Rooted and Rising By Rachel Barnes

A few years ago, around 37 or 38, I was in one of the hardest seasons of my life. Both my husband and I were stretched thin at work. We had a close family member who was very sick. A close friend was battling cancer. Life felt heavy, full, and emotionally exhausting all at the same time. I had three young kids. My youngest was three or four, and I remember thinking I was finally getting through the baby years. In my mind, life should have been starting to feel a little lighter. Instead, I felt like I was working twice as hard just to keep up. What I didn't realize at the time was that I wasn't only carrying a heavy season of life. I was also in perimenopause. And I didn’t know it. When Life Starts Feeling Harder Than It Should Looking back now, I can see it clearly. The exhaustion was one of the first things I noticed. Not tired from being busy. Not tired from having young kids. I knew what those things felt like. This felt deeper. I was getting thro...

Looking back, some of the biggest changes in my life didn't start with a detailed plan. They started with a simple yes. A yes to something unfamiliar. A yes that felt a little uncomfortable. A yes that ended up changing far more than I ever expected. That's what happened to me this past February. The Yes I Almost Didn't Say Back in February, an opportunity came up for a two-week trip to Florida. On paper, it should have been an easy yes. But it wasn't. Like a lot of moms, my mind immediately started listing reasons why it might not be the right time. The kids need you. Two weeks is a long time. Should you really be doing this right now? Like a lot of moms, I felt the pull between taking care of everyone else and saying yes to something for myself. But there was something else too. A pull. A knowing. The kind that's hard to explain but impossible to ignore once you've learned to pay attention to it. So I said yes. And that yes changed my...

There's something happening for a lot of women right now. It's a deep, persistent craving for something they can feel but can't always name. Not more stuff. Not another achievement. Something deeper than both. And the more women I connect with, the more I realize how many of us are craving the exact same things — and how few of us are actually saying it out loud. So here it is. Out loud. 1. They Want to Feel Proud of Themselves Not for what they did for everyone else. For something they chose. For themselves. Right now. This one hits the deepest. After years of pouring into the kids, the home, the relationship, the career — something inside starts quietly asking: when do I get to feel proud of something I chose for me? And let me be clear — this isn't about discounting everything you've already done. You have so much to be proud of. The life you've built, the people you've raised, the things you've carried. That's real. But this is a different...