Prologue

I don’t really feel like doing anything, let alone writing. But I didn’t feel like playing my video game anymore, and so here we are. Exploring something concerning the winding road to motivation.

Act I

I want to write. I really do. I keep having all these ideas pop into my brain and cling to the inside of my skull like Tom Cruise clinging to the exterior of an airplane in Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation. Except instead of allowing the thoughts to board the aircraft, it’s like I’m trying to achieve escape velocity from having to do anything.

I’m sitting in my darkened living room (ambient lighting is the way to go when it’s dark outside, after all). It’s 8:56 pm. My cat is sitting in the window staring at the brick wall next door. I have an 8-hour ambient music video, futuristic, yet deep and resonant sounding, on in the background. Framing the TV that’s glowing red and teal, I have not one, but two candles lit. Getting adventurous with aroma mixing. (That’s a bold-faced lie, I thought one of those candles wasn’t going to burn for very long, as it’s at the end of its wick. I have underestimated its resilience).

I might also be underestimating mine.

I have a glass of wine (my second). I logged out of playing Fallout 76 on my Xbox to try writing instead. My usual patterns aren’t kicking in, and this frustrates me. Normally I’d be out of a funk by now. Bored of feeling demotivated. Gamed myself out enough to not really feel like picking up a controller. But not this time. This time, I feel much too small to hold all the feelings that storm by like a squall warning that won't cease.

I would say that it’s indifference, ambivalence, a general lack of caring in every direction. But if that were true, it wouldn’t hurt this much. It wouldn’t feel like trying to drag the weight of someone else’s ended life with me every day, out of the desperation for it to be anything but true. I wouldn’t have that very real sensation that others have described, that now I can understand and describe too.

A piece of me went missing when my dad died. It feels like an apple-sized chasm in my chest, where the upper left lobe of my lung would be. Well is. My lung is there, on this plane of existence at least. I think the hole is from a different plane. And while it does no physical damage, when I focus on it, it feels like a small black hole trying to pull my sorrow and trauma into its mass.

When you lose someone close, someone who matters, a piece of you dies too. And I can now confidently corroborate the studies that show that emotional pain hurts just as much as physical pain. Those pain receptors in my brain are clocking overtime. I wish the union would get involved. No unpaid overtime allowed.

It’s not even that I’m avoiding writing because it’s all going to be about the grief of losing my dad. Some of it is, sure. But a lot of those skull-clinger thoughts are about life. About living. About meaning and human nature and psychology and our civic world and how we’re all existing through this crazy life together. How somewhere along the way, we know we’ve lost the plot to good living, and we’re slowly waking up to this reality and starting to change the path we’re trudging in the forest; building new paths back to old wisdoms and meadows that are already there, waiting for us.

We've lost the plot.

Being knocked over by the grief of losing a parent young has me worried about losing the plot of my own life. I’m scared to read the next chapters of my story. This chapter has been sad and long, and even though I keep flipping ahead a few pages to see how much of this chapter is left, it doesn’t seem like the next chapter is coming anytime soon.

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Act II

So what’s the deal with motivation? I can tell you that motivation, like enthusiasm or a sense of purpose, is hard to come by when you’re grieving. And look, that’s a broad generalization if there ever was one, because our individual differences and life circumstances add an infinite (probably) number of possibilities as to the other factors at play.

You want a strong analogy or comparison that highlights the complexity of a human, emotional experience? Buckle up buttercup. Because being a human with feelings is, to each our own, a little experiment and experience in quantum physics. I’m talking superposition, quantum entanglement, the movement and transferring of energy.

Now that would be a fun article to write.

But alas, I have stated I am not motivated nor enthusiastic, and thus, it must wait for another time when I am congruent.

More immediately (and more relevant) are the factors in front of me that very likely play a role. I was let go from my job back in February, and while that was helpful for finishing up university and then being with Dad throughout his 39 days of one hell of a fight for his life, and all the eventual aftermath for those left behind within this mortal coil… Now it’s adding to the already tremendous sense of uncertainty in my life. Job searches are always a bit of a slog. I don’t have a familiar routine or sense of purpose that can come from having a job. Or a healthy distraction. Instead, I am the one responsible for filling my days, making my own goals, self-motivating each and every task, objective.

And that can be a difficult thing to do on a good day. Try setting goals and being self-directed when the only direction you have is: Grief → this way, ← that way, ⤴⤵ and every which way. When even minor annoyances that generally don’t have much sway become the reason the rest of my day feels kiboshed. I really just want to be cozy in my new Dimmu Borgir sweater but noooooo it needs to be 30 fucking degrees (Celsius) and so humid there are fog warnings. Importantly, I should probably mention that I am somebody who does not enjoy being hot (I’d rather be cold) and I find the consistent hot and sticky environment of Toronto oppressive and vexing. And after the summer I’ve had, I am even more desperate to move into a different season.

Anything can help when you need to get out of your misery.

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Act III

(Huh, only three acts. Well, not everything can be a Shakespearean masterpiece.)

Though anything could help get me out of misery, the best tool I have is myself. And I am only too aware that I am choosing not to do the things that would help me move out of the rut I’m currently in. I wouldn’t say I’m happily sitting in this muddy rut, yet here I am, making mud pies.

I think it’s fair to assume that most of us know ourselves well enough to know what support looks like, and what we need to get through a hard time. If you’re reading this right now, you’ve already survived 100% of your hard times. If you happen to be a ghost and are reading this, please leave a comment on how you do it so I can tell Dad so he can read my stuff. Thanks in advance.

I know the things that will contribute to how motivated I feel (or don’t). I know what gets me fired up, excited, raring to go. I know what systems I need to put in place to help me accomplish those things. I know the elements to my routine that can make a difference.

I just need to do it.

And right now… I just don’t want to.

Epilogue

I know that, very often, motivation comes after action. Not before. Science says the same thing. (It’s nuanced, and there’s a lot of neuropsychology involved, but it’s that the feeling of being motivated usually arrives after the action is taken, because that’s when reward pathways in the brain light up.) See?! I even have the scientific explanation that should logically guide me toward action, and yet. I do not.

The hardest part is starting.

But once you start, everything follows.

And I think that’s my discovery, now, at the end of this article.

It’s 10:02 pm.

The hardest part is starting. And while I work my way through all of this grief, just about everything I do feels like it needs to be started. No wonder I don’t want to do much. The hardest part is staring me in the face from all sides.

Guess I better pick a side. And start.

My confession of tardiness was quickly forgiven by my best friend as she was called away to consult on hose reel replacement by her partner.

They moved into their house 8 months ago, in December, and have been tackling the house tasks for the summer.

I am deeply envious.

Not because I don’t have a hose reel of my own to replace (though that’s a close second), but because I’m envious of the projects they will take on together to build their home. There is a simplicity in that. I wish it was a of part my life.

I see it as an expense that gets me everything and the kitchen sink. Sure, I might need to replace the furnace, or hot water tank, or roof, or fix that hole I put in the drywall cause I told my honourary nephew to “Go long!” What I’m envious of, all costs considered, is the slow, gradual, long-term project of turning a house into a home. The creativity. The ability to personalize. To design a sanctuary, a safe space to land. That, and the forced mindfulness that comes with these kinds of manual tasks. Painting. Building. Gardening.

You can’t rush it.

Realistically, you only do one at a time, unless living in a construction zone is your thing. You pick the next thing you want to do. You try to conceptualize how to take the bones of the room in front of you and build what the next evolution of that space will be.

How those projects pan out can vary. And that variety appeals to me. Maybe it’s a whole room being refreshed. Maybe it’s just this one corner that gets a little attention for now. Or this one patch of soil that needs a new hosta. Or maybe, you just need to pull that rogue thumb tack out of the wall that has been taunting you for the past 4 months. There’s no right or wrong way.

There is something inherently simple, something that requires patience, about having a house to work on. Maybe it’s in part because I grew up in a smaller town and both my parents taught me these kinds of practical, home caring skills. Regardless, I’m craving that kind of slow simplicity. Life contains so much complexity and I feel starved for something simple, straightforward, clear. Pick a thing, make it mine.

I want my outdoor space to be an extension of my home.

I want to have the projects where just a little progress is made each time I work on it, and I get the satisfaction of seeing my vision take shape.

I want to maintain and learn even more practical skills. I might not build a whole house or cottage like my grandfathers, but I can refinish furniture, paint, landscape.

That’s not everyone’s cup of tea. I get that. For some, the condo lifestyle where you pay to have things looked after and get extra amenities is your vibe (pool party, anyone?). What’s important is having a home, wherever it may be, that is aligned with your values. As I come from a family of builders, often the lack of quality and lack of options to modify a space makes my face screw up like I’m sucking on a lemon.

