Featured: Melissa Swonger, Erica Elliott, Hanna Olivas, Sophie Olivas, Dusty Simmers, and others She talked me into another one. I told her. I told my husband. I hate networking. The twenty-something in me who walked out of the prestigious ad agency, saying, "I don't care who eats what pizza!" has always been uncomfortable with performative, transactional relationships. And all these years later, it's still true. "You're so good at it!" They insist. Really? I can't do small t

Photo Credit: Darin Swonger; Pictured: Darin Swonger, Melissa Swonger, and Remi Last week, I hiked five miles. Five miles? That doesn't usually qualify for cue-the-confetti moments. Nothing to the person who hikes regularly. Nothing to the person who summits. BUT, for the person who asked a year ago if I'd ever hike again, yeah, cue the confetti. This was a really tame hike. Only meandering through trees on a path qualified it as such. Perfect to start out and begin again...a

Photo Credit: Melissa Swonger; Chicago, 2021 Swaying is not the feeling I wanted, standing above the clouds, looking over≥ the balcony. It's a strange feeling when something that appears immovable reminds you that it is not. It was a slight movement, barely noticeable. Yet, in that moment, I was thinking about trust. Trust in the engineers who designed the structure. Trust in the steel beneath my feet. Trust in the architects who imagined what would eventually stand there. Mo

Melissa Swonger on the Southern Steps of the Temple Mount, Pentecost, 2019 Another first day in the gym. Honestly, I have had too many to count at this point. At some point, rebuilding loses its novelty. People love comeback stories, but they rarely talk about how exhausting it can feel to continually begin again after injury, grief, burnout, trauma, caretaking, disappointment, or life simply shifting underneath you before you fully regain footing from the last thing. A year

Photo Credit: Darin Swonger; Pictured: Melissa Swonger and her daughters Rest is not something I engage in easily. I don’t mean forced rest from injury or illness. I don’t mean seemingly being at rest as my body is still, but my mind is racing with all that I “should” be doing. I mean, rest that is restorative because I am worth it and my body needs it, rather than something I feel the need to earn. I have the red light panels. I understand the importance of grounding, sunlig

Melissa Swonger & Erica Elliot at iHeart Radio Country Music Festival '26 & Melissa and her daughters This season of my life feels full in a way that is both meaningful and demanding. My personal life with adult children is a season of transition. Two are still undergrads, one is in grad school, and the oldest is out of grad school and in her first career-based role. One is getting married in a few months. One has an imminent proposal. One is preparing for the MCAT. Last week

Photo Credit: Melissa Swonger; Immersive Experience 2022 There are moments in relationships when the intensity of our response does not fully match the situation before us. The reaction feels real, immediate, and justified, yet something about it lingers afterward. A question begins to form, often quietly. Why did that affect me the way it did? From a clinical perspective, this is not unusual. It reflects how the brain organizes experience, particularly when prior experiences

Photo Credit: Melissa Swonger; Pictured: Darin Swonger & RAE; Galveston Island, 2025 There is a particular kind of tension that arises in leadership that we rarely discuss. It is not the absence of connection. It is the presence of it. The kind of connection where you care deeply about the people involved. Where the relationship matters. Where the outcome is not neutral because the people are not interchangeable. And something goes sideways. It shows up across contexts, even

Photo Credit: Melissa Swonger There are days when leadership does not look like influence, clarity, or momentum. It looks like a much smaller, quieter decision. The decision not to disappear. We talk about connection as if it is always accessible, always available to us if we just choose it. But there are moments when connection itself feels like effort. Not because we do not value it, but because we do not feel like we have the capacity for it. The internal noise is louder t

Photo Credit: Melissa Swonger, Arkansas, 2020 Last week, I wrote about the Quiet Saturday—the internal space where we face a choice: how we will frame two unknowns —faith or fear. As I sit in an empty house in the tall hills of the Ozarks, I realize I’ve come full circle… sort of. This quiet green space has seen me at my lowest. It held me when I shattered, when everything I thought I knew about my life gave way, and when I needed somewhere to retreat, to heal, and to make se

Easter weekend this year had me thinking about a day many of us skip over or remember as a byline. We know about the crucifixion on Friday, then Shabbat (the weekly holy day in Judaism), which requires all work and superfluous movement to stop. What is made to bring connection and remembrance to families and communities was marked by fear, trepidation, and grief for those who were following Jesus, especially those closest to Him. As I was thinking about the Saturday of Holy W

Pictured: Melissa Swonger & Erica Elliott; iHeart Music Awards Red Carpet; Los Angles, CA 2026 Last week, I wrote about how the summit doesn’t change you. It reveals you. This week, I saw something else being revealed: in a room that helps shape culture at scale. At the iHeartRadio Music Awards, you expect energy, visibility, and performance. And all of that was there. But underneath it, something quieter was happening. Something that felt like a shift. Several of the biggest