things.

Then one more email. One more demand. One more difficult conversation…

…and suddenly it all feels too much.

Not because that one thing broke you.

Because stress has a way of finding where you’re already full.

The answer isn’t becoming stronger so you can carry even more.

Sometimes it’s creating enough space that there’s somewhere for life to land.

Tara ♥️

These practices are not for everyone. Slowing down, becoming still can be hard!

But for me, they’re simply delicious 🤩
They’re some of the best practices to step away from the noise and demands of life.

As I write this I’ve just taken myself through a 45 minute stress and detox yin practice. And I feel wonderful, super chilled.

Stress makes our bodies tight and tense. These promote release and relaxation. A soothing balm for even the most frayed of nerves 🥰

Tara ♥️

“I know what I need to be doing, I just can’t seem to do it”. I hear this a lot.

We can know that we need to drink more water, go for a lunchtime walk, eat the frog and post the damn insta post……and yet, we don’t do it.

Stress does that to us, hyjacks our ability to get things done. Start new things, stick to helpful habits.

Sometimes we just need to rest, sleep on it and go again tomorrow.

But sometimes we need to offer the body a sense of safety, security. Offer the nervous system opportunity to come down from high alert and create capacity again.

It never ceases to amaze me what becomes possible when we stabilise the system ♥️