Our community just celebrated a member publishing her first book, and one line has stayed with me: "I didn't need to get back to who I was. I needed to give myself permission to become who I was going to be next." I want to hear from you: What's one thing you've given yourself permission to begin again in this season? It can be big or small: a career move, a boundary, a habit, a dream you put on a shelf. Share it below, and then reply to someone else's with a little encouragement. Let's cheer each other on. 👇

This book came from a season of my life when beginning again was not something I chose. It was something life required of me. A few years ago, I experienced three strokes. In the years that followed, I found myself rebuilding much more than my physical health. I had to reconsider parts of my career, my relationships, my identity, my expectations for myself, and even my definition of success. I kept thinking that recovery meant getting back to the woman I had been before everything changed. Eventually, I realized I was asking the wrong question. I did not need to figure out how to get back to who I was. I needed to give myself permission to become who I was going to be next. That journey became the foundation for Begin Again With G.R.A.C.E. G.R.A.C.E. stands for Grieve. Rebuild. Anchor. Create. Embrace. Those five words reflect the process I found myself moving through as I learned how to acknowledge what I had lost without allowing loss to become the end of my story. I wrote this book for people standing in the uncomfortable space between what was and what comes next. It is for the person whose life changed unexpectedly. It is for the person grieving a career, relationship, dream, identity, season, version of themselves, or future they thought was certain. It is also for the person who knows something needs to change but has not quite figured out what beginning again looks like. One of the most important things I have learned is that beginning again does not require pretending the past did not happen. We get to carry forward what served us, release what no longer does, and build from where we actually are. Publishing this book was about more than becoming an author. It was about turning some of the hardest chapters of my life into something that might help someone else write their next one. That is why I wrote Begin Again With G.R.A.C.E. ❤️