Hey, girl, hey

This week I turned 50.

I marked it the way I know best, by writing it down. I made a list of 50 things I've learned in 50 years. Some came gently. Some came the hard way. All of them are mine.

I'm not going to put all 50 here. They deserve a little more room than an inbox gives. So I put them somewhere you can sit with them.Happy Wednesday, sis.

Read all 50 here.

Turning 50 did something else too. It made me want to stop learning these lessons alone.

For most of my life, I believed capability was my social currency. That if I could carry it, produce it, fix it and endure it, then I had earned my place.

Number 21 on that list took me half a lifetime to learn.

I don't want to hold that knowing by myself anymore. So this fall, I'm holding space for a small circle of Black women.

Here is what I want you to sit with this week: where are you still auditioning for a place that should already be yours?

Where are you carrying it, producing it, fixing it and enduring it to earn a love that was never supposed to cost you that much?

Get Curious about it. You don't have to have the answer yet. You just have to stop pretending you don't hear the question.

You don't have to sit with it alone. I don't want to hold this knowing by myself anymore either. So this fall, I'm holding space for a small circle of Black women to get curious together. See below for details and to register.

GET Curious

SOUL SESSIONS SISTER CIRCLE

What If YOU Stopped Working for Love?
​An unBEAcoming conversation about worth, performance and belonging.

Think about the last time you walked into a room already doing the math on what you'd have to be, carry, or fix to be wanted there. A lot of us learned early that love was something you earn and belonging was something you audition for. And our bodies have been keeping the receipts ever since. The shoulders that never fully drop. The yes that leaves your mouth before you mean it. The tired that sleep doesn't touch.

So sit with the question for real. What if you stopped? What if, for one evening, you didn't have to produce a single thing to deserve your seat?

That's why this circle exists. You're coming because some part of you is tired of performing for a belonging that should have been free. We'll get honest together about worth, performance, and belonging, and about the quiet verdict so many of us have spent a lifetime appealing: that we are not enough, as we are, to be loved. This is not therapy and it is not a lecture. It's a room full of Black women who already know, where you get to put it down for a while.

You'll leave with language for something you've felt but never named, a few prompts to keep sitting with, and the relief of not being the only one. Come exhale. Come as you are. You do not have to audition for your seat. You just have to want it.

This circle grew out of what I wrote turning 50. If you want to feel where it comes from first, start here.

This is not therapy and it is not a lecture. It is a room where we get curious together about a verdict a lot of us have been quietly appealing our whole lives: that we are not enough as we are to be loved.

You do not have to audition for your seat. You just have to want it.

When | Thursday, October 8, 6:30 to 8:00 pm

Where | For the Struggle Office, 2209 LaSalle Street

Cost | Free.

Space is limited to 15 to 20 women, so registration is required.

In love + light ... Bea