We will all spend a lot of time at home. We will share that space with people we love (and in my case, with no less than 2 cats). We all deserve to have a place where we walk in the door and exhale, and settle into our peace. A home is how I will do this.

How will you?

Today I started my search up again, in earnest, for my next career adventure.

In earnest because, at this stage, the not working thing, while it has been great in many ways, is now overstaying its welcome and turning into uncertainty and financial ick.

But today was the day. I’m now back home in Toronto, learning to exist in solitude with grief. This past week was also the culmination of months of work for a wedding for dear friends of mine.

The grief is now a gentle shadowy companion. It comes and goes, and that’s okay. My friends’ wedding was this past Saturday, and that day was amazing. And that concludes my bridesmaid duties.

There was a sense of a clear shift.

But of course, the inevitable “now what?” took up residence in my brain.

And so I knew it was time to find the next chapter in my career story.

But it was going to look very different now.

Lights

My job searching up to this point has included jobs that you could classify as a “strong maybe.” It might be the role I want to do. It might be a good fit at that company. I might really like it there. Maybe I’ll see the light, see that it’s good, when I’m in the job.

When there wasn’t any external perspective, and in the days where I was feeling run down by the process, I likely spent time applying for things I didn’t give a fig about. But it looked good. It would satisfy the scarcity mindset that has been perpetuated by the state of industry since the dawn of capitalism.

While I had set parameters for myself, is it worth my energy or not, the obligatory “don’t apply to things you don’t really want” on a Post-it note, they weren’t parameters I was holding myself to with conviction. I caught myself falling into the trap of trying to justify why I should just apply for that job, even though it made me feel like I’d be a future tummy ache survivor.

If you’re reading a job description and it’s not landing, it’s very likely not a good choice. Even if you can’t fully articulate a why, there’s a part of you that is responding to information absorbed and is signalling that this likely isn’t the move. It’s worth listening to that feeling.

And then my dad died.

Needless to say, I applied for not a lot over the time he was in the hospital, and then after. I couldn’t care less that I didn’t have a job, and moreover I was grateful I didn’t have one. I was exactly where I needed to be. Focused on exactly the person who mattered the most.

But eventually, just like the dramatic scene in an action movie, the darkness gives way to a sudden flooding of light with a mechanical swish.

Camera

Grief, of any kind, not just of the dying kind, has a way of drastically pulling a bigger picture into focus.

I’m not going to claim to be any kind of grief expert. All of us will encounter our fair share of grief in life, be it through loss, the ending of relationships, grieving big life changes, grieving hopes and dreams. It’s a universally shared human experience. But we don’t share about our grief nearly enough, despite its universality. We could change the expression to death, taxes, and grief. And seldom do we talk about grief in the context of other life things.

Like finding a job.

And that’s likely more common than we’d think. Maybe people probably leave work when dealing with heavy grief. That seems expected. Or, if you’re laid off, that is a source of grief in and of itself. So you’re coping with that gloom while trying to think about what’s next (that was me in February). It’s not easy to compartmentalize grief. It’s like trying to put the ocean in a box. You’re just going to end up with soggy cardboard and seaweed in your socks. (Why are you standing in the ocean in your socks? I don’t know, it just sounds funny and adds to the silliness of trying to ‘manage’ grief by doing silly things.)

But the perspective shift is real, and valuable. Thinking of my dad, the best way to honour him is to live in one of the ways I most admired: he didn’t give a hoot about what anyone else might have thought, if he liked it, he did it. Whether it was outfits, his deep, nerdy love of Star Wars and EVE online, his beloved Lancer EVO, he loved what he loved, and put money and time into it. Even a horrid Carhartt knockoff. He loved it and didn’t really care how hard we rolled our eyes at him.

So if I searched for jobs like that, how would it go? If I suspended all judgement from myself and others, where would I apply? What wouldn’t I accept as far as benefits and salary go? What kind of company would I be really proud and excited to work at?

Moreover. You learn that life can take very, very unexpected turns.

So you might as well spend the time you have doing something that brings you joy, fills your cup, and fires you up.

Action.

There’s a unique feeling to popping in your earplugs and moving into a darkened space, where your chest pulses in increasing intensity to the drums.

If you’ve never been to a heavy, drum and riff forward concert, you’ve gotta experience it at least once.

I’ve never seen Machine Head or Killswitch Engage, and there’s something magical about being introduced to a band’s music for the first time in a concert setting. Nothing beats the energy of a live performance, and sharing in that experience with a crowd of fans is half the enjoyment.

I think I made it through half a song before I started welling up.

My taste in music comes from my Dad, who passed away a month ago, who, arguably, was still young and tough enough to mosh if he really wanted to. He loved music, and we would share music discoveries over text as our father-daughter love language.

I would’ve normally sent him a video. I don’t think he listened to either of these bands, but it would still have been a music share.

It was hard to stand there and have the wave of grief nearly knock me over with the realization that I wouldn’t get to see anymore concerts with him. That he’d never meet my partner and share the love of the heavier music genres. That he gave me an amazing gift in my music taste.

I get to go on these musical adventures with my partner, who gets so excited about going to concerts, actually knows or has met at least 1 person in each metal band we like, and is even more excited that I want to come along.

That was an unexpected realization. My Dad bestowed his tastes in music to me, and it’s now a strong point of connection for my partner and I (who is, by the way, an excellent musician, a big fan of Pantera and Children of Bodom), and this connection is a really important piece for me. I want to be the kind of partner who is really supportive of my partners loves and dreams, and we have that easily. I don’t have to try to like this stuff. I do, so coming along for the adventures is just that.

It took a few songs, but eventually I felt I was able to make enough space for this new grief to exist, and it carried on its way. As much as I hadn’t expected this, I’m glad it happened.

As hard as these moments are, the more they happen now, at the beginning of this new way of life, the more I can move through the grief that comes up and move closer toward whatever type of peace comes after loss. The peace where you grow around the grief, so it’s not bigger than you, and find a place for that love to go.

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The weight of my grief was alleviated in part by the messages each band left us with at the end of their set. You are always welcome here, at our concerts.

There is a huge mental health lens in metal. It might be one of the things that really draws me to the genre. It’s substantially more open and in touch with the struggles of our emotional experiences. It calls out the double standards and doesn’t perpetuate much as far as old dogmas go.

Hearing those messages brought me out of my grief tumble somewhat. I am grieving, but I’m still welcome here. To participate, dance, jump, sing, and enjoy a night out. We’re all fighting some fight. We’re all battling our own emotions, demons, heartaches, fears, and more. But we have each other. We have music and moments of celebration. And we have a great weapon to win these fights.

So I’ll leave the last word to Jesse of Killswitch, who reminded us of this.

^{Photo by Anne Nygard on Unsplash}

After my Dad’s celebration of life, people soon started asking about my plans for work.

I had been laid off earlier this year, and it became the biggest blessing over the 2 months my Dad was battling for his life and when we needed to do services afterwards.

I showed up and fought beside my Dad. And I have no regrets. No shame. No uncertainty around how I showed up or if I could have done things differently.

It was interesting to me that people had asked me about work over the course of this. Some simply out of curiosity (perfectly fair). Others, from what I can only assume is their own scarcity mindset as I continued to be unemployed (though receiving employment insurance) and had not continued the pursuit of work.

My answer, every time, was that I had my priorities straight.

I can always make more money.

But I’ll never get my Dad back.

Grief

Though the celebration of life has ended, and people came to celebrate my Dad with us, the journey is far from over for my family and me. Grief has no timeline. And unlike other emotions, it comes and goes in unpredictable waves.

I’m not miserable all the time. I make jokes and laugh and spend time with people who are surrounding me with love and support. And I have many moments, even when I’m alone, where you know what? I’m okay.

Other times, I’m crying in No Frills over a large clamshell of blueberries.

That is exactly what can be so challenging about grief. We can fall into the sinister trap of having more consecutive moments of okayness and thinking that we’re all good now. Because grief isn’t lurking in some dark corner of your skull where it’s always seeking attention.

It’s love with nowhere to go.

And those moments, where we’re holding on to so much love without a person to receive it, that remind us of the piece removed from our hearts when someone dies.

I didn’t understand what people meant when they said a piece of them was missing after a person very close to them dies.

Now I do.

I feel it in my chest. A little more toward the left. Like the top lobe of my left lung has been torn from my chest and there’s a tiny black hole in its place, trying to pull the rest of my atoms into it.

