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Month: December 2025

Post Show Depression

Published on December 31, 2025

After a really good music show, some describe the feeling after as a crash—a drastic come down back to reality—even as post show depression.

Because when you’re at a really good music show, you’re not attached to reality as you know it. You’re somewhere else. Somewhere transported, somewhere high above, somewhere freeing and loved filled…

But as I heard someone describe it today… it doesn’t have to be a crash followed by depression… it can be something we gracefully carry back down with us and intentionally integrate into our reality as we now know it.

Because being at a really good music show isn’t a detachment from reality—it is reality. And what’s happening there can happen elsewhere, too. We just have to learn how to carry that updated understanding of reality with us.

Trust And Surrender

Published on December 29, 2025

While at a music show last night, a distressed women crossed paths with a group of friends and I.

After calming her down, we gathered that she lost her friend group and was freaking out because it had been over an hour and there were quite literally thousands of people there… which meant poor (read: no) phone reception… constant changes and shuffles in the waves of people… and to make things worse for her, I don’t think she was even five feet tall—so she was surrounded by walls of people at every turn.

What happened next, though, was pretty incredible.

We created a space for her to calm down… where she could feel safe in the sea of strangers… where she could dance a little of the anxiety away…

And quite literally the moment after I finished saying, “Sometimes this is what happens and you have to just lean into the side quest, and just trust that it will all work out…” she looked back over my shoulder and finds her friend group.

And she started sobbing.

And we all started celebrating.

And we all had a sunshine and rainbows universe alignment moment.

…Had she continued on the distressed, anxiety-ridden path she was on, she would’ve continued in the exact opposite direction of where her friends were. Us creating that space for her got her to turn around and realign with a better path.

And as it usually does… the universe delivered a memory, a lesson, and a remarkable moment all wrapped into one.

Sometimes, as hard as it might be, we just have to learn to trust and surrender.

Wobbly Tables

Published on December 29, 2025

Before sitting down to eat brunch this morning, the waitress asked me if I could get the wedge off the picture frame.

I had no idea what she was asking me at first but I soon realized she was using it to level the tables my friends and I were sitting at, which, she explained to me, she had hidden all over the restaurant…

…It took a total of 30 seconds to get it right and it saved us probably 30 minutes of irritation and complaint about having wobbly tables.

When you’re in the service industry, details matter. But you know what? Details matter just about everywhere else, too.

Being In Philadelphia

Published on December 28, 2025

Yesterday I drove from Buffalo, NY to Philadelphia, PA.

The drive was supposed to take six hours. But, because of weather, it took close to eleven.

That’s not only a lot of time to be driving, but it’s a lot of time to be with yourself.

And what I kept telling myself is that it was as good of a time as any to enjoy just being… and that being in Philadelphia wasn’t a better place to be than wherever I was on the road.

So I kept the music on loud… held a steady presence focused on the elements on the road… and tried to relax into my mind.

Sometimes singing came up… sometimes it was dancing… and sometimes it was inner work type thoughts. I welcomed it all. I fought none of it. And I arrived right when I was supposed to.

Visiting “Mama Hogan”

Published on December 26, 2025

A childhood friend of mine, who I hadn’t seen or really even spoken to in 15+ years, FaceTimed me yesterday…

…From my mom’s house.

…With my mom!

He said when he got into town, before he did anything else, he wanted to swing by “Mama Hogan’s” house… and could only remember that the street she lived on started with an “L” and that it had a giant tree on the front lawn.

…Well his memory served him well because he found the house, rang the doorbell, and ended up chatting with her for nearly two hours.

…Like it hadn’t even been 15 days.

It was the highlight of both my mom and my’s holiday. And I share it because it was such an inspiring effort—-especially after having lived out of town for 15+ years.

This is the kind of effort that people remember. This is the kind of effort that makes “real ones.” This is the kind of effort that cements friendships, memories, and legacies.

…This is the kind of effort our modern culture so desperately needs.

The Pulsing Cries From Within

Published on December 23, 2025

Why are some of the most popular classes I teach the ones that I announce are going to be the hardest?

I’ll tell you why: it’s because deep down, underneath all of the noise of the mind, many of us want to do hard things so that we can become great.

On a day-to-day basis, however, it’s the noise of the mind that usually wins over our attention and subsequent actions—and we stay within the realm of what’s comfortable, usual, and easy.

But, of course, that leaves us feeling unchallenged, underwhelmed, and unfulfilled.

Lead too many of those days in a row and it becomes an aching feeling that swells.

…Until eventually it grows to the point where it’s too hard to ignore or muffle under the general noise of the mind—which is what usually works—and we start to hear the pulsing cries from within.

“There’s got to be more to life than this…”

“Is this really all that I’m here to do…?”

“What will people remember about me when I’m gone?”

…And we resolve to step it up a little bit. To push ourselves a little bit more. To uncover a little more of the potential we have inside.

And the best way to do that, our spirit whispers to us from deep within, is to voluntarily do hard things.

Boundaries Like Laws

Published on December 22, 2025

It would be nice if you could set a boundary once and have it be as good as law.

But it’s worth remembering that even laws need to be monitored, patrolled, and enforced.

The strength of the boundary doesn’t come from the tone of your voice the one time you set it… or in the size of the intentions you have behind it… or in the seriousness of your body language when you talk about it.

The strength of the boundary comes from the strength of the enforcement of said boundary.

For example, driving 5 miles per hour over the speed limit will rarely get you a speeding ticket—it’s rarely enforced. But, running a red light? You’ll almost always get ticketed for. The latter is enforced significantly more than the former.

Now think about how this applies to the boundaries you’re trying to establish and maintain in your life. Are you setting 5 miles per hour over the speed limit boundaries that are only enforced… never? Or are you setting running a red light boundaries that are enforced every time. Think about the boundaries you’re trying to establish with yourself… your loved ones… your co-workers… etc…

People (you included) don’t respond to the announcements… they respond to the level of the enforcement.