If You’re Feeling Disappointed or Discouraged
What Happened When I Stopped Making Rigid Rules for Myself
“Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.” ~Viktor E. Frankl
I stood in my kitchen, staring at the leftover red velvet cake from my birthday party the night before. It was beautiful: layers of deep red with cream cheese frosting that I knew tasted incredible. And for the first time in years, I heard something different than the voice that had ruled my life.
For so long, there had been this other voice. Dominating. Controlling. It told me exactly what
A Simple Practice That’s Keeping Me Out of Catastrophic Thinking
“Hope is not a prediction. It is the choice to believe something good is possible before we have proof.”
For most of my life, I lived with an internal alarm system that never turned off. I expected disaster around every corner—financial collapse, professional failure, health crises, humiliation, and loss. Catastrophic thinking wasn’t just a habit; it felt like responsibility. It felt like vigilance. It felt like survival.
As a documentary filmmaker, anticipating the unexpected is part of the job. We learn to obsess over what could go wrong—equipment failures, weather shifts, emotional volatility, permissions falling apart, safety concerns, or a
How to Create Micro-Moments of Joy to Help You Keep Going
“The present moment is filled with joy and happiness. If you are attentive, you will see it.” ~Thich Nhat Hanh
I want to shine a light on something that often gets overlooked in both the medical world and the mental health space. Something I didn’t have a name for until I lived through it myself.
I call it joy deficiency.
If you’re reading this, chances are you’ve felt it too.
Maybe you’re living with Crohn’s, like I am.
Maybe you’ve faced chronic migraines, cancer, autoimmune symptoms, depression, fatigue, or simply the exhaustion of carrying emotional pain for far too long.…
AI Helped Me Sound “Better” and Feel Worse
It was close to midnight the first time it really hit me.
I was sitting alone at my kitchen table, still in work clothes, phone in hand. I’d come straight home after a long day of back-to-back meetings, staff conversations, and one decision I’d been avoiding for weeks—a call that would affect someone’s role, their income, and their sense of security. By the time I got home, I was too wired to sleep and too tired to change.
The house was quiet.
On the screen was a chat window.
Not with a friend. Not with a therapist. With an AI.…
The Cost of Chronic Stress and 6 Practical Steps to Presence
“You are not your thoughts. You are the observer of your thoughts.” ~Amit Ray
I was in the middle of responding to my third “urgent” email of the morning when I realized I hadn’t tasted my coffee.
The cup sat there, half-empty and cold. I had no memory of drinking it.
That small moment became the crack that let the light in. Because if I couldn’t remember drinking my coffee, something I claimed to love, something I looked forward to every morning, what else was I missing?
The answer, I would soon discover, was almost everything.
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