Choosing Strength Over Fear
- Oct 3, 2025
- 3 min read
By Karen Arcilla
In 2021, my world shattered when I lost my mom to COVID. The woman who had always been my source of safety and encouragement was gone overnight. The silence she left behind was deafening. Fear crept into every corner of my life—the fear of the future, of being alone, of never feeling whole again.
The first thing I reached for was a candle. Its small flame was the only light I could hold onto, a fragile beacon cutting through the darkness of my grief. That single flicker became an anchor, a place to rest my sorrow and honor her memory when everything else felt unbearable.
Then my high school friend Charmaine, who had known my mom, sent candles in her memory—a simple act of love that shifted something inside me. I realized I didn’t just want to buy candles. I wanted to make them. Not as a business, not for anyone else, but as my way of keeping her light alive.
That choice—choosing strength over fear—became my first step forward. Instead of letting the darkness consume me, I chose to keep lighting those candles, holding on to even the smallest glimmer of hope.
I didn’t walk that path alone. My family’s love steadied me when I felt untethered. Renata, my cofounder and sister in grief, became another anchor. She had lost her dad years before and understood the weight of carrying an absence that never really goes away. In her presence, I felt understood in a way words couldn’t reach. Together, we knew the power of a flame—to honor those we’d lost and to guide us through the dark.
Gradually, making candles grew beyond survival. Each one was a vessel filled with grief and gratitude. Every flame was a promise: light could still exist, even after loss. Loss changes us, but it also connects us all. We all know what it means to search for light in the darkness.
From that personal act of remembrance, Set Forth NY was born—a candle line born from pain and hope. I built it step by step, with Renata by my side, my family steadying me, and quiet encouragement from Robert, a dear friend. The name “Set Forth” holds its old meaning: to begin a journey. Though I was lost and couldn’t see the way forward, I kept moving, and these candles became companions for anyone navigating grief, change, or new beginnings.
Launching Set Forth was terrifying. I had no roadmap, no connections, and no guarantee anyone would understand what we were making. But I knew one thing: these candles mattered. They weren’t about masking pain or distracting from it. They were about holding it, honoring it, and reminding people that even the smallest flame can guide you forward.
Today, Set Forth has grown beyond what I imagined. Our candles reach people mourning loved ones, walking through heartbreak, celebrating milestones, or simply needing to feel less alone. Every message I receive about how a candle brought comfort feels like my mom’s light reaching beyond me—joined by Renata’s father’s memory, carried forward into countless other lives.
Choosing strength over fear hardly ever looks dramatic. Sometimes it’s just striking a match or leaning on those who hold you up. For me, it was making candles for my mom and, with Renata and my family beside me, letting that choice become a light for others.
Fear still visits me. But every time I watch a wick catch and a flame rise, I remember: strength isn’t the absence of fear. It’s moving forward anyway. And with each flame, we set forth again.
Each flame holds memory, hope, and the courage to begin again.
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