meet little house.

I’ve heard people talk about things like soulmates and love at first sight, but I’d never experienced it until I met Little House.

It was just a regular Saturday morning in April, I was home visiting the fam, and my sister and I were popping into town to buy groceries.  Three hours later, I went home having made an offer on my first house. For anyone who knows me, this was a wildly uncharacteristic and decisive action. In retrospect, it was an unmistakeable line of demarcation between a self that looked outside for validation and this new self that deeply trusted herself to recognize her own needs.

It sounds weird to say you need a house, but let me explain. At the start of 2015 I had just taken a new job. It was a big step up, in a relatively new career direction, and I was excited for the opportunity to stretch and grow. Several weeks into the job I was asked to take on an even bigger role for the company- leading a department- and weeks after that, my new role became one of the most critical for the company as we navigated huge external hurdles focused squarely on my department's work.  

The team I inherited were dubious. The founders were desperate and taking a big gamble on me, hopeful their bet would pay off.  I felt in way over my head. Who was I to be doing this job? What if I couldn't hack it? What if a decision I made took the company down? I was just a simple girl, from a small town, who was never supposed to be here to begin with.  

Desperate not to let anyone down, including myself, I put my head down, put a smile on, and showed up. Long hours, long days, long weeks, long months. Saturday morning strategy sessions. Calls with Important People. A trip to the White House?! A trip to the hospital.

When I left to buy groceries with my sister that morning, I was physically home, as in with my family in my home town, but I was also deeply unmoored. In the few months since I'd started the Job, I'd pushed off from the familiar shores of myself and was at sea. Rough sea. In retrospect, I was navigating it like a boss, but operating in near complete uncertainty and self doubt all the time had me physically and mentally weary.

Enter Little House. What kind of person buys a house in a town they don't live in, when they have a more than full-time job, only barely started earning a real salary, and is certain they're an imposter who is going to be found out immediately and banished? THIS PERSON. But I mean come on. Look at us!

I walked in and I new I was home. Like capital "H" home. My entire body relaxed. My creative mind came alive. Neither Little House nor I had to strive to understand each other. Complete non-judgement. Complete acceptance. Complete love.

It's not hyperbole to say that Little House saved my life. Through the ability to access a space where I could be 100% myself, I learned how to reframe my relationship to imposter syndrome. I started adding in boundaries and personal care routines that refueled me and allowed me to show up to my job differently. My relationship to my team changed, we all felt more confident together. We had some wins. I started sleeping again. For the first time in 5 months, my heart stopped pounding in fear.

With the launch of this site, I'm excited to introduce Little House to the world, and hopeful that through the content and coaching services offered here we can help others find healing through home.