It took me a while to really understand this massive emotion. I’ve never been through this severe of a loss before.

So I do what I can to try not to collapse under the weight of my own grief.

And so I choose my life.

Not work.
Not finding another job. (Not yet)
I’ll get there. It’ll have its moment.
But that moment is not right now.

There are, of course, times in our lives when we need to take a deep breath and power through the discomfort. This is not one of those times.

Scarcity

While I might seem cheesed that people are asking me about work and I’m presenting them as having no empathy or perspective whatsoever, that’s not the case for everyone, and that’s not what prompted me to write.

What’s upsetting about it is seeing too many people who live from a mindset of scarcity. And because that’s a real fear in their own lives, it comes out at others, most often unconsciously.

After the celebration of life, when the question came up, I told people that when I got home to Toronto, that would be the time. Until then, be here, be with my family, grieve together.

The next morning, after arriving back in Toronto, the thoughts about diving back into the job search floated to the surface. I was journaling on the couch and startled my cat when that thought was interrupted by a verbally expressed “hell nah”.

There was my answer then. My head and my heart already knew where my priorities firmly remained.

Life

Even so, life doesn’t stop. The world keeps turning, the weather shifts, and you still can’t find that thing you lost.

I will need to go back to work. And I want to. I have systems to disrupt. Experiences to create. Money to make. New adventures to embark on.

I want all of these things still. And it’s not like they don’t float around in my head, taking their time in the spotlight of my consciousness as players, each playing their part, hitting their mark, and exiting the stage.

But they do not outweigh, or outshine, nor can they outmaneuver this grief. Nor should they.

I have the whole rest of my life to work and go on adventures.

But first, I need to sit with the sorrow of doing all of these, knowing my Dad isn’t a text, a call, a hug away, to share in my adventures.

I had been consistent in my writing, and I was proud of this.

A severe family medical emergency ground everything to a halt.

Two weeks later, we’re all sitting with the hard lesson that sometimes, this stuff is hour by hour, not day by day. Progress can be excruciatingly slow, and there’s nothing we can do but wait and sit bedside.

And over this time, I’ve criticized myself for not writing. Not keeping up with my consistent practice of creativity.

This morning, I was quiet and calm enough to have that thought, which was then promptly followed by “How f*cked is that?”

What kind of world am I living in where I have been conditioned to criticize myself for not maintaining creative productivity (an oxymoron in and of itself) while living through a collective trauma?

Of course it was this that then prompted me to write and spurred my creative spirit (though wracked with grief) to share this. Because I know it’s not just me.

I was inspired in part by this article by Stoic Wisdoms, which explored the concept of the social clock, and how it has evolved to make us feel categorically behind in many (if not all) aspects of our lives. Through comparison and social norms, and the ever evolving algorithm, we have been conditioned to feel behind, inadequate, like we are doing something wrong.

When what we are really doing, is just living. Living our own lives, carving our own paths, deciding how to handle what life throws our way. There’s no rulebook, no Ikea instruction booklet on how to build your Schneedenborgen Bookshelf that holds the records of your life.

Just life. Happening. As it does. And you, with whatever experience you have, deciding how to handle it.

While writing this, I’m sitting outside on the deck, watching my mother’s Maine Coon kitten hunt a fat, fluffy bumblebee.

The bumblebee flew away, its droning hum fading into the distance. Probably wise. Lest it end up as kitten breakfast.

They are living. The kitten and the bumblebee. Not judging themselves. Not crushing their own sweet souls under pressures that will be inconsequential by tomorrow. Likely living fuller lives than we because they spend more time living, and less time comparing, analyzing, questioning, berating.

Now please excuse me, the kitten is scaling the barbecue.

Friday

My step-mom opened the door and walked towards us. We were 7 hours into my Dad’s brain surgery. Everyone struggled to read her face.

The surgery went well. Dad was still in the OR, they were closing him up, but they wanted to let us know that it went according to plan, and he’d be back in ICU in an hour.

I expected the moment to be like it is in the TV shows. Tears, prayers said out loud, someone tries to anoint the surgeon as a Saint. None of that happened.

No tears, no surgeon. We all took turns hugging my step-mom. Brother, sister, mom, daughter in turn.

Then back to waiting. It’s good news, but we all wanted that “proof of life” moment where we had eyes on him ourselves.

The relief was temporary.

The experience of someone undergoing surgery is so much more than the surgery yourself when you’re living through it with your family.

After Dad got back to ICU, the nurse did her neuro check, and came to give us her assessment plus the lead surgeon’s thoughts. The surgery went well, but there’s a lot of brain swelling.

So back to hurry up and wait.

For having a ruptured aneurysm, and a second aneurysm found on the scans, Dad had the best case scenario in a surgical team. It was an invasive surgery, but he crushed it. As much as you can in that setting.

And now. We wait. We wait to see what symptoms are brain swelling, and what might be postoperative cognitive dysfunction. And that’s what scares me. It could take us a week to learn what cognitive issues Dad might have.

Will he still be the same Dad? Or will his personality change?

I don’t know. And that is the most heartbreaking thing to try and hold through all of this.

My aunt shares this fear. We were talking about how we were doing over 9:22 PM pizza after 12 hours at the hospital.

Nany had a different take.

I’d rather have Dad around than not have him at all, whoever he is. I’ll still love him.

We went to sleep. Hurry up and wait.

Saturday

Dad said he was gonna fight this with everything he’s got, and he wasn’t kidding.

In 12 hours, he was able to answer who, where, when. Was remembering his nurses names, could express his pain location and level nonverbally. Then he was drinking water and even eating applesauce.

While he wasn’t able to move his left side after the surgery, he was making incremental improvements as time went on.

We scheduled a time for me to stop by to give my step mom relief, and bring Dad some simple smoothies, cause Boost was a no. I don’t blame him.

One day at a time. Hurry up and wait.

Sunday Morning

News! Dad was doing really well, they were preparing to transfer him out of ICU and into the inpatient neurosurgical ward. Not too shabby for day two.

I had just pulled into the parking lot to start my visit with Dad.

A text. Brain swelling has gotten worse. Dad needs emergency surgery to relieve the pressure. They’ll be taking off the part of the skull they had originally opened to do the surgery, and leave it off until the pressure goes down. If needed, they may put in a temporary shunt to also help.

I walked in just as the neurosurgeon was explaining and getting consent from my step mom through tears for these next steps.

Dad wasn’t conscious at this point, not really. But I squeezed his hand (on the side where he could feel touch), and he squeezed back.

I watched his stats on the monitor like I could side-eye them into staying good. I doubt it was a side-eye. Probably more like a mopey daughter who hoped her raw will could help her dad fight. For all I know, it was 30 year old and 7 year old Caylyn watching those stats.

My step mom told me to talk to him. I didn’t know what to say. I did the usual stuff (is there usual stuff? I don’t know):
You’ve got this Dad.
If anyone can do this you can.
I know you’re worried about me, but I’m good, and we’ve all got each other out here, and you can just focus on you.

30 seconds of material wasn’t going to cut it. They were going to put in another arterial line before wheeling him off. This buys me time with my Dad.

So I did one thing I know I can do well.

I’m supposed to talk to you. But I don’t know what to say Dad. I’ve never been through this before and I’m figuring it out as I go, too.

One of your former co-workers texted me today to check on me and you.

A friend from my teenage years.

My two long distance best friends from back home are making sure I’m okay so that you don’t need to worry about me.

You and your partner are a team, and you guys are going to get through this.

And him being wheeled away for surgery number 2 was when I brushed up against my limit. Hurry up and wait.

Sunday Evening

Four hours after we all moved away from my Dad’s ICU room like it had become the stuffiest place on Earth, my step mom’s best friend came to give us the update.

The surgery went well.
They needed to remove a little more of the skull to release enough pressure.
They didn’t put the shunt in, by they did the bore hole so they could leverage this if needed.
He’s going to stay on anesthesia and on a ventilator until at least tomorrow morning so that Dad is comfortable and his brain can focus on bringing its own swelling down.

This is really good news. Objectively.

Good news never feels good when you’re living through a collective trauma with your family.

I don’t know that any of us felt relief. Nor optimism.

All of us were pressed up against our limits.

We all started to fall through them.

Not like glass shatters and scatters across the floor. Like gently falling through sheer fabric that stretches to try and hold the weight of your grief anger pain sadness fear empathy care helplessness that no longer fits neatly within the frame of your body. With a whisper the fabric tears and you fall gently to the cold, hard ground. No more energy left to stand through the ordeal.

You can see it in the way we’re retreating from each other.

In the way we aren’t talking.

