http://www.theempoweredtherapist.com/

The Empowered Therapist, 12720 Hillcrest Road, Suite 106, Dallas, TX (2026)

01/06/2026

For many of us, 2025 was a difficult year, but before you start chanting, “new year, new me,” hear me out.

A year can be genuinely difficult and still contain moments of alignment, meaning, or growth. Naming this does not polish a hard year or minimize pain. It simply widens the lens.

At a time when the world is encouraging reinvention and self-improvement, I want to gently offer another possibility. What if this year is not about fixing yourself, but about creating more space for who you already are? What if softness is not something to grow out of, but something to deepen?

Softness, in this context, is not passivity. It is the ability to hold a fuller sentence. This was a hard year, and there were moments that mattered. I struggled, and I also learned something about myself. I was stretched beyond my capacity, and I became clearer about my limits.

When we allow ourselves to add the “and,” something shifts.

Perhaps the year brought grief and also discernment. Loss and also clarity about which relationships to turn toward. Exhaustion and also a deeper understanding of what feels aligned. These experiences are not contradictions. They are the texture of a lived life.

Creating more space for who you already are means letting complexity exist without rushing to resolve it. It means allowing grief to sit beside determination. Letting fatigue coexist with hope. Trusting that you do not need to become someone else in order to move forward.

To those of you learning that the gray area is actually where we thrive, I see you.

01/05/2026

I promise you, softness is the answer.

To those of you beginning to see yourself through kinder eyes, I see you.

(IC: Slide 1: Engaging with ourselves with gentleness allows us to soften to ourselves, it doesn’t make us soft; Slide 2: Complex trauma survivors are intimately aware that no one is going to save them, and honoring this concept as a truth allows them to feel a sense of control in an otherwise chaotic world.; Slide 3: Of course, this easily gets generalized into believing that no one will ever be available for you, which reinforces that you only have yourself to count on; Slide 4: And this is a problem since complex trauma survivors are often the most self-critical people around. When all you have is your own self-evaluation, and you are relentlessly hard on yourself, then you’re not likely to see a way out of your own suffering; Slide 5: You won’t feel safe enough to access healing if you are stuck in a vacuum of your own self-rejection; Slide 6: Isolation plus self-hatred, isn’t a recipe for healing; Slide 7: When we begin to consider all of the ways we have kept ourselves safe, we can begin to see ourselves more fully; Slide 8: Looking at ourselves with tenderness changes how we see ourselves, others, and what’s possible)

01/01/2026

At a time when everyone is creating new year’s resolutions and saying things like, “new year, new me”, I encourage you to consider the ways you can be *even* softer with yourself this year, honor your grief just a little bit more, and invite more of you to exist than ever before.

Dear ones, it’s our softness that creates a safe place for us to land.

To those of you learning that tough love was never actually the way forward, I see you.

Feel free to use any of my intentions as your own, and/or drop your intentions for 2026 in the comments!

12/31/2025

May 2026 be the year you allow your pain and your possibilities to co-exist.

Looking for glimmers, finding hope, and honoring our right now experience is crucial for our healing. Believe me, I know first-hand how annoying, difficult, and undesirable it can be to look for the good around you when the feelings within you are filling you with discomfort. And yet, when we slow down and attend to this present moment- when we look for something beyond our pain, we see that so much more actually exists.

And dear one, more of you exists too. When you offer your suffering comfort, when you look for glimmers as a resource, when you access a little more hope today than you had yesterday- this is healing.

I see you and all of the ways you made it through this past year. And the one before that. And so many before that one. We’re in this together.

Healing with intention looks like being intentional with how you show up for yourself, and I hope you’ll be so freaking intentional with yourself in 2026.

December 2026 you will thank you, I promise.

To those of you learning how to live beyond the traumatic experiences and the pain you carry, I see you.

12/30/2025

To those of you learning how to be in healthy connection with your family and peers, I see you.

(IC: Slide 1: Moving away from enmeshed family patterns is not an act of betrayal or abandonment but a necessary step towards personal well-being and healthier relationships.; Slide 2: The real threat lies not in the differentiation but in the stagnation of remaining enmeshed, which profoundly impacts our sense of safety with ourselves and others.; Slide 3: If we don’t start showing up differently, we can expect to repeat the patterns that were developed for us in childhood.; Slide 4: In order to find safety in relationships, we often need to first find our sense of self, separate from others.; Slide 5: Differentiating from our family does not mean disconnecting from love or belonging. It means evolving into an autonomous individual capable of forming connections with other self-differentiated individuals.)

12/29/2025

Grad school was tough, but you were never alone. You had professors, supervisors, and classmates by your side. And even if you felt overwhelmed or unsure, there was likely someone there to offer direction. You likely were given some sort of framework for how to move through your program. You probably had someone you could ask questions or who you could passively learn from by watching their progression.

Running your own therapy business feels different from grad school in many ways. Suddenly, there’s no curriculum to follow, no program structure to guide you, and no peer group to lean on. Without any intentional or formal business training, therapists are left to navigate private practice all on their own, and not only can this feel scary, but it can also be financially unstable and bring about all sorts of fears of inadequacy.

The Entrepreneur Collective was created to change how therapists feel as they navigate entrepreneurship.

Together we will build community, offer one another support, and build strategies to help you grow your business and feel confident in your entrepreneur identity.

Check out the link in my bio for more info!

To the therapist entrepreneurs looking for a way to feel less stressed and more resourced in 2026, I see you.

12/26/2025

Listen, I know change can feel so scary. Especially when our survival strategies were set when we were really young. If you were responsible for your own safety when you were a child, you might find yourself death gripping your patterns, behaviors, and ways of thinking. All of this is a protective strategy, and while it makes sense that you’re showing up this way, healing doesn’t tend to happen until we allow some things to shift.

