Quiz time: Do you know what the Kindred & Co. brand words are? Do you know why we picked those words?

Given this month is the 6 month celebration of Kindred & Co., we’re taking a deeper look at what all the words truly mean for us.

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At Kindred & Co. we like to throw this word “intentional” around a lot because we believe pursuing life with depth and desire to “do it well” requires intention. It requires thoughtfulness, deliberate effort, mindfulness, and sense of purpose.

When I think about my life and any missed opportunities I had, whether for growth and personal development or new experiences and friendships, it was mostly because I wasn’t in a mindset of intentionality. Sometimes I missed opportunities because I was being fearful, but even those can be seen as rooted in a lack of mindfulness. Being intentional doesn’t just show itself in the tangible actions we take, but is a mindset. A mindset of knowing I have choices and being thoughtful (aka intentional) about how I make my decisions and choices. I can choose to give into fear and not take an opportunity. I can choose to not take time to plan appropriately and therefore miss an opportunity for growth and learning.

Because being intentional is a mindset and rooted in purpose (we have to know where we’re headed in order to thoughtfully plan moving forward), it takes time and patience and kindness to ourselves as we develop this practice. But that’s why Kindred & Co. is here, we’re here to help you develop this habit and practice so you can live with intentionality.

intentional

“done on purpose, deliberate.”

Being wholehearted implies a commitment, unwavering in resolve and a posture of fully embracing whatever one is moving towards.

When we think about Kindred & Co. and the desire to see women embracing life without timidity, being confident in discovering the goodness and beauty in life, and freely chasing dreams and goals based in who they have been created to be and who they are becoming, then it makes sense that this posture of embrace would be rooted in wholehearted-ness (I know that’s not really a word).

Wholehearted is a posture of letting go of any bounds in order to fully embrace moving forward. Kindred & Co. specifically uses wholehearted to describe how we hope women would practice intentionality in our lives. Because intentionality is a discipline that in it’s definition requires mindfulness and deliberate thought, then if we want to be practicing intentionality well, it would make sense that we would be doing it with deep sincerity and commitment. Hence the phrase “wholehearted intention.”

What would it look like for us if we lived with complete sincere committed (wholehearted) thoughtfulness (intentionality)? Would we maybe be kinder, gentler, more patient people? Would we live with more freedom (having a clear idea of our capacity and what we are saying yes and no to, rooted in clear purpose)? Would we have deeper care for friends and family? Would we be better equipped to achieve our goals and pursue dreams?

wholehearted

“showing or characterized by complete
sincerity and commitment.”

As cliché as it might sound, we believe every woman is beautiful, both the exterior of what we can see and the interior. For the external beauty, we think of each woman’s physical features and the unique ways she’s been created to portray beauty. When we consider internal beauty, we may not see what exactly it looks like, but we can see the end result by how it is expressed in the way someone communicates, creates, cares, loves, speaks, dialogues, thinks, etc.

In that same vein, we want to be a business that points to beauty in the world – the beauty of nature, of acts of kindness in the global community, of moments where people are connecting physically and emotionally, whether its moments of joy and happiness or those of sorrow and grief.

We want to be a business that sees potential for beauty. We want to be calling out the beauty we see in our friends and community and helping them bring it forward, to share with others. We want to be helping create, communicate, and share beauty. We want to be seeing the beauty that is to come out of hard places, difficult circumstances, and sorrowful moments. There is beauty in the world, in ourselves, and to be seen and as a business we are about discovering, creating and sharing that beauty.

beauty

“a combination of qualities, such as
shape, color, or form, that pleases the
aesthetic senses, especially the sight.”

At Kindred & Co., we don’t believe we are meant to live this life alone. Not in the sense that we each need a significant other to live our lives with, but in the sense we are meant to be connected and in relationship with others.

We want to be a business that fosters connection and relationship. We wrote a blog post a couple weeks back about “being kindred,” explaining the heart and vision behind our name Kindred & Co. In reading the heart and vision behind the word “kindred” it’s hard to define the word separate from relating to others. It is by definition in relation to others, whether by the dictionary definition or by our made-up definition.

So if we made up our own definition of kindred and created a whole company and vision behind this word and what it stands for, then surely it would make sense that we are all about connection. We want to create a community and help others do the same. We want the Kindred & Co. community to feel connected, to one another, to us, to themselves, and to those around them. We want them to help foster connection and relationships. It’s part of discovering the beauty in the world, practicing intention, and living kindred.

connection

“a relationship in which a person, thing,
or idea is linked or associated with
something else.”

Joy is more than pure happiness. Pure happiness is an emotion we tend to feel because there is good happening around us or in our lives. But joy is different. Joy doesn’t necessarily mean that there is good happening in the current moment. Joy can be experienced even in the difficult, challenging, sad, and disappointing. Joy is more than an emotion we feel, but a kind of mindset. A mindset rooted in hope that there is good to come beyond the difficult, challenging, sad and disappointing.

And because joy is a mindset, this means joy can last longer, is more stable than happiness, can be a choice we make, and can be sustained through difficult circumstances. Joy rooted in hope that isn’t dependent on our circumstances means we don’t have to wait to experience joy, we can experience it now and in each of our days. It doesn’t mean we naïvely ignore what is happening in our world or lives, but it takes the truth in one hand and holds it in tension with the hope that there is good to come. This is joy and this is the joy mindset we at Kindred & Co. are hoping to express as a business, to instill in our community, and to help our community instill in themselves and in others.

We believe that in life, we can live with abundant joy and this comes from first starting off understanding how, why, and where we can find joy that sustains.

joy

“a feeling of great pleasure.”