The Cardamom Law

There's a Norwegian concept called Janteloven.

It's the unwritten social rule that keeps everyone in line — don't think you're special, don't stand out, don't want too much, don't be too loud or too ambitious or too anything that might make the people around you uncomfortable. Every culture has its own version. You know the one. You've probably been following it your whole life.

Most women absorbed it before they could even name it. And for decades we followed it faithfully — shrinking ourselves down to an acceptable size, performing the role we were handed, editing out the parts that didn't fit. But here's what we forgot:

There's another Norwegian law: Kardemommeloven. One that children learn even earlier, a bedtime children's book by Thorbjørn Egner, and somehow we left it behind when we grew up and started worrying about what everyone thought of us.

Du skal ikke plage andre, du skal være grei og snill, men ellers kan du gjøre som du vil. (Don't harm others. Be decent. Be kind. And otherwise — do whatever you want.)

That's it. That's the whole law.

Don't hurt anyone. Be a decent human being. And then go live.

Somewhere between childhood and midlife, most of us traded Kardemommeloven for Janteloven without noticing. We stopped asking what we wanted and started asking what was allowed. We stopped trusting ourselves and started managing other people's opinions of us instead.

For years I followed Janteloven like everyone else. I had the life that looked right on paper. The kind you could explain at a dinner party without anyone raising an eyebrow. And then one day I just... didn't have it in me anymore. The caring what people thought. The maintaining the appearance. The performing the acceptable version of myself. So I traded it all in. Moved from suburbia to a farm in Vestfold, surrounded myself with horses and alpacas, and built a life that made absolutely no sense to anyone watching from the outside.

People had opinions. They always do. But somewhere in that leap I remembered that book from my childhood: That the only real rules are don't harm others and be a decent human being. Everything else? That's yours to decide.

The moment you stop managing other people's opinions of you is terrifying, but it's also the moment your real life begins. No more performing. No more shrinking. No more editing yourself down to a size that was never yours to begin with. That's not selfishness. That's Kardemommeloven. And it's the most radical act of self-respect there is.

Screw the Script: The Gen X Woman's Guide to Midlife Magic. March 21st 2026.

Still screwing the script, sharing what works.