Author Kimber Hardick shares how letting go of perfection transformed her gatherings and her life

As someone who has spent years hosting like the whole night was a subtle performance review, I know how easy it is to call control “being thoughtful.” I had the playlists, the candles, the timing, the table. And yes, I wanted people to feel welcome. I also wanted to feel steady. If everything looked good and flowed right, I could relax. If it didn’t, I could feel that tight little edge in me that says, fix it, manage it, make it better.

For a long time, I didn’t question it because it worked. People came over. They complimented the food. The photos looked good. The night moved along. But underneath all that, I was working. Not in the obvious way, but in the mental way. Watching the room. Tracking who needed what. Trying to keep anyone from feeling uncomfortable. And if I’m telling the truth, trying to keep myself from feeling uncomfortable too.

It’s a strange thing to realize you can be surrounded by people and still not fully be with them.

What started to change it for me wasn’t a new hosting trick or a better plan. It was noticing what was happening inside me while I hosted. The tightness. The urgency. The way I could hear myself narrating the night in real time. Are they bored? Did I talk too long? Is the food taking too long? Do they like each other? Should I change the music? Should I fill the silence?

That’s not connection. That’s management.

Connection, for me, started showing up when I stopped trying to choreograph it. When I stopped treating the gathering like something I needed to deliver. When I let it be a room full of humans, each carrying their own day, their own mood, their own awkwardness, their own stories. When I stopped trying to smooth out every rough edge and instead stayed present for what was actually happening.

There was a Friendsgiving in Panama that brought this into focus for me. I’m not going to tell the whole story here because I wrote it into my book, An Invitation to Shine: From Invisible to Invincible, and I want people to discover it in the way it was meant to be experienced. What I will say is this. Something didn’t go the way I planned. And in that moment, I felt the fork in the road.

I could tighten my grip, take over, try to make it “good.”

Or I could let the night be real.

That decision was small, almost invisible. Nobody would’ve noticed it from the outside. But it changed how I’ve hosted ever since.

When I host from control, I’m “on.” I’m scanning faces and managing energy. I’m trying to prevent awkwardness, prevent silence, prevent anything that might make someone feel unsure. It’s a lot of work. And the irony is, it often creates the very thing I’m trying to avoid. People can feel when someone’s performing. They might not name it, but they sense it. The room gets polite. The conversation stays safe. Everyone behaves.

When I host from connection, I’m in the room. I’m not trying to manufacture anything. I’m not trying to steer the conversation into something impressive. I’m not trying to manage other people’s feelings. I’m paying attention, yes, but I’m not micromanaging. I’m letting the night unfold and trusting that adults can handle a little silence, a little mess, a little unpredictability.

The soup might be too salty. The dog might bark. Someone might say something awkward. A silence might show up and last longer than I want it to. And instead of rushing to fix it, I let it breathe. Because most of the time, that’s when something honest slips in. Somebody tells a real story. Somebody laughs for real. Somebody admits they’ve had a hard week. Somebody relaxes.

It’s not polished. It’s human.

I think this matters more than ever because a lot of us are tired. Tired of performing. Tired of getting it right. Tired of being the one who makes everything feel okay for everyone else. Midlife has a way of exposing this. Not in a dramatic way, but in a practical one. You start to notice you don’t have the same appetite for pretending. You can still show up with care, but you don’t want to disappear inside the role.

Hosting is one of the sneaky places we disappear.

So here’s what hosting looks like for me now. I still care about the details I genuinely enjoy. I still like a beautiful table. I still love cooking for people. But I try to do those things because they delight me, not because I’m trying to earn something. I don’t treat the gathering like proof I’m good enough. I treat it like an invitation.

I invite people into my home, and I invite myself into the room too.

I don’t need the night to be perfect. I need it to be real.

And real is where connection begins.

If this hits, and you recognize yourself in it, you’ll find more of this inside An Invitation to Shine: From Invisible to Invincible. https://a.co/d/6QHvyRt

“The point is not to manage the moment, it is to live it,” Hardick said. “Control might make things look smooth, but presence makes them real. And real is where connection begins.”

A New Approach to Gathering

Hardick’s work focuses on helping people move from performance to presence, particularly those in midlife who have spent years proving themselves. Her frameworks, including Wait–What–Watch and Feeling Without Feeding, offer practical ways to pause, notice, and live from truth rather than choreographed perfection.

The former yoga teacher and wellness studio owner brings lived experience to her teaching. After years performing her way through life, illness, loss and change asked her to stop striving and start listening. Her healing journey unfolded over decades but came together in Panama, where she finally began living what she had been learning.

“True connection does not need choreography,” Hardick said. “It needs presence.”

Loosening the Grip on Perfection

As the season of gatherings and gratitude arrives, Hardick offers a simple invitation: loosen the grip a little. Light the candles, set the table, then let the rest unfold.

Her message resonates with audiences navigating midlife transitions, career shifts, or the quiet ache of feeling unseen. Book clubs, wellness practitioners, and community groups have embraced her grounded approach to self-awareness and authentic connection.

Hardick leads small circles and online communities centered on presence, truth and remembering. She has appeared on podcasts and spoke at a live training event last September, sharing her message that presence, not perfection, allows people to live and lead with truth.

Hosting is not about hustling to make everything perfect, Hardick believes. It is about letting life, and love, be imperfect with you.

You can follow Kimber Hardick’s insights at kimberhardick.com and through her communitieson Instagramand Facebook.

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Last modified: January 26, 2026