Experimentation is key when we’re trying to heal from something we should have never had to endure. Allowing yourself to be curious, take measured risks, and try on new things, helps you to learn what you want, like, and need in adulthood. If survival was our focus, we likely didn’t get to learn about ourselves in developmentally appropriate ways, so in order to feel more resourced we often have to explore in the ways we missed out on when we were young.

To those of you learning how to let some of your patterns, assumptions, and fears go so you can find more of yourself, I see you.

(IC: Sometimes in order to grow we have to let go of the things that helped us to survive)

12/25/2025

A letter to those of you who long for a family you’ll never have and to those of you who had or have a family you never wanted.

Dear Younger Self,

I’m sorry that we still don’t have the family we’ve always wanted; I’m sorry the closeness we desire has been absent. I’m sorry for the longing we feel; for the needs that go unmet; for the desires that leave our heart feeling empty this time of year. I’m sorry for the pain we feel; I’m sorry that our sadness can’t be solved. I wish for us that our grief could be replaced with connection. I wish for us that our tears could be met with tenderness. I wish for us that our loneliness could be replaced with comfort.

With each family picture on social media, with each perfectly posed holiday card, with each caregiver and child we pass at the store- I know the longing to be loved is there. I know this time of year is hard for us; I know we wish we had someone to laugh with, to hug, to just be ourselves around. I’m sorry our family isn’t what we needed. I’m sorry that we don’t have a place to call home.

Dear sweet, loving, desiring, lonely younger self, I’m sorry this was the family we were born into. I’m sorry they didn’t and won’t do their own work so things could be different. I’m sorry they expected you to shift, and modify, and conform for their comfort. I’m sorry we believed we had to change in order to fit in; I’m sorry that my decision to no longer be for them meant that we no longer had a place to go. I’m sorry that they don’t see us; I’m sorry that they never knew how great you really are.

Younger self, all hope is not lost; families come in all forms. There are people who will see you, who will love you, who will hold you when you’re hurting. All of the sadness you feel is valid, and I am here to help us move through this pain.

To those of you who wish it were different, who wish there was a new family ready to embrace you as you are, I see you.
(IC: Dear Younger Self, I’m sorry this time of year reminds us that we don’t have the family we’ve always dreamed of)

12/24/2025

If it’s too much to look at pictures where people seem happy, take a break from social media. If you don’t yet have a community to connect with during typically celebratory times, it makes sense to feel lonely when you see others spending time together.

Tending to yourself might look like time away from your phone or just intentional time connecting with yourself and your needs. And tending to yourself might look like considering that the narrative we’re writing in our head likely isn’t anyone else’s full story.

What we see is rarely the totality of someone else’s experience. Very few of us share our hardest moments in our online spaces.

To those of you navigating the nuance that exists this time of year, I see you.

(IC: Slide 1: If you’re disconnected from your family, it can be difficult to see pictures of smiling families all over social media during the holiday season; Slide 2: For some of us, the holidays don’t bring about joy, instead we’re likely to feel sad, lonely, fearful, and isolated; Slide 3: If you’re in the depths of your pain, it can be additionally painful to see pictures of families where everyone looks happy; Slide 4: Something to keep in mind: A picture never tells the whole story; Slide 5: Some families are honestly happy. And some families look happy on the outside, while people suffer in silence.; Slide 6: Tend to your feelings. Take a break from social media when you need to. Let yourself connect with yourself when you feel disconnected from everyone else.; Slide 7: And remember that there is often so much more going on for others than we know. And likely, so much more going on for you than you’ve let others be aware of.)

theempoweredtherapist

12/22/2025

To those of you who long for the gift of emotional attunement, I see you.

(IC: Slide 1: You know what’s even better than the perfect holiday present?, Slide 2: A caregiver who is willing to take responsibility for their impact; Slide 3: A caregiver who is invested in repair following rupture; Slide 4: A caregiver who can hold that their experience of their child’s upbringing isn’t the only one that matters; Slide 5: A caregiver who honors their kid’s boundaries; Slide 6: A caregiver who understands that there is a power differential between them and their children (yes, even once their kids are fully grown); Slide 7: A caregiver who asks questions and takes a genuine interest in their kids’ lives; Slide 8: A caregiver who never utters the words, “I’m sorry you feel that way”; Slide 9: A caregiver who knows how to show up assertively, rather than passive-aggressively; Slide 10: A caregiver who never shames or guilt-trips their kids into spending time with them)

12/18/2025

Healing is equal parts grieving what was, honoring what is, and creating hope for what can be.

To those of you who long for someone who was never there, I see you.

(IC: Slide 1: So many of us are grieving people who have never even existed; Slide 2: If we don’t get the attunement we need when we’re young, it’s likely that we enter adulthood with lingering grief that we can’t fully understand; Slide 3: It’s hard to grasp grief that isn’t about something lost, but rather, something never had; Slide 4: If you find your heart aching this time of year, know that you aren’t as alone as you feel; Slide 5: Many of us feel abandoned by people who were never *actually* available to us; Slide 6: Healing looks like allowing this lingering grief to take up residence in your body, while you look for attunement in the here-and-now; Slide 7: Dear one, just because no one was there when you needed them, doesn’t mean no one will ever become available; Slide 8: The grief you carry is about what never was, not what will never be; Slide 9: We heal when we allow our pain and our hope to exist in relationship with one another; Slide 10: The grief we carry, matters. And the hope we need to embrace has been waiting for us all along.)

The Empowered Therapist

01/06/2026

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