Tag: mental-health

  • Conflicting Operating Protocols

    I can’t sleep… and I know virtually everyone on this planet at some point in their existence experiences this. Many will see this as a recurring event. For me? It is an existential truth.  There is an interesting moment each night for me—the point where my neurodivergent brain meets the absolute absence of energy left…

  • Pass the Brown Bean Juice.

    If someone were tasked with writing my owner’s manual, the first page would contain one very important warning: Do not operate before coffee. I’ve learned a few things about myself over the years. Some are admirable. Some… not so much. But one truth has become impossible to ignore. I don’t ask for much from life.…

  • A Manual Selfie of Sorts

    A Manual Selfie of Sorts

    Self-portraits… a manual selfie of sorts. When the world gets quiet, my thoughts usually don’t. Today, they settled on the only subject I know from the inside out: me, and the journey that’s brought me to this moment on the third rock from the sun. No what-ifs. No forecasts. No reinventions. Just who I am…

  • Not the Same River, Not the Same Me

    “No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it’s not the same river and he’s not the same man.”— Heraclitus I heard this today, and it stayed with me. At first, it sounds like a simple observation about a river. But it’s really about life. Heraclitus reminds us that two things are always…

  • How Curiosity and Creativity Became the Story of My Life

    I don’t remember deciding to become a creative person. I think I just never stopped being a curious kid. Like every toddler, I was convinced the world existed solely for my investigation. Everything deserved to be touched, tasted, shaken, stacked, thrown, or, if possible, taken apart. My parents probably called it “getting into things.” I…

  • My Knees Have Opinions

    I have reached the age where I’ve discovered something I never knew in my younger years. Apparently, my knees have opinions. The problem is, they’ve become a lot more vocal with age, and they don’t often agree with my heart. Getting injured no longer requires doing something stupid. There was a time when I could…

  • On the Honor System: How Are We All Still Alive?

    Civilization has a dirty little secret. It only works because, for the most part, we trust each other. Have you ever stopped and realized just how much of everyday life runs on the assumption that complete strangers are going to behave themselves? Not because they have to. Because they’re supposed to. That’s an important distinction.…

  • A Merely Audible Contemplation

    Lately, I’ve spent enough time alone to hear the refrigerator thinking. It’s a low hum at first, but if you sit quietly long enough, you start wondering if it’s judging your life choices. The funny thing is, I don’t remember solitude being part of the plan. Growing up in a small town, there was always…

  • Job Title: Yes (Other Duties as Assigned)

    There isn’t a single human being on this floating rock hurtling through space who has managed to live life playing only one role. Not one. If you know such a person, please let me know. I’d like to study them. Strictly for academic purposes, of course. Not because I suspect they’re an alien trying very…

  • Turns Out I Was Pretty Good at Being Me

    Once upon a time, there was a kid. A curious kid. A distracted kid. He was good at just about everything he tried, but never really great at any of it—or at least that’s what he thought. He never really knew what he wanted to be when he grew up. He considered all the usual…

  • Self-Inflicted and Poorly Supervised

    I know I don’t need caffeine. That’s the first honest thing I write today, and I almost want to stop there because it already sounds like the kind of sentence people say right before they absolutely do the thing anyway. It’s not even about needing it. Not really. It’s more like… curiosity. Scientific curiosity, if…

  • The Fine Art of Holding a Grudge

    When we were kids, grudges lasted about six minutes.Someone stole your crayon, you cried, your mom intervened, and ten minutes later you were both eating the same bag of chips like nothing happened. Justice was swift.Closure was immediate.Snacks were shared. Then we grew up. And somewhere between paying bills and learning how to properly sigh,…

  • Mirror, Mirror on My Desk…

    We spend a lot of time looking outward. At expectations. At what other people are doing, saying, or thinking. We compare, we react, we adjust. Most of our day is shaped by everything happening around us. But we rarely stop and look inward. There aren’t many moments in the day where it’s just you and…

  • Alone at the Happiest Place on Earth

    Most people would say the Disneyland Resort isn’t a place you go alone.That doing so feels equal parts pathetic and depressing. And maybe… on paper, it is. But I did it anyway. I was there for a two-day excursion—an Arts Education Leadership Summit. Work. Professional development. The kind of trip that comes with lanyards, schedules,…

  • Little-Known Facts About Me

    If you look back long enough, you start to notice the strange little things that were always there. Not the big milestones. Not the obvious moments. The quieter details— the ones that didn’t make sense at the time, but somehow explain everything now. I don’t usually sit around listing facts about myself. Feels a little…