Melissa Parks, PhD - Coach for Globally Mobile & Writer

Early readers have been sharing their thoughts on "A Compassionate Mess" and their reviews are making me teary eyed. I'm overjoyed to know that the way I've shared my story is having such an impact on others.

Sharing our common humanity with others is powerful stuff. As poet Andrea Gibson said, "Sometimes the most healing thing to do is remind ourselves over and over and over, other people feel this too." I hope my book continues to help others feel less alone as they navigate this messy, imperfect human experience.

Preorders are now open ahead of the June 23rd launch. Everyone who preorders receives a free companion guide with journaling prompts. Find where to order yours here - https://melissaparks.com/memoir/

I'm not sure when I first found Anne Scott and Girl Gone International but it feels like I've known them from the very start of my work with expats. Over the years I've connected numerous clients with their Facebook groups and local communities, and Anne has been a generous supporter of my work, inviting me to contribute my expertise to GGI — the world's largest global community for women living abroad — in several ways.

So receiving this endorsement from her feels like a full circle moment and I'm incredibly grateful:

"This is not just a memoir about healing — it is a reminder that the parts of ourselves we spend years trying to fix are often the very parts that make us most human."
— Anne Scott, Founder of Girl Gone International

Thank you Anne 😍

"A Compassionate Mess: A Therapist, Her Monsters, and a Journey to Self-Acceptance" will be available worldwide June 23rd — preorders opening soon. 💖

Something is shifting. Although I’m not sure what yet.

I was driving to lunch today with my oldest friends (the ones I met between ages 5 and 12, who I’ve somehow managed to stay close to through all the moves and life changes) when it hit me out of nowhere: I might be ready to move abroad again soon. 😳

It arrived the same way a voice once spoke to me in Madrid’s Retiro Park on my very first trip abroad: “I want to live here one day.”

Writing a memoir means spending years living looking backwards — looking back at old journal entries, old versions of yourself, reliving past grief and therapy sessions. And somewhere in that process, I think I’ve also been writing my way toward to something I didn’t expect —the possibility of a new chapter abroad.

Only time will tell what this means. But standing at the edge of my book launch — 17 days away — I’m realizing I’m not just someone who wrote a book. I’m someone who writes. Who needs to write. I’m a writer. An identity I’ve never felt like I’ve deserved. It’s truly the ultimate imposter syndrome.

AND it feels like it’s own version of

What does forward look like for you right now?



A huge thank you to for organizing this annual challenge and opportunity to reconnect with community on here through something I enjoy so much 💗

"You're too sensitive."

If you've never been told this, you probably wouldn't understand how damaging it can be. But if, like me, you've had this hurled at you throughout your life, you probably wince when you hear those words.

When you're told your whole life that you feel things too deeply, it causes you to stop trusting yourself. As I describe it in my memoir:

"Early on, I stopped trusting my inner emotional compass and looked outside of myself to find out how I was supposed to feel. If my feelings couldn't be trusted, how could I be trusted?"

Through the pages of my book I describe slowly learning to turn back inward and reconnect with myself. One of the pieces that helped along that journey was discovering the concept of the Highly Sensitive Person, or HSP. It was one of the first times I saw sensitivity painted in a positive light. Feeling things deeply wasn't a flaw, it was simply part of my wiring, and could even be harnessed as a strength.

This reframe was a milestone on the self-compassion journey I describe in my memoir, and I've seen how powerful and healing it's been for so many of my clients too.

"A Compassionate Mess" will be available worldwide June 23rd. 🌎💖📗

I was trained to be a blank slate.

No photos in my office. No clothes that would hint at my personality. No mention of having experienced anything semi-related to what my clients were going through.

I never felt completely comfortable with this blanket advice. As I write in my memoir: “Sometimes I feel like I was trained to be an empathy robot instead of a compassionate fellow human being.”

My approach to self-disclosure has evolved immensely since I finished my master’s degree thirteen years ago.

Some of my first expat clients found me through my blog, where I spoke openly about how I’d gotten through the emotional ups and downs of living abroad. “Tell me how to do the same,” they’d say. Grad school certainly hadn’t prepared me for that!

I never made sessions about me. I was cautious about what I shared. But it was obvious that the blank slate was not what my clients needed.

When I moved to the US and switched to coaching, I became even more transparent. Self-disclosure is more accepted in the coaching world, and my clients often wanted support specifically with the transitions I’d lived through.

As I dove deeper into self-compassion, I discovered the healing power of common humanity, which often includes knowing that the person in front of you has been through something similar.

The memoir is a whole new layer of sharing. I assumed no one would want to work with me after reading it. Yet early readers are suggesting just the opposite.

I still remain firm about not sharing when I’m presently in crisis (that’s for my own therapist). But sometimes they know I’ve been sick, or my kids have been sick, or something my younger professional self would have shaken her head about. We’re human. And the further I get in my career, the more I see that showing our imperfections, and being okay with them, is an essential foundation for healing.

“A Compassionate Mess: A Therapist, Her Monsters, and a Journey to Self-Acceptance” will be published June 23rd.

This post was inspired by the prompt from the challenge organized by

Three weeks from today, "A Compassionate Mess" will be out in the world. 🎉

To celebrate, I'm hosting an online launch party on June 23rd and I'd love for you to join me.

We'll do a reading from the book, a short guided self-compassion meditation, Q&A, and a giveaway of some of my favorite books.

📅 June 23rd · 10am PT / 1pm ET / 7pm CET

🔗 Sign up at the link in my bio

Everyone is welcome — no need to have read the book or be planning to. Just come celebrate with me.

Hope to see you there!