Glow by Lady E

Some stories need a little more room. When I began writing Gentle Healing , I wanted to explore the quieter parts of life: the thoughts we carry, the expectations we place on ourselves, and the small ways we learn to treat ourselves with greater kindness. As the series unfolded, I found myself wanting to continue the conversation beyond the pages of Glow. And so, Gentle Healing Extended was born. I’m creating a complimentary digital editorial edition featuring five new, personal essays about finding our way toward a softer, more intentional life. Alongside the magazine, I’ll also be sharing Soul Notes: Before the Day Begins , a printable morning journaling companion. A little space to gather your thoughts before the day begins asking things of you. I’d love to send you a copy. Early access registration is now open. Simply leave your first name and email address through the form below, and I’ll send the magazine and its journaling companion to your inbox when they’re released. ...

  Dear Glow Girls, It’s been a while since the last issue.  Right now, as I write this, it’s 12:24 am and I just finished decorating 17 notebooks and fulfilling another big order.  I posted 16 notebooks yesterday and one regular client bought them all.  There goes my inventory.  But I’m very grateful. In fact, thank you. More please.  And Lady Flo also arrived. So, yeah.  I’m sure you can imagine how that’s going for me.  I was swamped with orders one after another at the atelier. There was no breathing room.  And then I was commissioned to work on a book project that will last 18 months. So that’s an ongoing thing.  And now, I’m preparing for a bazaar and of course, Christmas! As I wrote this issue, I was also experiencing and choosing gentle healing  in many areas of my life. You’ve read about some of them in this issue.  For many years, I thought of healing as only physical health. But now I am profoundly aware of not only m...

Come sit with me for a while. I have my journal open, and tonight I’ve been thinking about something I suspect I do more often than I realize. I turn healing into another thing I need to accomplish. I want to know when I’ll be over something. When I’ll stop thinking about it. When something that hurt will finally stop hurting. When I’ll feel like myself again. And somewhere along the way, healing quietly becomes another deadline. Another invisible date on a calendar. Another thing I can somehow be late for. But maybe healing doesn’t work particularly well under project management. Maybe there are things I will understand quickly and things I’ll have to revisit again and again. Maybe I’ll feel completely fine one day and unexpectedly tender the next. That doesn’t mean I’ve gone backwards. It means I’m still moving through it. I remember one day, many years ago, when I had fibromyalgia. I lived in constant pain. I just couldn’t get a good day. And then one day, in the office...

  I have a lot of stationery. (Remember that sack that arrived on Black Saturday?) Probably more than I need. Definitely more than I need. But I’ve stopped feeling guilty about it. Because somewhere between buying pretty pens, collecting stickers, and convincing myself that yes, I absolutely needed another tiny pad of paper, I realized something: I actually use them. Not all at once, of course. That would be chaos. Instead, I’ve started letting different pieces find their way into different pages. This Page, These Things This is one of my recent journal pages. For this spread, I used just three pens: a Zebra Sarasa Clip, a soft-colored marking pen from Daiso, and a Chosch Click Dot pen. I also used little grid paper pieces from a set of Daiso memo pads, along with a few stickers I had collected from KKV. Nothing particularly complicated. Nothing carefully coordinated beforehand. I simply chose what I felt like using and started putting things on the page. A little paper here. A sti...