Hi! I'm Lori.

I realize that this is where I’m supposed to share my life story in a nutshell—or at least offer the highlights, my biggest epiphanies, and my qualifications for writing about wisdom. Instead, I’ll put it simply: I hurt.

I hurt a lot, for a long time, and I caused it.

When I was younger, I carried around numerous victim stories to justify my negativity and misery. After years of suffering, I realized I truly was the cause—no one and nothing else made my life hard.

I was the one thinking undermining thoughts. I was the one drowning in overpowering emotions. I was the one dwelling on the past. I was the one who moved around all the time, hoping to escape myself. Eventually I realized that I was the only one who could change how I experienced the world.

I knew it wouldn’t be easy—that I’d have to let go of certain things and make certain choices over and over again. And so I do, in as many as moments as I can, knowing I will never be perfect—but finally accepting that’s okay.

I started tinybuddha.com as a community blog in the fall of 2009, after tweeting quotes through @tinybuddha for more than a year. It’s a place where people of all ages share how they apply wisdom to everyday life—a space where people write authentically and sometimes vulnerably about the challenges we all face.

Though people often ask me about the numbers—the Twitter followers, the page views, and the unique visits—that’s not why I run Tiny Buddha. I do it because engaging in this way connects us on a meaningful level and allows us to make a positive difference in each other’s lives.

I run Tiny Buddha because I’m done hurting alone. The world’s a far brighter place when we choose instead to heal and thrive together.