Atoosa Rubenstein is a woman who changed my life forever.

I’ve never met her. I’ve never spoken to her through more than an email (which I framed and hung on my wall for years). But, when I was fifteen years old and had dreams that felt too big for my body, the walls of my bedroom were covered in her letters. Every month, as the Editor of Seventeen Magazine, she would write an editor’s letter. I would wait for the magazine to arrive in my mailbox so I could peel through the glossy pages and find her encouragement for me. Those were the first words I ever encountered that made me feel less alone. That made me feel like it was okay to be different or to have big dreams. Those letters carried me through all the awkward years of high school, propelled me to pursue writing in college and moved me to New York City to follow my dreams. They are one of the main reasons I’ve written faithfully on this blog for the last eleven years. I grew up wanting to give to others what Atoosa gave to me: confidence and an unapologetic spirit when it came to standing out and pursuing one’s dreams.

This is a new monthly feature— a space where I can show up and share what’s going on in my life behind the scenes. I try to script purpose and practicality into all my essays on the blog but this space is simply for me to say, “Hey, here’s what I’m learning as of lately.”

So it’s the beginning of 2021. The first Monday. Naturally, everyone feels this heavy, hovering pressure to change something. To do something more. To try something new or to bring back something old that worked last year.

Regardless of whether you’re a chronic goal-setter or someone who shirks away from the start of a New Year, I hope you show up. That is my biggest hope in 2021: That we would show up. Fully and whole-heartedly.

That we would show up with wobbly knees and tired spirits, ready to start fresh.

That we would show up when life doesn’t quite look how we planned for it to look.

That we would show up for one another, even when the to-do list is long and we’re not exactly feeling it.

That we would know that showing up has nothing to do with perfection or with documentation. That if you show up for something you’ve wanted— that first workout, that first page of a novel, that first Bible reading plan— and you don’t tell a soul about it, it still counts.

Personally, I want this to be a year where I de-program my brain out of the habit of needing to capture moments. I’ve forged a habit of documenting the rare and the sacred moments. I’ve lived by the principle, “If you don’t share then did it really happen?”

2021 is the year for me to say: Yes, it really happened. And I know it happened because I was there. I was there, without my phone, and it was enough. I showed up. I was here.

I believe God is most present in the ordinary. That the ordinary is actually sacredness wearing a disguise. And if we want to experience more of him— more of the good stuff— we need only be present. We need only to show up for this day and recommission ourselves to the work of “right here.”

I’m showing up for 2021- for the laughs and the tears. For the dirty diapers. For the first steps and the fresh cups of coffee. For the morning hours before the world wakes up. For the nights by the firepit and the meals made out of cookbooks. For the unplugged evenings and the walks to the park in the afternoons. For the messy. For the imperfect. For the crooked and the holy.

I’m hurdling— both feet first— into 2021 with a single prayer in my lungs: Dear God, show up, show up, show up. And help me to do the same.

keep fighting forward,

hb.