The Hand You’re Dealt

Life begins with a hand none of us chose.

The Hand You’re Dealt is the original SO LA candle collection—a seven-candle symbolic journey exploring healing, identity, inherited stories, and ultimately the freedom to author your own life.

The collection was intentionally created around the symbolism of seven. The first five candles correspond to our five senses—the ways we initially experience and make meaning of the world. The final two belong to Below Deck, where the journey moves beyond what can be seen into intuition, symbolism, and deeper ways of knowing. Woven throughout the collection is a second symbolic thread: the seven chakras. Each candle pairs artwork, fragrance, crystal, and reflection with qualities traditionally associated with one stage of that journey, inviting a multisensory experience of healing and self-discovery.

Together, the seven candles trace a symbolic progression through rupture, inheritance, vulnerability, authenticity, authorship, intuition, and sanctuary. While each candle stands on its own, together they tell a larger story: not of becoming someone new, but of returning to what has always been there beneath survival.

Every candle was created as a symbolic experience bringing together original artwork, tailored scent throws, crystal, tarot, reflection, and a cause whose mission reflects the heart of that chapter as well as a story attached to its charitable giving, with a mission that extends the community here. Together, they invite you to engage not only with the candle itself, but with the ideas, questions, and stories it was created to hold.

I. The Black Rock

Every journey begins somewhere.

The Black Rock marks the moment certainty gives way to something unknown. It is the place where innocence meets reality, where life is quietly divided into before and after.

As the foundation of The Hand You’re Dealt, it reminds us that transformation rarely begins with clarity. It begins with disruption.

Supporting CHILL.org, in honor of dear friends lost to suicide, this candle honors hope, youth mental health, and the belief that early support can change the course of a life.

II. The Motherland

Before we understand ourselves, we inherit stories.

The Motherland explores the mother wound, intergenerational trauma, and the unconscious patterns passed quietly through families. Inspired in part by Tippi Hedren’s story and the broader conversation surrounding inherited pain, it invites compassion instead of shame.

Rather than blaming the generations before us, this candle asks a different question: What becomes possible when awareness interrupts inheritance?

Healing ourselves gives future generations a lighter burden to carry.

III. The Sequin Cowboy

Not every inheritance belongs to women.

The Sequin Cowboy explores the pressure placed upon the “golden boy,” the expectation that masculinity must suppress vulnerability in order to deserve love or respect.

Inspired by the hope of a softer future for boys and men, this candle honors emotional honesty, sensitivity, and the freedom to become fully oneself without shame.

Healing the patriarchy liberates everyone.

IV. In The Raw

There comes a moment when the story changes.

In The Raw is the space where old identities begin falling away. It recognizes that many of the burdens we carried were never ours to begin with, and that understanding our history becomes the beginning of freedom.

This is the candle of rebirth, not because suffering was beautiful, but because truth makes new life possible. Our wounds become places of wisdom rather than lifelong prisons. Healing becomes less about fixing ourselves than remembering what survival asked us to hide.

Knowledge becomes the beginning of agency.

V. A Bunny Is Born

Healing eventually becomes creation.

Inspired by the closing moments of Meet Joe Black, A Bunny Is Born celebrates the realization that your future no longer belongs to your past.

This candle honors the moment you recognize that you still get to choose your life. It is a celebration of possibility, imagination, authorship, and the beautiful responsibility of creating a future on your own terms.

Not because the past disappears—but because it no longer gets the final word.

Below Deck

Not everything that guides us lives on the surface.

Below Deck is the companion collection to The Hand You’re Dealt. If the first five candles explore visible healing, Below Deck explores the quieter inner world that continues long afterward, and the place where intuition, symbolism, imagination, and deeper knowing begin to emerge.

Inspired by the idea that life asks us to navigate with more than our five senses, this collection encourages us to trust what cannot always be measured, but can often be deeply felt.

Like calm water after a long voyage, Below Deck was created with crystal-clear waters and smooth sailing in mind.

VI. Sea Stars

The sixth candle marks the beginning of the Below Deck journey.

Sea Stars represents awakening perception—seeing beneath the surface and learning to trust both intuition and insight. Inspired by the symbolic “third eye,” it celebrates curiosity, expanded awareness, and the courage to believe what your inner compass quietly reveals.

It reminds us that some of our greatest gifts emerge only after we learn to look deeper.

VII. Sacred

Every voyage deserves somewhere safe to return.

Sacred is the final candle in the collection and the place where the journey comes home.

It honors the peace that can exist after healing, not because life becomes perfect, but because we begin relating to ourselves differently. It celebrates the sanctuary we build through courage, self-understanding, and continued learning.

This candle is about grace in the aftermath. It recognizes that healing rarely happens cleanly, yet reminds us that clarity, safety, and belonging can still be created.

It is the place we return to. The harbor after the voyage. The reminder that, after everything, we can always come back home to ourselves.