In the way we begin to haunt whatever we’re room we’re in because we don’t exist there. Not really. Not right now.

And so we hurry up. And wait.

The Second Friday

Malignant swelling.

Hemicraniectomy.

He survived. Again. A third surgery. Giving Hercules a run for his money.

Hurry up and wait.

Four weeks later, he died.

My Dad.

I lost him.

Not that I did any of the losing. Isn’t it odd how we phrase that as if we are to blame?

And as I lie on that cold, hard ground, the grief seeps in like frost creeping up blades of grass. Grief is probably one of the most complex feelings and experiences we have. It cannot be rushed, cannot be rationalized. It needs space. I need time to adjust to my life without my Dad. A lot of time.

And so I hurry up. And wait.

This past Tuesday, I graduated from University with my Psych degree, Magna cum laude. As part of the ceremony, they explained the Latin meaning of Magna cum laude “with highest praise” for our academic accomplishments. After four and a half years working full time while doing school part time, this was a proud moment, worth celebrating. My convocation was four hours away from where I live, but it was worth traveling there. Celebrating, receiving my degree, and enjoying the tradition and ceremony that we share with other graduates and their families. Meeting a really good friend for the first time in person. Priceless.

That Tuesday evening, on the drive back home, I got a text from my step mom telling me that my dad had had a brain haemorrhage and was now in the ICU. They were trying to bring down his blood pressure so that they could do surgery to repair the aneurysm that caused a subarachnoid bleed.

That’s a lot of Latin in the same day.

It’s now Thursday, and I’m writing this from 18,000 feet in the air as my aunt and I fly home before my dad’s surgery on Friday morning. We’re flying home for Dad. To show him that he’s got a lot of people in his corner, and that we will show up. Because he’s worth it. And I know that’s meaningful because this has been a terrifying and shocking couple of days. Actions speak louder than words. And comfort comes from presence, not absence.

What is it with Tuesdays? So dramatic.

It started with joy, pride, celebration, relief, and connection. It ended with shock, sadness, fear, uncertainty, and testing my ability to support my family from a distance.

Emotions are not mutually exclusive, however. We can and do hold opposing, or what feel like conflicting emotions constantly. It often doesn’t feel like that as we swing between feelings, but they don’t need to cancel each other out. And that’s part of the emotional growth and resilience we can practice.

Dad having a severe health event does not make me any less proud of my accomplishment. Nor did it stifle the relief that came from celebrating the conclusion of this chapter of my life. Nor did it stop me and other family members from celebrating my achievement. If anything, I hope that it would bring some joy to family. A moment to celebrate something with me as we all try to navigate this trial together.

Conversely, the feelings from my graduation do not lessen the fear, sadness, and shock I feel. There are actually a lot more emotions than that right now, but all those emotions feel like they’ve been thrown into a bucket that’s being sloshed around and I can’t make heads or tails of it. That’s fine. I think my whole family is carrying their respective bucket of emotional goop.

And this is just one example of the ways in which we hold conflicting emotions. This morning was a logistical nightmare. But by tackling things one at a time, the pieces of the puzzle fell into place. I woke up at 9 AM. Booked a flight. Cancelled plans for the day. Found a cat sitter. Arranged an airport pick up when I land. Packed, cleaned, ate and was at the airport by 1:30 PM.

Getting things done served the muddled feelings puddle. Not only do we hold the emotions of the events themselves, we also hold the emotions that arise as we are deciding how to respond in a time of crisis.

No matter what happens… how do I want to show up? What kind of person do I want to be? What kind of daughter? Step-daughter? Granddaughter? Niece? Sister? This can feel like a deeply difficult question when no matter how much information you try to gather, no matter how deep you dig into the details, the answer can’t be found there. There’s no single detail about a medical procedure that will give you answer on what to do. Both my aunt and I went down that road.

But we were asking the wrong questions. These moments are challenging in part because people are fearing regret. In my growth and journey through therapy, I’ve been able to distill that down to a very simple question: No matter the outcome, who do I want to be?

I want to be the kind of person who shows up. So I do.

My partner and I decided to take a chance on Zach Galifianakis’ new show: This is a Gardening Show. Only 6 episodes, 16 or 17 minutes each, so we figured hey. Let’s watch the first one, if we don’t like it, no problem.

It was so good. We watched them all. We laughed. We learned. We sincerely hope Zach does a Season 2.

Zach. Are you doing a season 2?

…

Please?

This is a Gardening Show is a documentary miniseries following Zach Galifianakis as he explores his passion for gardening, peppered with his oddball humour, talking with gardening experts and kids to bring us a well rounded, wholesome adventure through the joys of growing things.

It was the delightful, laughter filled show my partner and I needed.

I strongly recommend it. But this isn’t just praise for a gardening show with an eccentric host.

It’s also a nudge toward wisdom we already have. Things we already know.

When was the last time you encountered someone who was like, “ew garden”. Chances are, you’d raise your eyebrow at them. We humans like plants. Trees. Flowers. Being outside.

That’s the anecdotal evidence. But we have boatloads of evidence that gardening is beneficial in various domains of our life. It’s not the magic bullet (nothing is) but gardening has been shown to have small to moderate benefits on reducing anxiety and depression, supporting weight loss, while increasing life satisfaction, quality of life, and a sense of community.1 So there are both self-reported benefits as well as clinical benefits, according to this study.

Research by the Blue Zones Institute2 has sought to understand why certain places in the world have substantial populations of people who live to 100 years old (and beyond) in relatively good health. Their research shows that these populations have plant forward diets, and often do gardening both as moderate exercise and to enjoy the purpose of producing one’s own food.3

In reading a book on Ikigai, a Japanese concept and framework for living a purposeful and joyful life, gardening frequently came up as an activity by those who had and maintained their Ikigai.4

There’s a bunch of science and data for you. Really, the proof is in the pudding. Or in the dirt. Whatever.

We humans like plants.

We enjoy nature and the outdoors. We love walking through forests and parks, doing water sports, caring for houseplants and fresh cut flowers in our homes, sitting on a balcony or a patio, travelling to places with climates different from our own. You have all the evidence you need, from your own experience, to make the extrapolation that, you know, gardening likely ain’t so bad.

But back to Zach for a second here. His show was a gentle, yet hilarious, reminder about just how much gardening can bring us. It felt like a friend reintroducing me to things that I already know and know I need. A simple joy… And me asking my boyfriend after every episode if I could plant this tree and that crop in the backyard we don’t have. Babe, we need a backyard.

Exercise

Gardening is considered a low-impact form of exercise, with cardiovascular, flexibility, and muscle and joint strengthening benefits.5 Some forms of yard work hit the mark for moderate-intensity exercise, which is what most public health agencies recommend we get 150 minutes of per week. But don’t do it for the guidelines, do it for your buns.

Yard work such as mowing, raking, and weeding are more intense forms of gardening exercise that get your blood flowing. And all of those activities come with a bonus nature smell (fresh cut grass, the peaty smell of dead leaves, and fresh turned soil).

Moreover, gardening is a fantastic exercise option for older adults and those who might need some form of exercise close to home due to chronic pain, injury, or mobility challenges. The various movements and grades of intensity to gardening makes it a great option for many.

Quick aside: I am not a doctor, so if you are healing or dealing with mobility restrictions or chronic pain, consulting a health professional is a good move. If you want to do your own research or don’t have a health care professional to speak to, Mayo Clinic is an excellent, reputable resource for health information. This article on gardening was written by a Family Medicine and Primary Care Nurse.

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Purpose

Gardening also delivers a sense of purpose, and your nervous system notices. Growing or caring for plants is something that allows us to witness the outcomes of the effort and time we put into them.

We’re gonna go on a neurotransmitter journey.

Dopamine is a very important neurotransmitter. It’s the neurotransmitter that brings us our sense of pleasure, it’s part of the brain’s reward system.6 But dopamine is also responsible for learning, attention, mood, sleep, pain processing, kidney and blood vessel function and more. We need it to maintain homeostasis!

A constant release of dopamine acts similar to how addictive substances work.
We get the instant hit of dopamine.
We like it.
We are reinforced to come back to the same thing that brought us that good feeling.
Eventually we need more hits to feel the same sense of satisfaction.

But now! Other things, things that take time to produce an outcome, perhaps, aren’t offering that same sense of satisfaction, not releasing the dopamine hit that we want to reinforce us to stick with that thing. There isn’t that instant feedback.

But gardening. Could gardening actually combat this?

