If there’s one lesson that the universe has taught me, it’s that it’s perfectly okay to not have your proverbial sh*t together. It is so darn easy to get caught up in the facade, and believe that everyone around you has it all figured out based on what you see and the narrative you create in your head, but these things don’t define us.

What you likely don’t see about me is that I’m sometimes socially awkward, I never know what to do with my hands (unless I’m holding a camera), I have face hairs I need to pluck, I pretty much hate real pants, I eat Doritos nightly and I have my fair share of insecurities. I work too much, I drink too much (wine), I hide clutter in every drawer and cupboard of my house, and I have too-much-late-night-wine-and-chocolate-zero-exercise-post-baby wobbly bits on my body (and probably always will), but the truth is, there’s nothing wrong with any of me just as there’s nothing wrong with whatever thing you are criticizing yourself about.

My challenge for you is to stop hiding behind society’s standards and start owning the hell out of who you are right now and the fact that your happiness and joy means a heck of a lot more than anything that we are told we should be. I think a more accurate measure of success and contentment is our ability to find happiness and beauty in the good stuff, and also in the bad, the real, the ugly, and everything in between.

Don’t you think?