12 Things This Year Taught Me About Showing Up
I've been dreaming about this since 2019. For years, I told people I wanted to start a blog. I created a website. And then I let it sit there while I convinced myself it wasn't ready. Perfectionism is a beautiful cage. Then I took a career sabbatical and made myself a promise: I would stop abandoning passion projects and actually build the life I wanted. In Nepal, tired of my own bullshit, I pressed publish. That was a year ago today. Here's what showing up has taught me.
A Week in Hanoi That Woke Up All My Senses
If you've been following this series, you know the journey so far. It started in Bangkok, wound through Siem Reap, and then landed in Ho Chi Minh City. Each city taught me something different. But Hanoi? Hanoi was the one that grabbed me.
Welcome to SOWN
A year ago, I was on a career sabbatical traveling through Southeast Asia when I pressed publish on something I wasn't sure anyone would read. It was a blog. I called it WokenHeart. Today, it has a new name.
Living In Purpose: A Conversation with Stephanie Alejandra Flores
Stephanie Flores is a veteran, mother, and an advocate. She has every reason to be cynical, but instead, she's still fighting. Still refusing to look away.
We talked about growing up in Ecuador, raising her daughter Mila in a world that doesn't always make space for Black girls, and navigating breast cancer while learning that vulnerability isn't weakness.
And then she said something that stopped me in my tracks: "We're always living in purpose. Everything that happens in our life is not a coincidence."
This conversation is about community, motherhood, and what it means to keep showing up even when life gets heavy.
If you've ever felt like you're falling behind or haven't figured it all out yet, this one's for you.
The Art of Loving Friends From Afar
When you pack up your life and move across the world, you quickly learn that some friendships were built on proximity, and others were built on something much deeper. Distance has a way of revealing what's real. Life back home doesn't pause—birthdays are celebrated without you, babies are born, careers shift. You're deeply connected to these people, yet just out of reach. There's a grief in that, sitting alongside all the joy and adventure. But here's what I've learned: long-distance doesn't diminish friendship, it can actually deepen it. The friendships that survive distance are the ones where both people are willing to stretch, to make the effort, to stay curious about each other's evolving lives. It's not about always being present in person. It's about being present in spirit, through voice notes at odd hours, shared TV shows across time zones, and the conscious choice to stay connected even when convenience fades.
Reclaiming My Attention (And Maybe My Life)
I knew exactly where my lack of focus was coming from: "Hello, my name is Ashlee, and I'm addicted to my phone." What started as staying informed turned into chasing dopamine hits through endless scrolling. I'd pick up my phone for one thing and end up on TikTok twenty minutes later, wondering how I even got there. My bedtime routine was a battlefield, over an hour of scrolling before I could fall asleep, blue light winning the nightly war to get rest. Then I removed my phone from my bedroom entirely. The first night? I slept through the entire night for the first time in months. Thirty days later, I've finished three books, don't touch my phone for two hours after waking, and I'm learning what it feels like to be present in my own life again. This is what happens when you decide you want something different and you're willing to do something different to get it.
When Healing Becomes Community: A Conversation with Andrea Buckley
As a therapist and community builder from Detroit, Drea believes healing doesn't happen in isolation, it happens in the spaces between us. Raised by a village in small-town Michigan, she learned early that we're better together than we are alone.
This month's spotlight explores what real community actually looks like, how to stop performing independence, and why love, whether romantic, platonic, or self-directed, is a choice we make every single day.
"I see love as an action. A decision. I'm showing up in love for myself today. I'm choosing each other again and again," Drea shared.
If you've ever craved deeper connection, this story is for you.
