Think about what happens when you put a wild animal in a cage. It doesn't just sit there peacefully. It paces. It snaps. It goes quiet in a way that isn't calm, it's defeated. It shows up in distorted, unpredictable ways. Feelings work the same way. When a feeling gets locked up, through denial, suppression, or being told it doesn't matter, it doesn't go away. It just starts showing up differently. As a mood that lingers for days with no clear reason. As a body symptom. As a pattern you can't seem to break. As that thing you reach for at the end of the day to numb out. You're not experiencing the feeling anymore. You're experiencing a caged feeling. And a caged feeling acts nothing like what it actually is. This week's reflection: 🐅 Is there a feeling you've been keeping in a cage? Something you've been pushing down, managing, or refusing to let yourself fully feel? What does it look like when it comes out sideways, as a mood, a body symptom, a pattern, or a reaction that seems out of proportion to the moment? What do you think that feeling might actually be, underneath the cage? Sometimes the thing we've been managing isn't the problem. The cage is. Imagine what could happen if we allowed our feelings to be expressed freely. I wonder what would happen? xo, Amanda

I got hit with a summer cold. Boo! I hate being sick. Doesn’t everybody though? 🥴🤷‍♀️ I’m running behind on everything including the UnShaming Reflections post from yesterday. I’ll get it out this week. Sorry for the delay. 💕 I used to push through, ignore my body, symptoms, and inner urge to rest. I don’t do that anymore. I’m giving myself time to slow down so my body can divert essential resources to fighting this thing. And with a secret hope I’ll recover faster. Obviously. How are you doing?

At some point in your life, someone taught you that certain feelings were acceptable and others were not. Happiness? Good. Gratitude? Good. Calm? Good. Anger? Problem. Jealousy? Ugly. Sadness? Something to get over quickly. Maybe they didn't say it in those words. Maybe it was a look, a tone, a change in the room when your feelings got too big. But the message landed: some feelings are welcome here and some are not. And once that belief takes hold, we start going to war with parts of our own experience. We push away the "lesser" emotions. We try to stay in the "higher" ones. And we shame ourselves when we can't. But here's the truth: no emotion is better, preferred, higher frequency, or more evolved than another. The belief that some feelings are good and some are bad? That is shame. This week's reflection: Which of your feelings have you been taught are "bad" or "wrong" to have? Anger? Jealousy? Resentment? Grief? Pride? Pick one. And ask yourself honestly: who taught you that this feeling was a problem? What would change if you stopped treating it like one? Every feeling you have is part of you. Even the ones that make you uncomfortable. Especially those. xo, Amanda

Over the past two months, you've been doing something most people never do. You've been turning toward your body, not to fix what's wrong, but to listen to what's there. You've practiced hearing your body's language. You've challenged the instinct to pathologize your symptoms. You've let some things get bigger instead of smaller. You've started to separate who you are from what shame told you was wrong with you. This is not just awareness. This is the beginning of a new relationship with yourself. And the invitation now isn't to leave this in the realm of reflection. It's to let it start shaping how you move through your actual life. To trust that your body's knowing can guide real decisions. About rest. About boundaries. About what you give your energy to and what you don't. The permission to say "NO!". You are not a pathology that needs healing. You are a story that is unfolding. 💗 This week's reflection: Think back across these past two months. What is the single most important thing your body has told you that you weren't hearing before? And what is one small, real, concrete way you can honour that knowing this week? One small choice that says to your body: "I heard you. And I believe you." That is unshaming in practice. And you've already begun. 💛 xo, Amanda

Shame is a master of shrinking things. It takes our experiences, our expressions, our truth, and makes them smaller. Quieter. More manageable. More palatable. We learn to hold our breath. To pull our shoulders in. To speak more softly. To contain the thing in our body that wants to be bigger. In unshaming, we practice the opposite. We let the experience grow. Not to be dramatic, but because the body's truth often needs more room than shame has allowed it to have. When something gets big enough, we can finally see it clearly. We can witness what's actually there instead of the shrunken, controlled version we've been managing. This week's reflection: Think of something your body does that you usually try to contain or minimize. Maybe it's a sigh you hold back. A stretch you don't take. A sound you swallow. A gesture your hands want to make. This week, try letting it happen. Let the sigh be louder. Let the stretch take up more space. Let your hands move the way they want to. What happens when you stop making yourself smaller? What do you notice when the experience is allowed to be full-sized? Shame shrinks. Curiosity makes room. And sometimes what we've been containing is exactly what we've been missing. xo, Amanda