Thankful.

I’ve been privileged to enjoy a diverse career that took me from motherhood to law school, from marketing communication to business professor. Above and outside of it all I’ve always been a writer.

I started tapping out little stories on my mother’s 1960’s era typewriter and sending them off to magazines when I was 12 years old. It took a few years to actually be published, and by that time I was already busy trying to do a million other things.

That tendency to take on too much and feel like I could never do enough, along with many other traits, is something I now understand through the lens of a late-life ADHD diagnosis. (I think “diagnosis” is a misnomer.)

Yes, ADHD is a thing—a very big thing to those whose brains operate that way. Many don’t know it about themselves, and that can be unfortunate. It certainly was for me.

ADHD can bring with it significant strengths such as creativity, hyperfocus, imagination, humor, spontaneity, intuitiveness, broad interests, and pattern recognition.

It made me a popular professor largely because I can’t stand to sit still and be bored, so I went out of my way to engage and not bore my students. I also jumped in to solve any problem I identified or that someone brought me to fix—way more welcomed by my students than my husband and children. (I wonder why…)

For me, ADHD also came with heightened sensitivity and overreactivity to criticism and rejection which tended to make me a target for those very things throughout my life. My mind was a constant tornado of thoughts, intense emotions and responses, and almost unlimited capacity for sensory input. I thought it was that way for everyone.

My motto was, “Prevention is everything.” It still is to some degree. That meant I was a chronic fixer frantically running around trying to put out the most critical fires and trying to catch every raindrop in a shot glass. I was driven by fear—of both the known and the unknown.

Add to that a long string of traumatic events from toddlerhood to marriage, motherhood, and beyond, and I probably spent much of my life in fight or flight—mostly fight—which ultimately led me to excruciating late-in-life relational crises and losses, including ongoing, complex betrayal. I turned to substances to relieve the unbearable pain and slipped across the invisible line into addiction (common among ADHDers). Finally, I experienced complete nervous system collapse and could barely function, much less work, for about 14 months.

Cognizant.

I understand all of this in hindsight now and have tools for healing, peace, and sober living. But not soon enough to avoid losing much of the substance of what I regarded as the best parts of my life. I sadly also passed much of the stress from my cranked up nervous system to my husband and four children.

They each showed up with their own issues and challenges, and when our children were in their late 20s and early 30s, our once happy, charming family blew up as if hit by a nuclear bomb. That was 12 years ago, and the bombs continued to fall.

My husband and I are now separated, and all of us have had to find our own unique paths to self-awareness and healing.

Thankfully that has brought us all back to each other in some capacity. We’re connected by fragile threads based on deeper understanding, forgiveness, gentleness, and grace. We’re becoming kinder, more patient, less anxious, fear-driven people.

I guess I have to say it was worth it—but I wouldn’t put my worst enemy through the pain we’ve all been through over the past decade. Not even through the pain of the current moments as the former structure of my life continues to collapse, costing me joy from the things I used to love and value most. There’s not turning back.

I’m proud of all of us for surviving and persevering as we have. We have a lot of love and respect for each other. We also allow for a lot more space between us than we used to. Space to search, discover, heal, and become unique individuals apart from each other.

Curious.

That brings me to a stage in life where I feel ready to participate through writing in hard conversations about things I continue to learn and increasingly question. Real learning leads to questioning. I continually challenge my own conclusions.

My writing extends broadly to topics relevant to my personal experience and growth, such as:

• identity, relationships, behavior, belief, faith

• business, AI, politics, oppression, advocacy

• trauma, loss, addiction, health, well-being

• perspective, bias, receptivity, reinvention, transformation

…as well as to the stories we tell to defend and protect what we believe to be true.

I examine it all through the lenses of philosophy, psychology, epistemology, history, neuroscience, ethics, and AI. Whatever I go through I study from all sides.

I have a historian’s love of context, a professor’s instinct for making ideas fascinating and accessible, a lawyer’s comfort with uncertainty, and a student’s curiosity and desire to understand.

I notice how patterns reveal connection, division, relevance, and dissonance. I write about what can happen when we keep our eyes and minds open, thoughtfully adjusting in response to new ideas and information.

I examine how we make sense of our experiences and assign meaning to them…

• how we experience knowing

• how we decide what is true

• how we bridge the gap between knowing and doing

• why we often struggle to turn insight into action

• how we change our minds

…and most importantly how we build lives with it all.

As I tell my marketing and management students, The answers you get are only as good as the questions you ask.

Hopeful.

I’ve loved a lot, lost a lot, learned a lot, and changed a lot. My children and grandchildren light up when they see me and are my greatest joys.

My husband and I are navigating our separation, learning to relate to one another with greater honesty and gentleness. Where that ultimately takes us remains unknown.

I’m dreaming, processing, and writing my way through all the trauma and loss to a master’s in epistemology, ethics, and mind at the University of Edinburgh. It’s not an easy thing to do this late in life with lower energy and limited income. It’s hard to get financial aid for graduate school.

Your readership, engagement, shares, and support are helping me get past these barriers and become an even more informed, thoughtful, productive voice for integrative healing, learning, and growing.

I’m deeply grateful.

Conna Bond, JD, MA
Professor • Philosopher • Parrhesiastes

• BA History — Whitman College

• MA Integrated Marketing Communication — Marist University

• JD — University of Florida Levin College of Law

Subscribe for free to my latest posts or join my Memoir Circle with a small paid subscription to also receive exclusive pre-released installments from my progressive memoir Memories in Present Tense.

Be different.

But not completely different.

Different in the way we think you should be different.

Different in the way we think others think you should be different.

Because we know.

And they know.

Better than you.

Who you should be.

Regardless of who you are.

Regardless of how you feel.

Regardless of what you know.

Regardless of what you have experienced.

Don’t care what others think.

Don’t care what anyone thinks you should think.

Don’t care what anyone thinks you should feel.

Don’t care what anyone thinks you should do.

Be you.

The real you.

The genuine you.

But not that you.

Not in that way.

Not in those words.

Not with those actions.

Say what you mean.

But don’t say anything we don’t want to hear.

Don’t say anything embarrassing.

Or challenging.

Or uncomfortable.

Or ignorant.

Don’t say anything you would say.

Don’t do anything you would do.

Don’t share your truth.

Say what we would say.

Do what we would do.

If we were you.

It’s up to you to figure that out.

Because you should know.

In any given moment.

In every given moment.

You should know.

What we would say.

What we would do.

You should have known.

What we would have said.

.What we would have done.

If we were you.

But you didn’t.

And you don’t.

But we did.

And we do.

And what you don’t know.

And what you should have known.

Is the problem with you.

June 1, 2024

I’m writing my way through acute trauma and loss to a master’s in epistemology, ethics, and mind at the University of Edinburgh. It’s not an easy thing to do later in life with more limited energy and income. It’s hard to get financial aid for graduate school.

Your readership, engagement, shares, and support are helping me get past those barriers.

I’m deeply grateful.

Buy me a textbook!

Subscribe for free to my latest posts. Or join my Memoir Circle with a small paid subscription to also receive exclusive pre-released installments from my progressive memoir Memories in Present Tense.

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Conna Bond, JD, MA

Professor • Philosopher • Parrhesiastes

• BA, History — Whitman College

• MA, Integrated Marketing Communication — Marist University

• JD — University of Florida Levin College of Law