personEl
“With every season, I’m reminded that the masterpiece needs the mess to make it whole. I’ve learned that faith doesn’t cancel out fear, love doesn’t erase heartbreak, and growth isn’t always graceful. But it’s always worth it. These reflections are my reminders (and maybe yours, too) that peace comes from progress, not perfection.“
- personEl
Every year, right about now, the same quiet panic sets in. Football is about to take my co-viewer for six months, and the shows we love are piling up. So I do what any reasonable woman would do. I run a campaign.
- personEl
I was at my brother's house when I glimpsed the name my sister-in-law had saved him under in her phone. Two small words that undid something I had carried for years.
- personEl
One morning, mildly annoyed and full of attitude, I said a curt goodbye, walked out of the bedroom, and tumbled down the stairs. What happened next is why I love him.
- personEl
I have rules about travel, and I keep them. Then I came home worn out.
- personEl
A really good book asks for my devotion, my attention, my time, and then it ends. A reflection on reading as a finite love, complete with longing and a reluctant goodbye, and why I choose it every time anyway.
- personEl
It started with Hubby backing into a parking space I would have pulled straight into. That one moment sent me down a rabbit hole of all the little everyday differences between men and women.
- personEl
Carrie turned moments into meaning and heartbreak into sentences. CarriEl is the part of me that does the same, and the reason this blog exists.
- personEl
Twenty-eight years after Sex and the City debuted, I’m still finding pieces of myself in these four women. This week I’m exploring all of them.
- personEl
After fifty posts, I believe this more than ever: Anyone’s life can be an inspiration. Including mine.
- personEl
Sometimes the real love story is not chemistry, history, or timing. Sometimes it is becoming true friends after life changes you both.
- personEl
A month of celebrations leads to reflections on what marriage has actually been, and how different it is from what I imagined.
- personEl
April has a way of revealing what we’ve been holding onto. From closets to contacts, a quiet clearing begins.
- personEl
For a long time, my name felt like something I had to explain. Over time, I realized it wasn’t my name that needed to change, it was my relationship to it.
- personEl
A Saturday morning memory of my daddy’s daily habit of calling the people he loved, proof that sometimes the smallest routines carry the greatest meaning.
- personEl
I didn’t panic when I fell into the water. I stayed under for a minute, holding a private underwater strategy meeting. ...
- personEl
When I’ve felt tension after a conversation, I’ve sometimes tried a softened re-entry instead of naming it directly. Recently, being on the receiving end of that strategy made me pause and reconsider my own patterns.
- personEl
Valentine’s Day doesn’t arrive as a blank slate. For many of us, it carries memories, comparisons, and expectations formed long before we ever thought to question them.
Hi there!
You’re not here by chance. No matter how you found your way to inspirationEl, what matters now is that you’re here. I hope you’ll find something speciEl, motivationEl, and most of all, inspirationEl.