My theory with no prior research:

There are many different tasks you can do to garden or do yard work that evolve in real time before your eyes. So these little bursts of satisfaction and reward can present really quickly.
A few rakes and you already have a clear patch of grass.
Pull out a few weeds in the same spot and you have a satisfying, clear patch of soil.
Plant one plant in a pot. Empty pot to not empty pot with a plant quivering its leaves in joy at its new home.

It’s not taking that much to arrive at a gratifying outcome. And because of that, reinforcement has already started in your reward system!

Some seeds only take 7-10 days before they sprout, then you watch them get a little bigger every day, and you tend to them.

Flowers will bloom and share their beauty with us.

And if you want to go for the big kahuna of gardening purpose, plant things that produce food.

I can share from personal experience that there is something deeply satisfying about picking fruits or vegetables that are going to be part of lunch that day. Thank you to my Slovak grandmother for growing all sorts of things, every year. (And making the best pickles ever from garden dill and cucumbers).

Another quick aside: This is my theory from having no research, but as a student of psychology… I can’t not do research. A quick Google Scholar search did pull up quite a bit around gardening and mental health, brain health and inflammation, how just being outside actually plays a huge role in dopamine release, and the myths around dopamine detoxes. So, my theory has already been investigated by others, and I will leave you to decide what rabbit hole of further research you wish to jump down.

Mental Health Benefits

As far as mental health benefits go, gardening seems like a 5-in-1 win:

• Being outside, enjoying fresh air

• Exercising and moving your body

• Doing activities that have purpose

• Eating well (if you’re growing your own food)

• Mindfulness

• Slowing down

• Stopping and

• Smelling the roses

Diet

I’ve already shared that there’s something delightful about harvesting your own food. There’s also a bit of a catch-22 here, depending on your motivation to grow your own food. While homegrown food is picked at peak ripeness, and you know what chemicals you’re using on your plants (if any), and many food items are easy enough to grow in small patches of land, there are upfront costs to gardening, your climate will dictate what you can plant and when, and it does take time and effort.

Buying local farm-produce might be the better option for your lifestyle. And both gardening and buying local produce might not be feasible depending on finances.

But I’ll harp on one thing here. Fruits and vegetables are really important parts of our diet. Even canned fruits and vegetables are way better than no vegetables. Full stop.

Environment

Beyond us, our environment and all those who inhabit our ecosystem benefit from gardens.

The neighbourhood walks in the spring time when the spring blooms are coming out.

The happy bees and butterflies that float from flower to flower, visiting all your neighbours on their journey.

The sound of the wind in the trees in the park as you lie in the shadow of tree branches with sunlight sprinkling through.

The smell and breath of fresh air that blows off a lake as you listen to the waves.

Gardens are great for us. Indirectly, as well as directly. And when we’re outside, we experience this, we know this. It’s old wisdom.

No yard? No problem

As an apartment dweller myself, I’ve had to get creative in the last 12 years. And gardening is accessible to everyone, no matter where you are. Here are a few ideas for you:

1. Houseplants. Cleaner air inside, lots of options for plants that need lots of care, next to no care, will forgive you if you forget about them for three weeks. You just need to do a tad of research on what works for your place.

2. Cat owner? Grow cat grass. I tried that. My cat didn’t care much for it. Sure didn’t stop her from killing 3 other plants that weren’t hers.

3. Kitchen herb garden. It could be as simple as planting an egg carton in a plastic bag-lined box that sits precariously on a window ledge to one of those fancy hydroponic window sill magic herb garden things.

4. Allotment gardens. For the more serious gardeners and those that have time, many cities have allotment gardens you can essentially “rent” to grow your own food.

5. Community gardens. Hey, it’s not yours, but you’re still reaping all the benefits, plus you get some community out of it.

6. Planters outside your apartment. Even if there’s no yard, there’s sometimes a touch of space where some planters or pots could go. Part of the joy is picking out what kind and colour of flower you’d want to put there!

Now, maybe you have one of those landlords who is a stick in the mud, and despite the aesthetic improvement of a few flower planters, they’re giving you a hard time. They have nightmares of you throwing dirt all over the property and rogue squirrels invading what little yard exists. Well do I have a solution for you.

You would need to be living somewhere with neighbours, but you can all collude to put out flower planters. And when the landlord asks if you did it, you reply, no you did not. And your neighbours will answer that they also did not. The next time you see your landlord, you can talk about an obscure Reddit thread you saw about a movement of flower vigilantism.
Use this tip at your own risk. Results: unverified.

Thank you to Zach Galifianakis for making This is a Gardening Show. I’ll leave the last words to him:

The future is agrarian.

P.S. If this article somehow makes it in front of Zach… You’re doing a Season 2, right? RiGHt?!?!

You should really talk about yourself more. Share what’s top of mind, what’s happening in your life, recent discoveries, a good book. Hell, a bad book.

Because something magical happens when you do. When you open yourself to other people in the world around you, connections are made that would otherwise have been left dormant, undiscovered. Opportunities unrealized.

There is a fantastic term for this type of occurrence.

Synchronicity:
the coincidental occurrence of events and especially psychic events (such as similar thoughts in widely separated persons or a mental image of an unexpected event before it happens) that seem related but are not explained by conventional mechanisms of causality —used especially in the psychology of Carl Gustav Jung1

Also, a great album by The Police.

I’ve experienced a few delightful moments of synchronicity that have really solidified the importance of being an open, vulnerable person in my everyday life. And saying nothing at all would have led to…. exactly nothing.

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Synchronicity I

I had just wrapped up a sauna and cold plunge session and was on my way out the door. The owner was there with a few other members that I didn’t know, and asked how I was doing, knowing I was just about to wrap up school. He halted the conversation that the group was having to ask me. Definitely a little put on the spot, but a generic “I’m great!” is so not me, and also not truthful. A thesis is a lot, and faking feeling just dandy was not on the menu. So I shared I was just about ready to hand in my thesis, deeply exciting for me after a ton of work and stress that I had been encouraging to melt away in the sauna.

One of the members, let’s call him Patrick, asked about it.

I told him one of the concepts that was part of my study was perfectionism. His eyes lit up and he said I must know a lot about it now, and he had recently taken an interest in perfectionism. I told him I’d be happy to send him a few great articles to get him started.

He, as a Gemini, agreed and mentioned he appreciates follow through.

I replied that I, as a Taurus, am stubborn as fuck and follow through on my commitments.

Fast forward 2 weeks.

Patrick and I get chatting at the Member’s night at our sauna club. He shares what he’s learning from the articles I sent him, and pulls out a printed article for me that he thought I would be interested in. I find out he works in mental health, within an organization I deeply admire. He offers to add me to their speaker invites, which come in every Friday to feature an expert in a particular psych topic.

Patrick and I are now emailing back and forth, sharing insights and articles. And I’ve ended up on the insiders list for talks I wouldn’t have access to otherwise.

Synchronicity II

I posted on LinkedIn about losing my job, but finishing my thesis, and what I wanted to do next. I got invited by a LinkedIn connection (not even a former or current colleague) to a networking dinner. I was not going to be in town, so I couldn’t go.

I was rather disappointed at the time because I’ve never been invited to a networking event before, never mind an exclusive, invite-only one with other professionals focused on the human experience at work. Tantalizing.

I sent my acquaintance my regrets, I would be in British Columbia at the time of the dinner. I was really excited, and just delighted that he thought of me to invite to such an event.

He shared he was heading to BC at the end of May. His first visit to the West Coast, as his company would be hosting another dinner there.

You bet I shared I would be in BC until the end of May, and I straight up invited myself to that dinner.

And now, I’m going to a 100 person, invite only, dinner of professionals that is now also a product launch. In a fancy BC restaurant on the marina.

The lesson? Talk about yourself. Connections and opportunities are forged this way.

The most thrilling piece? I have no idea where these stories go from here. There is so much to still be explored in these budding relationships. My vulnerability didn’t open the doors itself. That vulnerability let others know they could open that door, and invite me to cross the threshold.

Dinner

Soft leather-bound menus, warm lighting in a deep brown and black, natural ambience. Delicious food. Alchemical cocktails. Easy conversation flowing over appetizers and half-drunk glasses. An experiment on what happens when you bring strangers together to celebrate a friend’s birthday.

Dessert

The group mixes. Less like oil and water, more like acrylic paint colours beginning to blend. A wander around a corner. Then another corner. 7 gelatos please. No nuts for him though. Stabbing someone with their EpiPen isn’t part of the birthday plans tonight.

7 must now become 5. Apparently the babysitter has a life after 9:30 PM on a Saturday night. Who knew? But 17 was a while ago for us now. Hugs. And thank yous. The next stop is just a short meander down to the harbour.

