Filled Cups

09/25/2026

09/24/2026

Making a real friend online is a skill. Like any skill, it gets easier once you know the moves.

I see this all the time in our community. Two people click over text, the conversation is easy, there's real chemistry there. And then it just stays online. Weeks go by. The momentum fades and nothing ever becomes real.

So here are the three moves that actually turn an online connection into a real one. Move to voice notes or a call so you can hear each other's actual tone. Suggest something specific and low stakes, like coffee Saturday morning, instead of a vague "we should hang out sometime." And once you've made the plan, follow through fast, while the excitement is still warm.

None of this takes being bold or extroverted. It just takes a little intention at the right moment.

Save this for the next time you meet someone great online and aren't sure what to do next. And tell me, which of these three do you usually skip?

09/23/2026

Have you ever looked in the mirror and wondered where you went?

That's the question at the center of this week's episode of Connectedness. My guest is Mare, the founder of Oshanah, a personal development practice built on neuroplasticity and her own incredible story. At 12 years old, Mare had an accident that erased her memory completely. She had to relearn who her friends were, who her family was, everything. And instead of that being the end of her story, it became the beginning of a life she got to build on purpose.

We talk about what that experience taught her about identity, and how it shaped the work she does now helping women, especially moms, find their way back to themselves. So many of us quietly lose pieces of who we are while we're loving and raising our kids. Mare walked me through why that happens, why it tends to hit hardest around the empty nest years, and the exercises she uses with her clients to help them reconnect with who they really are underneath all the roles they play.

I got to experience one of Mare's workshops in person a few months ago and it genuinely stuck with me. If you're a mom in the thick of it, heading toward an empty nest, or just feeling like you've lost touch with yourself, I think you're going to feel so seen by this one.

The full episode is up now, link in bio. Give it a listen and let me know which part hit home for you.

Go find Mare and learn more about her work at oshanah.com or on Instagram Oshanah.

Neuroplasticity WomensWellness IdentityJourney Oshanah CharlotteNC

09/23/2026

Have you ever looked in the mirror and wondered where you went?

That's the question at the center of this week's episode of Connectedness. My guest is Mare, the founder of Oshanah, a personal development practice built on neuroplasticity and her own incredible story. At 12 years old, Mare had an accident that erased her memory completely. She had to relearn who her friends were, who her family was, everything. And instead of that being the end of her story, it became the beginning of a life she got to build on purpose.

We talk about what that experience taught her about identity, and how it shaped the work she does now helping women, especially moms, find their way back to themselves. So many of us quietly lose pieces of who we are while we're loving and raising our kids. Mare walked me through why that happens, why it tends to hit hardest around the empty nest years, and the exercises she uses with her clients to help them reconnect with who they really are underneath all the roles they play.

I got to experience one of Mare's workshops in person a few months ago and it genuinely stuck with me. If you're a mom in the thick of it, heading toward an empty nest, or just feeling like you've lost touch with yourself, I think you're going to feel so seen by this one.

The full episode is up now, link in bio. Give it a listen and let me know which part hit home for you.

Go find Mare and learn more about her work at oshanah.com or on Instagram ._personal_development.

09/21/2026

There's a version of me that used to think being alone meant something had gone wrong.

Moving from Chicago to Charlotte taught me otherwise. Some nights alone felt like the deepest kind of peace I'd had in years. Other nights that same solitude turned into an ache that surprised me. Same apartment, same silence, two completely different feelings.

Here's what I've come to believe. Being alone is just a fact. You're by yourself, that's it. Loneliness is a feeling, and it's the distance between the connection you have and the connection you actually want. You can be single and completely at peace. You can be in a room full of people and feel like nobody sees you.

If you've chosen solitude, if you love your own company, if being single feels right for you right now, please hear me: that is not a problem waiting to be fixed. Some of the fullest, most grounded people I know have built that fullness alone first.

And if it's been a while since loneliness felt more like an ache than a choice, that's worth paying attention to too. Not because something is wrong with you. Because we are wired for connection, the same way we're wired for rest and food and sleep. Noticing that you need more of it is not weakness. It's just honesty.

So today, be gentle with yourself either way. Whichever one you're in.

With you always, Fernanda

Photo credit: unsplash

09/19/2026

I have sat across from so many people at Filled Cups events over the years, and there is a moment I have learned to recognize almost immediately. Someone is telling me about the last person they dated, or the one before that, and somewhere in the story they say something like "I just knew he would make me feel whole" or "I thought she was going to be the missing piece." And I always feel something tighten a little in my chest, because I know exactly where that story is headed.

It is not that wanting connection is wrong. Wanting to be chosen, to be seen, to have someone show up for you consistently, that is one of the most human things there is. But I have watched what happens when someone walks into dating carrying an emptiness they have not looked at yet, hoping another person will be the one to fill it. It rarely works the way they hope. The relationship becomes a project instead of a partnership. Every small disappointment feels like proof that something is fundamentally wrong. And the person on the other side ends up carrying weight that was never theirs to hold.

What I have noticed in the people who eventually find something steady and real is that somewhere along the way, they stopped outsourcing their sense of okay-ness to whoever they were seeing. They built it themselves first, slowly and imperfectly, often while still figuring out how to date at the same time. It was not a clean before and after. It was messy and nonlinear and full of setbacks.

I do not think there is a tidy lesson at the end of this one. I think the honest version is just that the people I have watched build the most solid relationships were the ones who were doing their own inner work alongside the dating, not waiting to finish one before starting the other.

If you are in that in-between place right now, you are not behind. You are exactly where this work actually happens.

09/18/2026

Join us at our singles mixer tomorrow! Ages 30s and 40s. We'll see you there! Comment "interested" and I'll send you a link. Or check out the link in my bio

09/15/2026

Use these ideas next time you're in a social setting and you'd like to open conversation with someone! Comment your favorites below, or add your own ideas.

09/14/2026