Anna Schmunk

I’m excited to announce the My Sweet Dumb Brain Hope-Mail Exchange : a sweet, simple experiment in connection and kindness. If you sign up, my editor Becca and I will match you with another reader, and you’ll each send one piece of hope-mail to the other (or more than one, if you wish!).

You could send a letter, a postcard, a drawing, a trinket —

There’s a phrase making the rounds online: “The more I heal, the less ambitious I become.” I’ve been wondering if its resonance reveals a quiet fatigue with the constant push for more and a longing for lives that are simpler, quieter, and more self-directed. Not smaller in value, but in volume. To me, that’s not regression. That’s freedom.

it doesn’t actually work on an entire society, not forever, because even thought we are an imperfect species, and even though we can and are acculturated towards terror, it takes so much effort to smother every single part of yourself, save for the venomous bits.

Community is the opposite of patriarchy. It does not make you earn belonging through your attractiveness or caretaking. It does not isolate women into romantic dependency. It does not parade the isolated islands of nuclear families as the pinnacle of achievement and success.