Been out on any good limbs lately? If you said yes to actual, physical limbs, send us a photo! But if you said yes to those metaphorical, sometimes uncomfortable limbs, I say, “Me, too.”

Once a quarter when we have the Spirit feature in our Mind, Body, & Spirit column come up, I hand off that opportunity to someone pretty easily. In all these times, I never felt experienced enough to write that one myself. Until now. And I’ll say, as I wrote it, I knew it was a solid piece, but I wasn’t at all sure it fit in the magazine (yes, even after six years of doing this job!). But depending on how you look at it, I pushed myself—or maybe sabotaged is the better word—because I didn’t ask anyone else to write a back-up piece. No just-in-case. Gutsy. Maybe crazy.

What you’ll see in the magazine is the edited version, the one that fits the word-count requirement. On my blog, you can see the entire thing (it’s about 300 words longer), if you’re curious.

Putting yourself out there, to brandish yet another cliché here, is hard. And I realized that’s what some, if not all, the men in the LKN Men’s issue each year experience. We ask them to be styled, often in clothing they wouldn’t have in their own closets, and then to endure a photo shoot with not only Chelsea (who can put anyone at ease) but with four or five other women staring at and talking with them, the solo subject in the moment. We try to joke and laugh to make it fun, but the truth is, these men are typically out of their elements. Even if they are extroverted and a blast in their own offices, this experience has unnerved more than one guy throughout the years. The good part is that we aren’t going to let anyone look bad, but even that sometimes bears repeating. More than once. What we know to be normal and fine, doesn’t always feel that way to someone else.

So, while we already know that all this year’s LKN Men look awesome—and their stories are great—take a minute to tell them, either face-t0-face or via technology. They put themselves out there—and man, are we glad they did!