Wine

There’s no reservation, but we’re just here for drinks. I pulled the birthday card. A Taurus, she says. Well you’re stubborn, so wait 7 minutes, and I can get you a couch on the patio. 3 minutes later we’re cozied on the patio sofa like we own those 5 cushions.

Our caretaker for the evening, Michael, comes over. Little did we know we were about to have the most enjoyable experience not contained in a 750mL bottle.

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The wine snobs at the table start. Throwing out varietal names and tasting notes. Michael isn’t fazed, he expertly returns our serves, one-upping our challenges with tasters and expansive knowledge of similar grape varietals for a type they don’t have.

I thought 140 wines by the glass was excessive. Michael disagreed. The Rolodex in his head was ready for the challenge.

Next, a pinot noir.

Then, something that doesn’t give headaches?

I think I’ve got just the thing, Michael replies. There’s even a story with the pinot noir, I’ll bring the bottle by so you can see.

The final player, a curveball serve: I don’t know anything about wine, but I really like a nice, peaty scotch. Is there a wine kind of like that?

Michael looks up to visualize his mind catalogue of wines. He’ll be right back.

The 5 glasses gently clinked onto the table. Beautiful glassware that matches the style of wine.

We all take a sip.

The ocean holds its breath.

Everyone is blown away, and we can’t wait to tell Michael when he comes back that he is truly a master of his craft.

No Viognier, but a light, crisp, birthday white if I’ve ever had one.

The pinot noir in its fishbowl glass had a story to match its taste.

The scotch lover, shocked. The first taste on the tip of the tongue was deep, red fruit, then the tannins dried out his mouth just like a good scotch on a windy day.

He told us wine stories, made excellent recommendations, and we chatted science (mechanical engineering and space exploration, specifically), philosophy, and masters of wine. More humans have been to space (~700-800) than there are masters of wine (~400). Wild.

Michael was the sommelier who somehow knew that 30 is an exciting milestone. Did I tell him I turned 30? No… I think he just knew.

And if you’re ever in Vancouver, Canada, check out Provence Marinaside, and ask for Michael.

I turned 30 this week! And I am stoked. For this birthday, and for what the next decade will bring. My 20s were a roller coaster that on some days I didn’t feel tall enough to ride. But I’m 30 now, and I’m tall enough for any roller coaster.

Lucky for me, I’m in BC with my boyfriend and get to celebrate with him and some friends I have here. Then I’ll go home to Toronto, and celebrate with friends there. And then to my hometown of Thunder Bay to celebrate with family and friends there. Call it my birthday quarter.

Birthdays enjoy mixed reception. From full out birthday bashes, to intimate friend dinners, to “just another day.”

I went through a phase in my mid-twenties where I wasn’t very good at planning anything to make birthday plans, but my family always made it special, even from 1400km away.

But as I’ve gotten older (and wiser, I’d like to think), I’ll always plan to celebrate my birthday. And then haunt the hell out of whatever birthday parties happen after I’m gone.

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Thank you, 20s

I’m excited to enter my 30s because my 20s taught and gave me so much. It was a decade of learning, growing, hurting, grieving, making, breaking, exploration, mistakes, and living.

When I turned 25, I had my quarter life crisis. The COVID pandemic helped make that quarter life crisis extra special. And I learned one of the most important lessons that paved the way for the second half of my twenties to really give me opportunity. At 25, I came to the realization that I don’t know nearly as much as I thought. But I had learned enough of what I didn’t really like or want to feel informed about some directions I’d like to go in. But not nearly prepared enough to forge ahead bravely. More like I’m holding a dying flashlight while tripping my way through a swampy bog during a foggy night, nothing but a granola bar in my back pocket.

Where I am at the end of this decade isn’t where I expected. I finished school before my 30th birthday. That was the plan. I lost my job in February and am unemployed. That was most certainly not part of the plan. The part where my flashlight finally died and I have more swamp than sock in my shoe. But often we’re pushed toward the next thing even when we don’t feel ready. That’s the Universe, God, or simple happenstance looking after you. The time I’ve been unemployed has forced me to slow down and to both deeply reflect on, and critically think, about what kind of life I want to create for myself.

I know I could just revert to my usual pattern, that scarcity mindset, and jump into the next job that is the same as what I did before because that’s an easier entrance to another company. I’m doing the work so that my next career adventure has a little more to offer than an extra granola bar in my pocket.

Instead of falling into mechanisms that no longer serve me, this birthday is also a bit of a reminder that this point in my life is a turning of the page. Moving into the next chapter. I’m entering a whole new decade. How am I going to set the stage?

Why I’ll always celebrate birthdays

I woke up on May 5th, grateful, to sleep in, to do a birthday yoga practice (thanks Adriene), chat with my Mom and her Maine Coon kitten, my Nany, have snacks for lunch. The evening’s events were a mystery to me. My amazing boyfriend took the reins in planning the whole evening and making it a surprise.

On Saturday, I’m getting together with my friends in BC to celebrate with dinner and gelato. Nothing excessive or fancy, just getting together with lovely people. That’s more than enough for me!

There are a lot of feelings around birthdays. I hear rather often “it’s just another day” or “it doesn’t really matter after a certain age.” Fair enough. However. At the very least, birthdays should be an excuse and an opportunity to bring people together. I think we can all agree we’re more disconnected than we’ve ever been. Why not have another day in the year I’ll never forget, and use it to bring the people I love together?

I just saw a headline on LinkedIn saying that the “AI gold rush” is pulling workers into startups and away from corporate jobs, as layoffs and RTOs continue.

This headline would have me almost falling out of my chair. If I had been sitting down.

What if the AI revolution isn’t what AI produces at all, but what people produce as AI takes over the administrative work? What if AI isn’t the answer to our problems, but the answer to allowing us to solve our problems?

Michael Katchen, CEO of Wealthsimple, has always stated his firm belief that we have brilliant people in Canada to build technology companies. But that they’re not being supported to get out there and start the businesses to solve problems they’re passionate about. He believes there’s no reason Canada can’t be on the global stage of industry, advancement, and business.

Canadians leave to start businesses elsewhere, and that’s only one side of the coin. AI may be something that enables Canadians to start their own businesses and have better prospects right at home, and still distribute their services globally. And unapologetically, eh.

This reminds me a clip of Robert Downey Jr. when he launched The Footprint Coalition, a tech media and venture capital company in 2019. RDJ took inspiration from Tony Stark, his Iron Man character who evolved over the films from focusing on his tech, to focusing on his character. In a crudely paraphrased by me recap: there’s absolutely no reason, with all the brilliant people we have on the planet, that we can’t come together and solve the world’s problems.

This AI boom might be the push that people, previously uncomfortable with making the entrepreneurial leap, need to dive into creating businesses and solutions for the problems we have yet to solve.

Just imagine how our world could change when human capital is leveraged on such a potentially massive scale.

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Leveraging people to their fullest potential has a consistent business challenge… Forever. People are a highly valuable and simultaneously, an expensive asset. Leveraging this asset seems like a sane thing for companies to want to do to support the bottom line and create a sustainable, profitable business. Yet we still seem to be struggling to crack that nut and are replacing our people with AI processes instead.

Here’s the deal: Our brains work in magnificent ways that AI hasn’t even come close to replicating. Sure, AI can data process in sequence like nobodies business, but memory encoding and retrieval? We humans have it down pat. This is what leads to intuitive jumps and creative problem solving in a way a machine can’t.

Is this true way that AI unlocks human potential? Not by making us individually more efficient, or giving each of us a thought partner, but taking over the repetitive, mundane tasks we all do, freeing us from administrative shackles, to build better systems, stronger connections between colleagues and teams, and enhancing our working experiences?

I think it just might be. Because this is also applicable even to people who aren’t losing their jobs due to a company restructuring to double down on AI.

Take the admin assistant working across court districts in Northern Ontario, where the system is so disjointed that someone in Dryden is managing case files for Thunder Bay (both towns in Northern Ontario, Canada). Instead of using her empathy and razor-sharp people skills to support victims who call in frightened and confused, or support the legal teams working to actually help people navigate the worst moments of their lives, she’s chasing duplicated paperwork and coordinating with colleagues doing the exact same redundant work, eight towns and two forests over. In criminal law, empathy can’t be relegated to the “soft skill” bucket. It’s infrastructure for the functioning of that system. And we’re burying it in administrative noise.

What could she be doing instead? Sitting with a victim who needs someone who understands the system they’re terrified of. Catching something a legal team missed because she knows the people involved and has seen enough cases to catch what can fall through the cracks in a complex system. Building the kind of trust that makes justice and healing feel possible. We have the technology to free her for exactly that work. We’re just not using it. And at some point, that stops being an oversight and becomes an ethical failure. I think we’ve reached that point.

