Zumba class used to be my happy place. Several times a week I would walk into this class and I’d forget about all the hard things in my life. Fun music, people sweating and laughing. We literally looked like we had taken a group shower when we were done. It felt so good. The instructor…
I first met Micheal Jason Allen when my daughter and I signed up to be extras on a movie set. My best friend Yousef Kazemi wrote and was directing a movie called The Stand-in. Follow its progress here. He was a well-dressed man (because we were in the wedding party) with a bowtie and a…
Please help me welcome Stephanie Musarra to #BeReal as she shares with us her experience with homelessness. It is easy to make assumptions about someone who is homeless because let’s face it… many of us have never been there. We tend to believe this is a problem we will never be faced with. But I…
Let’s be real for a moment. Life and death kind of real. A young woman is afraid nobody will come looking for her if she goes missing. What is the reality surrounding her concern and what can we do to fix it? A few years ago I ran across a letter written by Brianna Jonnie…
I don’t remember the first time I thought, “man I wish I could be more…”. More classy, more beautiful, more funny, more smart, more stable, more serious. I’ve lost count of how often I wished I was less messy, less emotional, less sad, less weak, less random, less awkward. Seems I’m constantly wishing I had…
Around Valentine’s Day of this year my daughter told me she was going to celebrate strong women. She said not everyone has a boyfriend and (she was 12) not everyone wants one. So I thought let’s do it. So the question is simple. If you were going to celebrate a strong independent woman in your…
#BeREALationships welcomes Michelle Poston Combs. We’re in the 21st century and we still struggle when defining family. Which is stupid, your family is who you say your family is. It’s quite simple. My husband and I have been together for 21 years. His daughters became part of my life when they were 9 and 12…
I had the chance recently to go to BlogHer. I got an email stating I had won one of the Voice of the Year Awards. I almost trashed it thinking it was spam but I when I saw the link they included was my #BeREAL piece I paused. I read it. I looked up BlogHer…
Please welcome Mac Dickson McCannell to #BeReal. Be real… Two simple words that mean so much. When I was asked to explain what “Be Real” means to me, I was at first confused and yet, excited. It has taken me weeks to figure out what angle I wanted to approach. I think why I was…
Please welcome Lindsay Fischer to #BeReal. On Reinvention, Releasing Reality and Whole-Hearted Living I’ve never felt more alive than the day I decided to take the screen off and be myself, releasing stuck pieces of reality from the filter used as my defense and watching the withheld, eager remnants descend in the very first pour.…