If we think about this as an actual strategy with AI, we can shift how we think about AI, using it to free up humans so we can throw them at some of our biggest problems. Figuratively of course, throwing people isn’t very nice.

I don’t want this to minimize the very real feeling of job insecurity that many of us have. That’s valid, and that’s real. My ask to you is if you can reframe your thoughts around your job and AI. How might you like to be spending your valuable time in your job? Can you think of other, more interesting, more impactful things you could be doing if you didn’t have 2.6 hours minimum of administrative hum drum each day? Or how more motivated you might be to work if you weren’t constantly being the duct tape that holds piecemeal systems together so the whole, shakey, digital framework doesn’t fall around your head?

Wouldn’t you like to reimagine your work and the impact your job could have on others?

And maybe the answer is no, and that’s totally fine. So long as we’re all mindful that new technologies come and change the labour landscape all the time. Steam engines, machine-based agriculture, the computer, the cellphone, the internet, smartphones, AI. Advancements happen to us. We just need to decide what we do with it.

Let us then, collectively, decide that AI is the tool that will enable us to work better, smarter, and in more connected and human ways. Let’s choose to use this tool to spend our time on the most impactful, meaningful things, bringing back a joy to working. Reducing the incidence of burnout. Embracing the potential for ourselves to tackle the problems we’re passionate about.

Could we support our Northern Ontario admin assistant to support the victims outside of her paperwork?

I think we had better try.

A note on this article: many of these insights came while I was going my makeup. I’d like to see AI figure something like this out while doing its eyeliner.

I needed to get away from my automatic tendency to move into doing mode when I get new information. I replaced logistics with sitting outside on my boyfriend’s second storey balcony. Listening to the neighbourhood. Smelling the deep fried fumes and caramelized onions from a nearby restaurant. Watching my cat glare at either the patio door curtain blowing in the breeze or eyeing the local house spirit. I’m still undecided on that.

Holding a cooling cup of tea, the Nokiiwin Tribal Council emblem protecting my favourite beverage. Giving my hands something to hold so I can stay grounded. Feeling a soft, spring, BC breeze on my face. Feeling the cushion of a sleeping bag from my boyfriend’s childhood holding my body like it knew I needed to be softly held. Attempting to navigate some new emotions my body hasn’t needed to hold for a long time.

I attended a LinkedIn webinar for new grads. Though I have five years at a fintech company under my belt, I did just finish my undergraduate degree, so thought this would be a good thing to attend, seeing as I also lost my job. A two birds with one stone kind of situation, seeing as I’ll need to understand the current job market.

It was insightful, I made a few notes, had a few of my own musings confirmed. And once it wrapped up, I sat down on the sofa with my computer ready to take action! Carve out the to dos! Make a plan and set the deadline!

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Maybe it’s the muscle spasm in the right side of my neck, making me acutely aware I need to move slowly and gently, or maybe it’s the overwhelm of the last 2 months really settling into my bones now that school is done. But there was no way I was going to manage to do anything. The thoughts in my brain were mashed potatoes. All the thoughts led to a gooey “what am I even doing?”

So instead, I came to sit outside with my cat and my tea, and tried to simply sit with it all. It was the right move, no doubt. But it’s so unfamiliar right now.

To be able to sit outside and rest without worrying about a deadline? Like sitting on the deck of a luxury cruise.

To give thoughts space and freedom to simply exist, and myself the opportunity to experience them? Like re-gifting myself the right to just be.

To allow myself to experience the feelings that are coming up around the next phase of my life? It’s the necessary, uncomfortable, but essential experience of showing myself love. It hurts. There’s grief. There’s uncertainty. I’m not sure if I need to cry, or punch something, or freak a stranger out by giving them a hug.

But getting to sit with this in relative peace means that I won’t be stuffing these emotions into an old box that has the tendency to fall off the shelf and spill its outdated coping mechanisms into the new, brave choices I will make.

It’s clear I have work to do. It’s evident this next career move won’t go as planned, and will likely have a timeline very different from what I’m hoping for. And it’s not standing at a crossroads deciding left or right. It’s a little more precarious. I’m sitting on the roof of an A-frame cottage with security and rushed choices on one side, and uncertainty, growth, and brilliant opportunities on the other. I know in my head and heart, the side with uncertainty and opportunity is the better choice. I just don’t yet feel ready to slide down that side of the roof to land in that forest.

I need to rest. I need to grieve. I need to experience how I take up space in the world now that one part of my career has ended, and school is no longer the back burning element I can’t shut off.

I know I need these things. Time. Space. Rest. Nature. Reconnection with self. To move out of survival mode. I’ve known for a while that I needed this.

Now I’m here, and I’m realizing I need to learn how to coexist with it. The emotions, the thoughts, the new sensations in my body as I decompress from five years of low-grade chronic stress. I don’t really know how.

But I’ll learn.

We’re afraid of AI not because of the sensational scenarios of humanity’s downfall. We’re afraid of it because it’s a reflection of us. A mirror to our own human nature and behaviour.

That’s it. That’s the story. That could very well be all you read of this article.

And humans, oh we love to blame. AI might very well be our latest scapegoat to avoid acknowledging our own behaviour.

Instead of saying

“horrible people with horrible intentions used AI to do this horrible thing!”

We often say

“AI did this terrible thing! 90% of the terrible thing in fact! And this was the terrible outcome on the humans! How frightening! AI is out to get us.”

If only we could wash our hands of our horrible behaviours and blame AI for bad things. That would make us all feel much better about ourselves.

Wouldn’t it?

Let’s use a real example.

Here are some headlines for the same data breach event:

“AI Chatbots Weaponized in Massive Mexican Government Data Breach” — LA Times

“Generative AI Used to Breach Mexican Government” — Mexico Business News

And here are some different ones:

“Hacker used Anthropic’s Claude AI to steal Mexican government data” — LA Times

“Claude Code Abused to Steal 150GB in Cyberattack on Mexican Agencies” — Security Affairs

Did you notice the difference between those headlines?

The top two don’t mention a human, and simply state that AI was used to make this breach possible. The automatic assumption we make is that AI is the reason this happened. That if AI didn’t exist, this could not have happened. At first blush, we take what we read at face value, which is why critical thinking is so… critical.

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The bottom two mention abuse of the technology, and that a hacker (a human) was responsible for the attack.

Now, frankly, between you and me, regardless of how headlines frame up the news, if AI is involved, it tends to elicit two polar opposites in the spectrum of emotions around AI: technological elation or doom, gloom, and panic.

And while those are popular subjects within the debate, there’s a psychological lens to this I find really interesting that goes under discussed.

We’re projecting the best and worst of what we think humanity is/can be onto AI. But not looking at ourselves, our culture, or our society.

We either think humans are absolutely brilliant for our advancements with AI, that it’s going to completely revolutionize our lives and be the most amazing thing ever created in the whole universe!!! Very… grandiose and narcissistic. Two very human behaviours.

Or, we think AI spells the end of humanity. We’ve opened Pandora’s box and there will be no stuffing anything back into it. It is technology that will destroy the very fabric of society. Wipe out humans! Build a new world as it sees fit!!! Also very in line with a human fascination (or obsession) with apocalyptic thinking.

I’m not about to get into the neuro- or behavioural science of why humans project, behave, or obsess over the things we do. But any time AI is mentioned, it’s potential, it’s threat, whatever, the subject being discussed is such a human thing or a human desire. Why then, do most of the opinions I’ve heard or read about AI seem to mirror human desires and perspectives?

Didn’t we go through this when the computer was invented? When the Internet was invented? Hasn’t every new, revolutionary technology in the history of humanity been lauded as either the greatest or worst thing to ever happen to us? And haven’t all of those things been of our own creation?

Agriculture. The Wheel. Steam power. Light. Computers. The Internet. Heelys (IYKYK).

And now, Artificial Intelligence.

Is AI really all that different from anything that has come before? Seeing how we’re handling our world today, I’m not convinced we’re very good at learning from history and remembering the past. At this point, our memories are worse than goldfish.

Goldfish 1, human 0.

I think AI is a reflection of ourselves, of humanity, and we don’t like what we see. So we either want to see it succeed well beyond us so that our insufficiency feels like it created something amazing, or we want to see it fail because we’re afraid of what we’re going to do with it, which includes it getting away from us and getting up to its own devices.

Either way, we’re failing to address one of the most meaningful components of this debate and exploration of AI.

We’re keeping the focus on AI. But what if we held up the mirror to ourselves instead?

What do you think?

If you catch me trying to shave my legs with a toothbrush, don’t be surprised.

Cognitive exhaustion, especially sustained over years, leads to some interesting oversights in your actions. Thankfully, most of mine are relatively benign, though perhaps my toothbrush would disagree.

I’ve been working full-time while completing an undergrad in psychology for four and a half years. Exhausted hardly covers it.

But thankfully, I got let go from my job.

Ha! Didn’t see that one coming, did you?

Two months before my final thesis report was due, I was informed that I was no longer employed. It was a shocking heartbreak, for sure. But having needed to work on a lot of resilience over the years, some acceptance, and that specific type of peace that comes with acceptance… that peace settled into my chest pretty fast.

Up to this point, I was doing my best to hold it all together with pixie dust and good intentions to get school done. Then I could rest, right?

Fast forward to now…

I defended my thesis yesterday.

Jobless! But defended my research!

Both of those things feel pretty surreal individually. Together, a bit of a cosmic fuster cluck. This was not how I was envisioning the plan. Sure, the plan isn’t hard to part with, it was really only 8 weeks long.

That plan being dashed like a bug on a windshield feels like my field of view has gone from looking at a single daisy to realizing I’m in a vast, rolling field of wildflowers.

I thought I had it made with my job.

But now, the insights, possibilities, and desires are truly endless.

I certainly don’t have it all figured out, and I am definitely the appropriate amount of spooked by the uncertainty. But without the fixture of a familiar job, how I’m looking at continuing life after getting my degree is vastly different.

I’ve gone from “Well this is how this is, and it dictates these four other areas of my life” to “What do I want for all these other pieces of my life?”

That’s the funny thing, isn’t it? That we don’t stop long enough to think critically about whether or not we’re still aligned with what we want. Do we still even want the things we thought we wanted?

If I were a wildflower, where would I want to planted?

What purpose would I like to have? Practical? All for the bees?

Or just to languish in the sun?

Or maybe I’m the flower for butterflies?

What colours are my petals?

What shape are my leaves?

Am I poisonous to some? Stay away!

Am I native to a single place, or can I let my seeds travel on the wind to explore new fields?

Though things will happen to us that are unexpected, that we don’t feel ready for, that come out of left field, we can always decide how we want to grow and thrive out of that situation.

I could mope over my one daisy that someone else crushed.

Or I could enjoy all the flowers in the field.

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Picture yourself standing in front of a millstone. You need to grind wheat, to make flour, to make bread (and pastries). You don’t have a windmill or a water wheel. And so it’s the strength of your back that will turn wheat into flour.

You’re gripping the wood post that will allow you to turn one stone against another, you grip the wood, and start pushing. You expect the first rotation to be no issue; you’ve got your legs and your back working for you after all. You are struggling to make it a quarter turn. You hear the slow scraping of the stones against each other, and the popping sound of the wheat berries as you begin to crush them into flour.

Finally. A quarter turn. But you’re going to need many rotations of your millstone to make the amount of flour you’ll need. So you keep pushing.

This is what it’s like to get started again with healthy lifestyle choices. You have no momentum. You’re starting from a standstill. Force, effort, energy (cognitive especially) is required.

Rarely are we waking up one day and perfectly back to each and every routine we’d like to have without some tension.

You’ve made it a quarter turn… now a half turn. It’s hard, it’s slow, but you’ve made it around once now. You keep pushing. Second rotation complete. You’re now starting to see the first dustings of flour spill down. Your first hint that what you’re doing is producing results. Now you’re building momentum.

Third rotation. You’re picking up the pace, able to walk a little more quickly as you complete a fourth rotation.

More flour is starting to accumulate. It’s pouring out more steadily now as your posture becomes easier, your steps more sure, and your gait around your millstone becomes smoother, less strained.

Beginning again with lifestyle choices, routines, healthy habits, is just like this.

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When you don’t have momentum, starting out is hard. Rewards seem slim to non-existent. But as you build momentum, it becomes easier. You begin to see tangible results, and this motivates you to keep going.

And before you know it, turning your millstone feels easy. You don’t have to think about it. Your brain isn’t nudging at the inside of your skull telling you “this is hard” anymore. You also feel good. You feel strong, those endorphins are flowing, and you want to keep going. It would feel good to keep going!

And those healthy choices have become easy. Your healthy choices leave out the temptations (you didn’t buy those unhealthy snacks!) and when those temptations don’t exist in your space, you don’t need to put the effort into resisting.

So the next time you’re lamenting over not eating the way you want, not sleeping the way you want, not exercising the way you want, not [enter thing you’re not doing here], give yourself some grace. Remember that it’s not a given and not automatic that we make these choices.

When we need to come back to survival mode to get through something tough, we end up making the choices we can handle at the time, and this is part of what allows us to get through. Sometimes we’re able to keep our healthy choices, sometimes we’re not. We usually have at least one thing that falls by the wayside. (Mine’s cooking. What’s yours?)

But being in this state is not forever. And we might have gathered some momentum in making easy, safe, or comforting choices to get through the struggle, but we can always reverse that, and get our momentum going in the other direction.

It’s not instantaneous, and that’s okay.

Can your first choice be to offer yourself grace? Be gentle with yourself as you get back to it?

Just like most other days noted on the calendar.

Spritz. Gone.

We ignore the boxed-in footnotes for holidays in other countries (sorry NZ) and for the holidays our North American calendars don’t mention (Diwali, anyone?) they pass by like headlights on a rainy night. Blurry, not belonging to “us.”

Calendared holiday events don’t have impact on my life as an adult. I can’t count the times someone asked me what I’m doing for a long weekend, and I answer “it’s a long weekend?”

There’s no ritual to celebration as an adult. Each noteworthy day comes up fast and departs just as quickly. At times, it’s hardly a hiccup in my month.

But…why?

I have no anchors. I live away from my family, and there’s no matriarch or young child to root the rest of us frantic, reactive adults to the moments set aside in the calendar for intentional celebration. Nor am I part of any faith that fills my life with ritual, connection, and reflection. And food. Can’t forget the food.

There were no rituals in my family around International Women’s Day. My Nany did send me a gif though. There’s that matriarch, pulling through, holding us together through distance and our unintentional living.

I don’t think I replied to her.

I wish things in the calendar didn’t come and go in my life like a leaf floating down a shallow stream. I wish I had rituals and ceremonies around significant dates that brought more to my life. Whether it be in celebration with my own family and friends, or getting out into the community and doing something to better the lives of others.

But somehow, the dates on the calendar have become nothing but letters on glossy paper. A quiet reminder of something important happening on this day. But not too important, because it’s only 8 point font.

Can I find a way to create my own anchors? Can I adjust a busy, loud, life to fit yet another thing?

Or can I be more intentional with my time.

Make space to connect with the days that matter to me.

Be the bringer of celebration to myself and to others.

Yes. I can.

And I’ll write my important days in 16 point font.

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Whether you believe in energy work or not, we know that someone else verbally sharing their experience of you can help with perspective, or putting something into words that you feel, but haven’t quite been able to articulate into something coherent. The Reiki practitioner helped me take the chaotic, tangled threads of my current lived experience and pull out the specific ones that really need untangling. And will likely help untangle the rest of the emotional rats’ nest that is my current emotional state.

Revive Wellness Club quickly became my 3rd space. I have a place close to home where I can experience stillness, co-regulate with other sauna goers, and support my aggressively dysregulated nervous system by stressing it through contrast therapy, pushing my body to heal itself. Nothing like a little hot and cold in a social setting to shock some life back into your system.

Taken together, side effects include feelings of lightness, safety, being seen, being held, supported, welcomed, openness, release, relaxation, ease, and peace.* *Not science. My opinion and experience. But I’ve been saunaing since 7 years old, so I have tenure.

Walking home that night, I felt a lightness I hadn’t in… probably years. And it was way more than just a great sauna session with community.

Originally, I wasn’t going to go.

I had just lost my job, and I was heartbroken, exhausted, confused, disappointed, and so much more.

We talk about “forcing” ourselves to do things. But the push to go that night wasn’t a forcing. I knew I needed to go. It might have been my intuition, which I have slowly been rediscovering after much disconnection and not listening to myself or my body for a while. Whatever that deep seated wisdom was that encouraged me to get my butt out the door, it’s been there the whole time. I just needed to remember how to listen.

Our bodies contain an inherent wisdom. We have science that backs up that statement, as well as cultures, religions, spirituality and so on. It doesn’t really matter what you call it or what you believe.

What matters is that you listen.

I’ve started listening again.